Charter Review Commission - Regular Meeting

Hey, Peter. Are you ready? Peter, are you good? Okay. Alright. Hey. It's 05:30, and it's 03/25/2026. Let's get this Summers County Charter Review Commission meeting going. And, we are down here at 3000 Rockefeller, on the 8th Floor. So with that, I'm gonna call the meeting to order. And, Peter, can we get a roll call, please?

Player?

Here.

Manny? Manny? Gregerson? Here. Tatters? Here. O'Donnell? Here. Cass? Do not see her yet. Decker? Here. Preston? Here. Dodd? Here. Mankey?

He's gonna be online.

Okay. I see him on there. He hasn't accepted Ben, if you're listening, please accept the promotion. Oh, there he goes. Oh, he declined to be a panelist. Okay.

I'm I'm here.

Oh, there he is. Okay. K Mink? Here. McGee? Eslik?

Here. James? Here.

Kaylee?

Here.

K. Thank you.

K. So I just see, McGee and, Cass missing right now. Alright. Alright. So can I get a motion to, excuse those two at this time?

So moved. Second.

Do you have a motion and a second from, commissioner sorry.

Who?

Annie and Chatters.

Yeah. Annie and Chatters. Yep. Thank you. I I need believe me. I need all the help I can get. All those in favor? Aye. Aye. And any opposed? Okay. Great. Hey. To kick this off, just before, we do public comment, I just wanna make a couple of announcements. Apparently, when you, announce that you're resigning from being the mayor of Lake Stevens, it causes a an uproar, hopefully for just another twenty four hour cycle.

But, I would I wanted to tell this commission that, I'm I'm gonna stay with the commission. My effective date, on the resignation as being mayor is April 13. But as long as I have an address in this county, I'll, and then District 5, I will, I'll stick with the commission. So just so we don't have any yeas or uhs, I'm not sure which way it would go, but, that's where I'm at on the commission status. Okay? Alright. Let's go to public comment. Do we have anyone in online? Let's go online first,

If you would like to get public comment online, please raise your virtual hand. I see Abby has her hand raised.

Alright. Abby. I will allow her to speak.

Abby, you should be able to speak now.

Yes. Can you hear me?

Yes.

Hi. Hello, everybody. Well, good afternoon. And thank you, commissioners, for your contribution on this committee and for the opportunity to speak today, especially in this online format. I'm sorry I can't be with you in person.

My name is Abby Ludwig, and I'm calling from Olympia, Washington. I'm a cofounder of Standing for Washington, the pact that was formed to support the citizens of Everett in their efforts to protect the Snohomish River watershed. That was with Everett Initiative twenty four zero three, which did pass in November 2024 with 57% of the vote. So I'm here today to speak for the voice of the 26,000 Everett residents who made their democratic voice very clear that they value the ecological health and integrity of their natural resources. That was challenged, by a developer lawsuit, and that is continuing that lawsuit.

But today, I wanted to talk to you about first, I wanted to remind us all what happened in Snohomish County just four months ago. On 11/11/2025, a blueberry farmer near Lowell's Snohomish Road noticed an oil sheen in his drainage ditch, and he called BP. And that's how we learned that the Olympic pipeline, just 2,000 feet from the Snohomish River, was leaking. It wasn't BP's monitoring system. It was a farmer.

And this same paper same pipeline exploded in 1999 in Bellingham and killed three people, and that same pipeline in 2023 spilled 21,000 gallons of gas near Conway. This pipeline has caused 21 spills since 1999. So after that spill, senator Cantwell wrote a letter to BP demanding answers, and she got no response. So in December, the Washington the full Washington congressional delegation sent a follow-up letter, and their first question was how many gallons actually spilled. And as of today, four months later, there's still no public response from BP, and we still don't know how many gallons were spilled.

We believe this is an immense accountability gap, and then this commission can address that. So we're here today asking the commission to create an office of the watershed advocate in the county charter. It mirrors exactly the office of the public advocate that this commission created at its last meeting in 2016. So we're asking you to use your authority and to use that model again to protect the county's watershed. Now I'd also like to know because as a member of the public, I feel I have a right to speak plainly that the organization ran the opposition against Evers watershed protection with Toyer Strategy Advisories, and that firm's owner, as a family member, is sitting on this commission.

An employee of that firm is appointed as this commission's coordinator. But that ethics question was raised, this commission is well aware of that. The point I wanted to make was that the ecological integrity of this county's watershed belongs in this room. So lastly, I'd like just to point out that for that there oh, I only have three seconds left. I'm sorry. So I just encourage the

Thank you for your comments.

Okay. Do we have anybody else online?

Yes. We have Catherine Lewandowski. Okay. Catherine, you should be able to speak.

Okay. Can you hear me okay?

We can. Yep.

Okay. My name is Catherine Lewandowski, and I live in Arlington, Washington. Thank you for allowing me to speak. I'd like to make comments on several of the proposals tonight. First, as last time, I'm a believer in ranked choice voting.

And any headway that we can make on moving towards a more an improved voting system that helps us to elect representation that aligns with the views of the majority of voters is an improvement. What I see happening here in Snohomish County and Washington and even in America in general is primary candidates being elected by a majority of the minority of voters. And people really don't like seeing how our government at every level has become watered down with people promoting the the views of the minority. Rather than our great country being known as the land of the free, we are really more like the land of you must think and believe like me or else. It's not what my great grandfather envisioned when he came to America.

So please look at those closely. Secondly, I have to say that I feel your language regarding, and I apologize. I was gonna put the proposal number down there, but it's the one regarding elected officials holding multiple offices should really reflect that elected officials should not hold more than one elected office, especially if it is considered a full time position. I do not believe that we are really getting the representation that we deserve when we have full time reps holding other, even part time elected positions. I don't feel that we get the representation that we all deserve.

And especially what I have seen working down in Olympia, even my elected senator has commented that it is really a full time job down there. And after seeing over the last ten years, as I have been a citizen lobbyist in Olympia, the job really is full time. And maybe if it was treated as such, they could get much more stuff done down there. Thirdly, to the person who authored that proposal 11, thank you. I was down in South Everett the other day, and I could not believe the pack of children riding their electric bikes with their with their helmets on and popping wheelies.

There was, like, 40 of them, and they were coming down both lanes of the road straight at me. All I could do is stop. I'm a nurse for forty years, and I would totally not wanna have to be talking with their parents explaining to the damage that had possibly been done to their child. So I don't know if there's any what the rules are on licensing those, but I think it definitely must be done. Plus my thoughts are, oh my god.

I can't imagine being a parent nowadays and trying to hearing from my kid how I've got gotta buy him one of those electric bikes. Oh, jeez. That just I'm glad they're not my my kids are are grown. Anyway, thank you for proposing that. I think it's an excellent proposal. I'll take care of your work.

Thank you. Anyone else?

Is there anybody else? Please raise your virtual hand. That's all online.

Okay. And do we have anybody in the audience who wishes provide public comments? Go ahead,

Eric. Hey, commissioners. It's me again.

Eric Bedstrip, Snohomish County lead for Fair Vote Washington, a nonpartisan nonprofit organization that advocates for use of ranked choice voting in Washington state. To start, I'd like to thank you for your support for amendment number six in the last meeting that would adopt use of RCV for future Charter Review Commission elections. I'm hoping this will again receive sufficient votes tonight, to receive legal review. I'm here tonight primarily to speak in on in support of amendment number 12 that would adopt use of ranked choice voting for elected offices in Snohomish County. Ranked choice voting has been around for over a hundred years, and where ranked choice voting has been adopted, it's been consistently shown to deliver the following positive benefits.

First and foremost, voters like it. Once they get a chance to experience it firsthand, it's they say it's simple, and they want to keep using it. Ranked choice voting is the fastest growing nonpartisan reform movement in The US. Second, RCV empowers voters. Ranked choice voting gives voters more say. Vote for who you really want and then rank your backup choices. No more voting for the lesser of two evils. Third, RCV creates more competitive elections. Under our current system, most seats are safe seats with little real competition. But with RCV, newcomers who may not have as much money or name recognition can still have a fair side.

And then last, ranked choice voting changes the incentives for candidates while campaigning. RCV rewards politicians who reach out beyond their base to build more common ground, produce civil issue focused campaigns that focus on solutions. In RCV elections, there's less mudslinging and attacks on opponents. So why does this matter to Snohomish County? Snohomish County, specifically the county council, has had uncompetitive elections and low voter turnout.

Of the five of the last 18 elections for a county council member had more than two candidates file filing for office. Incumbents tend to win reelection, and so competition really only occurs when an office is vacated. And each district of the five in Snohomish County is held by the same political party since 2013, except for Sam Lowe who went won the fifth in 2015. This indicates that each party is pretty well entrenched in their district. Ranked choice voting is used in a growing number of jurisdictions across the country, including states and cities with a wide range of political leanings, including Alaska and several conservative leaning communities in Utah.

I respectfully ask you to advance this charter or this amendment so that Snohomish County voters themselves can decide whether they want to adopt ranked choice voting or not. Regardless of anybody's positions on it, allowing voters to decide how their elections is conducted is the most transparent and democratic approach. If you have interest or desire, I'd be happy to answer any additional questions any of you might have either individually or collectively. Thank you for your time and service to our county.

Thank you, Eric. Anyone else? Good.

Hello? Hi. My name is Holly. I live in Edmonds. I grew up there and, moved away as a teenager and a young adult, and now I've been back in Edmonds for the last four years.

So today, I wanted to express my support for proposals one, eight and nine. But I'm primarily up here to advocate for proposals six and twelve as well as five, the ranked choice voting for Charter Review Commission positions, other county positions, the council members, and then making certain positions nonpartisan. And last time I was here two weeks ago, I heard the debate around proposal six, and there was, I guess, a lot of back and forth about kind of procedural aspects of it and, like, ease of ballot use and under votes and over votes. And I wanted to address that briefly. My understanding is that there's there's advantages and disadvantages to plurality and ranked choice voting procedurally, and undervotes happen in both systems.

People screw up their ballots in both systems. And then the other major objection to RCV a lot is, like, majoritarian failures when someone gets less than 50% of the vote, they still win the election. That happens in both systems too. So I think procedurally, a

lot of the

the effectiveness depends on the implementation, education, whether candidates, encourage people to rank them or whether they say it's it's me or no one else. And then sometimes it takes several cycles of an election and playing with factors to get it right and for people to to learn how to use it. And, to echo Eric's point, a lot more people are becoming aware of the system and and especially younger demographics. Where I think that ranked choice voting really shines is a more fundamental shift in campaigns. So more civility in discourse, more reaching across the aisle, more coalition building.

And then Eric made the point too that it gives outsiders with less name recognition a better fighting chance at getting somewhere in an election. I noticed in one of the other proposals, you wanted to set term limits. I love that. This is another way to get more fresh faces coming into our elections. And so I want to encourage that we support long term innovation over potential short term pitfalls. So thank you.

Thank you, Holly. Anyone else?

I'll be brief. My name is Janice Green. I live in Everett. I have a couple of concerns. I haven't noticed on the website or posted anywhere the process that we're using for, citizens to actually, propose ballot yep. Excuse me. Propose, charter amendments. We don't know what the deadlines are. It's not on your website. We don't know the process.

So I'm sure that there are a lot of people that want to be involved, and we would like to have that information readily available to us. The other is, what the chair just said about leaving on April 13 and continuing until that time. I do have a concern. And the concern is if you're making decisions about the charter and you're not gonna be here for the actual repercussions or any other, you know, the outcomes, I would say, that's a concern. So thank you for letting me speak, and I thank you all for the work that you're doing. So thank you.

Alright.

Chair Galey Yes. Those concerns for the website were brought at the last meeting, and they have been added to the website since.

Okay. Great. Great. And as far as your concerns on my commission Quick

question before you move on. Chair Galey, I just looked at the website before this meeting. Have they been added late this evening?

Well, when I so because I spoke with miss Ludwig earlier today walking her through the procedures, and there is a document on there, rules and procedures. And in there, it talks about how to propose an amendment and then the dates and everything.

I I would argue that that is not transparency for the public. Oh, okay. There there needs to be more identification of where to find specifically the information doctor Green has asked. I have been asked numerous times by many members of the public as well. Thank you.

My apologies on that. I I we'll fix it.

Yeah. We'll take a look at that. Yeah. Okay. Great. Let's move forward on the agenda. You know, let's let's, we need to throw in here an approval of our current agenda. So let's do that in a 3.5. Let's get an approval of the agenda because I think that there's some wants of a change. So can I get a motion to approve the agenda? So moved. Okay. Okay. Any discussion?

Just a just a a requested amendment. Commissioners, out of consideration for the new proposals being brought, I suggest after we hear from auditor Fell, we take the new proposals out of order and then revisit the existing proposals to ensure that we have adequate time for discussion around those new proposals.

Okay. So we have a motion to, do agenda item five, we'll call it one, and then new proposals, and then go back to the rest of five. I I guess a question I have on that is, we're gonna have Garth talk about, the ranked choice voting with the charter review commission, but then we're also proposing now to do ranked choice across the board.

So And I will say for that, the presentation that I requested the auditor put together is on ranked choice for the charter review commissioners. However, I think there is some overlap, for both.

Yeah. If we could really talk about the whole subject, that would be wonderful. I knew you I knew you would thumbs up me on that one. Okay. Any other discussion, Sean?

I would like to see proposal 13, which is seventh on the list, probably not going to get to tonight or late late tonight. And I know the treasurer is here to speak on that, and so maybe we could sneak that in.

That is a friendly amendment to my amendment, so I I accept that. Absolutely.

Yeah. Right after proposal six, I'm okay with that? Yeah. Okay. Any other go ahead.

I I was just gonna say another friendly amendment. Let's go with the ones where we have a guest, and then we can revisit. I think the flexibility, no one's gonna hunt us down.

I'm good with that. Any other discussion? All those in favor?

Aye.

Aye. And any opposed? Alright. Let's, let's hit real quick, Peter, the updated procedures.

Yes.

So I'm sorry. Taking a motion to approve the, March 11, agenda.

So moved.

Approval. Second. A minutes. Minutes. So moved. Okay. So moved.

And a second. All those in favor?

I abstain. I

abstain because I wasn't there.

Alright, Carol. Thanks, Craig.

Thank you. Thank you.

Alright. Let's go to updated procedures.

Last week, excuse me, two weeks ago, the commission decided to add a new step, seven vote threshold to forward proposals for legal review. We just need to put that in our official rules and procedures and vote on that.

So I think we need a motion to add that to as a procedure.

So moved.

Okay. Do have a second? Second. And a second. So I have a motion to add the can you read it again, Peter?

I would add a seven vote threshold to move on to legal review. So we have the five vote threshold to study, seven vote for legal, and then the eight vote to go to the ballot.

Okay. Discussion. Jennifer.

What does study mean? Like, what do you get out of five votes versus seven votes?

Say that again. I'm sorry.

So it's a five volt vote threshold to study. Right. Is the noun studying?

Yeah. So the five vote is the we're gonna put a little more cerebral power into it, thinking about it, and then bring back, some vetted Peter research as well as maybe even, Ben research and then take it to that next level. And then that's where we wanna see if we have a seventh vote to get it to the next step.

Probably not the Ben research because that'd be the legal review. Yeah?

Yeah. Yeah.

So the five vote differently from the last couple meetings. Yep. Moving forward, five votes gets you excellent

Gets you Peter.

Policy work from Peter. Further discussion once that's prepared, which could be in the future, not the very next meeting. Mhmm. Once you've got that great policy work done, there's an opportunity to potentially have another vote. You hit the seven votes, then you get the legal review that probably drafts the actual, like, what the language might look like. Correct. Or the, you know, this idea is crazy. You guys didn't think about this angle. This doesn't make any sense, etcetera, whatever the attorney might come up with.

Correct.

Okay. Great. And I I think following that process so, like, I don't know. I on the Zoom call, it's like I participate, but also sometimes maybe hard to total fully participate. It would be great if things came back when the policy work was done because I don't think that happened two weeks ago. It was just like, remember that thing we talked about two weeks ago? Let's just talk about it again with zero new information.

I I would agree with you on that.

Yeah.

So this sounds like a great change. Thanks.

Okay. Great. Any other discussion? Janelle has her hand

up.

I'm sorry? Janelle has her hand up.

Oh, Janelle. I don't see Janelle. Janelle.

Now she doesn't have her hand up.

Okay. Mark. Yeah. Thank you. Just wanted to reiterate where we are currently, proposals process has three steps. This is the adopted rules that we are currently going under. So is this gonna be like a two a? Are we gonna have four steps now?

So, yeah, it'd be a four step. So three would be four, and three would be this one.

Okay. So the seven vote is a whole separate time to wait, whole separate meeting. It's just one extra meeting. Correct. Okay.

Great. Any other discussion? Hearing none, all those in favor? Aye. And any opposed? Alright.

Okay.

Alright. Yeah. I I think I I'm with, commissioner Dodd. I I'm struggling to understand the utility of the short term. I'm not working on it, so I I don't know. So I need I need more consideration.

Okay. So we have two abstentions. Alright. Then let's move forward to let's take a look at proposal six.

Sorry, Cher. For clarity's sake, the motion passes with the majority. Is that correct?

Motion passes. Thank you. Alright. Out of there well, you have the floor.

Alright. For the record, Garth Feld, Snohomish County auditor, and thank you commission for, allowing me to come share a little bit more information about ranked choice voting and, how it, potentially could work in Snohomish County. My plan and the presentation I have was designed to go through what is ranked choice voting, a little bit about how the single transferable vote process works, and really looking at it from a a real world, real life example. The city of Portland recently in in 2024, elected, council positions for dis from districts using the single transferable vote method. And so we have that as a as a example that we can look towards and inform what it would look like for us.

And I won't bury the lead, but, you know, I I think your question is probably, can we do this in Snohomish County? And and the answer is yes, and there are some things that are required in order for us to make it successful. So with that in mind, if if that sounds like a good plan, we'll move forward to the to the first thing to consider here. So what is ranked choice voting? When when I think of ranked choice voting, I think of it one first as a voting method for voters and how voters interact with the ballot, how they mark their choices.

And then it's a set of rules that govern how votes will be counted to determine race winners. And what's been proposed in the Charter Review Commission situation is a sit electing your commissioners by using what's called a single transferable vote method. And so if you go to the next slide, you'll see what the ballot looks like. This is an example from the city of Portland. This is what their ballot looked like.

I will say there's more candidates than are listed here on the screen. There are actually 23 candidates in this particular race. There are some pretty comprehensive and voter friendly instructions that indicate how you rank your choices. So you don't wanna rank, two candidates in, individual column. You would need to have one vote for per candidate and column, and you don't wanna have more than one vote in a single row, which would indicate that you're ranking a candidate in more than one rank.

So, so from a voters perspective, there's certainly education. It's a little bit different than what we do currently. It takes up a little bit more space on the ballot, but it is something we can, work on educating voters, to handle about like this. You also see that there are three candidates elected to four year terms, and that's in the the bar above the ranking section. So,

if

you move to the next slide, let's talk a little bit about the rules, for for counting a ranked choice ballot. So for the single transferable vote method, the first step that you go through is identifying a threshold. And that threshold percentage is the number of, the percent of vote that somebody needs to get in order to win, a seat, and that's based on the number of seats you're filling. And so in the city of Portland example, it was three seats, and so the threshold would calculate out to 25% plus one additional vote to make sure that nobody could have more votes than than the the winners in the in the end. So so once you have this threshold, then you go through a a process of of actually counting the both the votes on the ballot.

So the next slide will show that first step in the counting process, and that's first to count all the rank one votes on a ballot. So if you remember the ballot that we saw, it had columns that had rank one, rank two, rank three. The first step is to go and count everybody's vote for rank one. And I'll show you an example of the outcome of this, here in a minute. But, you're gonna you're gonna do that on the ballots. And if any candidate gets 25% or more, they're declared, winner because that's our threshold, the number of votes somebody needs to get in order to to be to win a seat. So, that's your first step.

Yes. Sorry. Can we just for clarification. If there had only been three seats, that would have been 3033% plus one?

So there are three seats here, so it's 25% plus one. If it if it's only two seats, it would be 33% plus one. Yes. You're correct. If it were four seats, it's it's 20% plus one. So that's you will have, you'll have two seats that are are are filled. And we'll talk about how votes get transferred here next. So the first step is this counting their first ranks. So the first choice essentially for all voters on their ballots. Once that's done, then the next step is to go through and you can get to the next slide here, and determine if one or more candidates meets that threshold.

So in this case gets 25% plus one of the vote. Then we're gonna redistribute the surplus number of votes that they had in excess of that 25 plus one to, other candidates on the ballot. And that's based on their second choice ranks or in subsequent rounds, third, fourth, fifth, sixth, potentially choices. So if nobody's at at, 25% plus one, then the next step that you would go to is you would eliminate the candidate with the least number of votes and redistribute their votes to their next ranked

candidate. And we'll yes. Doesn't that mean that my vote for person x could be moved to vote for person y without me having any input in it?

Well, all it only gets moved if you rank condition. If you So if you vote

for x and

x loses Right.

Then my vote would then be shifted to person y.

So if on your ballot you voted for person x and you didn't vote for anybody else, you decided I'm not gonna rank anybody else, your ballot's an exhausted ballot. And so you don't have another choice that you've determined.

And where will my vote go?

It it it it's exhausted. It goes nowhere. Okay.

So it just disappears.

Ultimately, when it it's it's not counted in further rounds to determine winners. It's it's it's sort of like an under vote in a in a sense. And now if you had chose person y as your next choice, when we get to redistributing those votes, we would vote the vote will go to person y. And you'll see. I'll I'll walk through some actual results, and we'll see how this all plays second.

So again, first step in this is to count if somebody's meeting the threshold to win a seat, we're gonna redistribute their surplus votes. Otherwise, we'll go and eliminate the candidate with the fewest number of votes and go to their next, ranked vote. And then you get to step four, which is the next one. And step four is you repeat this process over and over again until you get to the number of, candidates to be elected based on the number of seats that we have to fill and and that they've reached that threshold. So again, there's a real world example in city of Portland.

So if we click to the next slide, we'll go through some actual election night results. So here's this race, 23 candidates. You have, no single candidate getting to that 25% plus one. Right? If you look in that first candidate line, you'll see Dan Ryan.

You see that he has 19% of the vote on the first count the first round of counting, I should say. So no single candidate has achieved the 25% plus one. So what's the instruction the counting rule say? It means it says we eliminate the candidate with the least number of votes at that point, which is the right in line of 80, and we redistribute those votes to the next group. So if you go to the next slide, you will see that those votes have been redistributed.

It's the way the graph is set up is that blue is the previous count, and then there'll be green as we go along for votes added. You can also see in a percentage that a a candidate has of the particular vote, there's a parentheses and a plus two or a plus zero or a plus one. That's how many votes were added from the 80 that were pulled from the write in line. And you might if you were to add all those up in this case, it would it would equal 35 votes. That's less than 80 because there are a number of people that didn't do anything but a write in in those cases. Question. Yeah.

It just it says three seats are up for election. Yep. At the top, it's the City Councilor district. Is it is this all like like in Marysville, we have an open city. There's no districts.

This is this is very similar to the the charter commission here in that in city of Portland, they divided up their districts. They have five districts five or six districts. And then they do ranked choice voting for three seats in each of those districts, Just like there were three seats in the five districts here for rank for charter review, they they elect three people to that particular district using this ranked choice voting method rather than the simple plural plurality.

Alright. Thanks. For clarification, how do you get the the other ballot? Where where do these extra votes come from? Is it that'd be a second choice on someone's ballot?

Yeah. So so the right in line was their first choice, and then the votes are distributed based on the second choice now. As you go down rounds and rounds, that'll be either their second or third or fourth depending on how often that that vote essentially gets moved to qualified or available candidates. So so you'll see that if you go to the next slide, this jumps ahead quite a bit. This is round 18.

So essentially, what happened is there's nobody that yet has haven't have met the threshold. Dan Ryan's still at 24. He hasn't gotten to 25% yet. And so all of the votes from those previous candidates all the way up to Marni Glickman have been redistributed in rounds to other candidates. And and so, again, we don't have anybody that's achieved that 25% plus one.

So if we go to the next round, we have somebody that is now leading. And it's saying leading because this is election night. It's not certification night. And so more ballots could be added in future counts. At the end of the election, that says something like winning or completed or or finished. So so so so Dan Ryan has met the threshold. So our rules say if somebody meets the threshold, what happens? We redistribute the votes that are in excess of 25% plus one to other available candidates. And I

think, Garth, how come Nate West didn't drop off?

So they the way they designed their report there here is that they did it on an initial vote on rank one candidates and ordered the number the candidate names in that order. And then they didn't reorder the candidate names each round. They just stuck and kept that order for the entire count. So, Michelle Depasse had fewer votes than Nate West. If you go back to the previous slide, you can see that on '18.

Yeah. 3977. So she was defeated and her votes in the next round were redistributed. And when that happened, we had in round 19 that Dan Ryan has now met the threshold.

Ben has his hand up.

Yeah. Ben, go ahead.

Thank you. Did you say that you start eliminating candidates on election night even though additional ballots are still coming in and that could have changed whether that, you know, first least ranked person might not have been redistributed from

yet?

No. That's not what if I said that, that's not what I intended. This is this is just how we count count votes each day. So candidates are are still candidates on the last day when we're counting votes. We're not eliminating candidates in the in our process of how we process incoming ballots.

It's only how the votes get counted once we do the tabulation. So if you were to go to the report set for the certification day, it would still start with 23 different positions and go round by round and look at every ballot that was returned for the election, even those that came in or drifted in after election day that were still on time and valid, and it will include those in the count. So this is just a a count of the ballots that were received and processed election day.

Great. Thank you.

So, so if you go to the next slide, we know that we have to redistribute those votes for those excess votes for Dan Ryan because he doesn't need all of those. And and so here, I just I put this up because it shows that a 106 excess votes were transferred. And they're gonna be transferred to other candidates that are still viable candidates. And you'll notice that in round 20 under number of votes, you're starting to get things that are percentage of votes. Right?

You're not seeing whole votes. So it's 9,574.16. And the percentage the point one six are based on the fact that you have you're you're redistributing those excess votes based on the proportion of people's support for candidates. And those aren't gonna that's math. That's not gonna work out as individual ballots that are getting redistributed.

It is actual proportions of ballots based on support that people have in those next round choices. So just wanted to point that out that can sometimes be confusing to people because you're not when you're when you're redistributing those the excess votes, the surplus votes that a candidate has, they're done based on proportion, not not essentially taking full votes and moving them. So if you go to the next round, we'll keep going through here. So they redistributed those votes, and now Nate Nat West or Nate West is is defeated. The next slide will be around 21.

We've got two candidates now that are 25% plus one. So we'll go to the final round, and now you have three remaining candidates. And if you click one more time, they end up redistributing everything. So you have everybody in nice, neat 25% plus one. So it's, from a voter perspective, it is, it's it's something that people could understand in terms of ranking people on their ballots.

We do this frequently. From an administrator's perspective, there is more work in terms of the counting process, and it is more work in educating voters on how the counting process occurs. So I think I I appreciate the examples that are often shown of ice cream cones and pizza and how we have different interests and flavors to to kind of explain ranked choice voting. I think that's important, but it's also important to understand that there are some complexities once you get down into the the details themselves. So with that said, the question becomes, can we do this?

And and again, I I think we can successfully implement ranked choice voting if that were to be a decision of the voters. But it's gonna require time time to prepare for that and also some money to make sure that we have the right equipment and technology in place to produce accurate, dependable, transparent results. So what does that look like? You know, based on what I've seen done in in other jurisdictions, a two year implementation time is is really the minimum that people need to or jurisdictions need to purchase and test equipment, establish and adjust procedures and ballot handling processes to develop the reporting tools. The reporting tools are are require considerable amount of work and making sure that you can provide enough reporting so people really understand how that process goes.

We'll need to train staff. And then certainly, I think most importantly, is educate voters, candidates, the media, and everybody involved to understand how this process works and how the vote counting occurs. So that's the two year implementation timeline. How much will that cost? Well, you if look at Multnomah County, which conducts elections for city of Portland, they have 571,000 registered voters.

We have 540,000 registered voters, so very similar in size. They spent $1,100,000 over a year year and a half period to implement. So I I think it's fair to say that we'd be looking at something similar. There may be some savings based on some some developed technology that other jurisdictions have used and implemented. We know that King County is going to be implementing ranked choice voting here.

We run the same tabulation system as King County, so maybe we'll save some money in software and purchases, things like that. But but I think a million dollars is probably a good estimate for the first implement implementation. If you look at Multnomah County's records and and they put a great report that's listed at the end of this. If you look in that report, the recurring cost does drop to $600,000 or so every time you have to do one of these elections. And I probably would drop further over time.

If you want to go to the next slide. So just my recommendation is that whatever proposal is put forward, just make sure that we identify the accounting logic but don't go too specific in terms of the number the tools and some of the methodology just because we wanna have that flexibility to utilize best practices and adjust rules as they as we as we roll out implementation. We And can work with the council to make sure that rules are codified in the appropriate place for that. And then the next slide, just a couple of other observations and impacts on elections administration. From our perspective, one of the things that gives voters a lots of confidence in our system is that we're able to report each election that we have one ballot counted or one voter that got credited for returning a ballot.

As you go to ranked choice voting, you're going to need multiple ballot pages. So not just one piece of paper, but two pieces of paper. And when that happens, voters don't always return two pieces of paper. So, again, it's gonna be an education process to help people understand that we don't have a one, ballot page to voter reconciliation anymore. We'll be able to reconcile and and keep track of those things, but it'll look differently for voters in that that process.

It will also take longer to count release results. Multnomah County said that they saw approximately 300% increase in that time. Like, 300%, that sounds like a lot. Yeah. That for us, that would be going from a half hour time period each time we count to and report results to maybe an hour, hour and a half to to do that work.

And then our state law does require hand recounts in certain situations. And in those situations, hand recounting a ranked choice ballot is much more difficult. Again, Multnomah County did a a great job preparing and actually did a hand recount test before they conducted their live election and were successful in doing it. It just takes time and and lots of hands. So, again, I think the last slide is just a resource that I'd recommend folks read if they're interested in this.

That's the implementation report from Multnomah County. And, again, you know, we can we can do all sorts of things. We can do this well if if voters were to to select it. It just takes time and money. So yeah.

The proposal that we're considering here is is for commissioners, for the Charter Review Commission. So and we're up again in ten years, supposed to be on the general ballot, general election. So you're gonna have the ranked choice voting for commissioners on the same cycle, same ballot, I guess. I'm not even sure how that would work with traditional voting method for the rest of the, elected positions in the county.

Yeah. So what what happened in in Portland and what is typical is that you will separate out the ranked choice ballot races to a separate ballot. So voters have their traditional races that are elected by, you know, the top candidate plurality, And then they'll have a ballot that has the ranked choice voting races on it so that they can then vote that with rankings. And that's where you run into two ballot pages for one ballot packet for a voter.

So I I guess I would ask point of clarification for commissioner Dodd. Is your intent to maintain proposal six or or just go with proposal 12? Because 12 would include six.

Yeah. I think I would defer to the commission. Like, if this was Amanda's commission, I would put both of them forward, obviously, but that's not how it works. So I think I'm fine voting separately on them because if if we get to where the commission is comfortable with six but not 12, I wouldn't want six to go away because we entertained 12.

Oh, okay. Any other questions for the auto?

Can I add one thing? I know that there's another proposal for and this may be what you were talking about for executive elected positions or council positions. The rules vary a little bit for that, but the cost, the time, the energy, and our ability to do it are the same. The difference is that you won't have the percentage transferable because you're only looking at, two candidates and so or one candidate to win a particular seat. So, so that some of that complexity in the vote counting, goes away.

Any questions for that?

Did just wanna confirm. There's sort of an economy of scale if it was all county level positions. We wouldn't be paying a million dollars for every race.

That's correct. This yeah.

Any other questions? Alright. Thank you for your time.

Yeah. Thank you again for having me.

Appreciate it.

Yeah. Okay. Let's let's, go

ahead and

discuss proposal six then. Mister Dodd, what are your thoughts?

Well, I like it, Jared. Okay. Okay. Well, I'm not kidding. But so I really appreciate that our auditor took the time to come and explain that. I think that it's something that depending on your each commissioner's familiarity with ranked choice voting, it was easy to just imagine unicorns and rainbows instead of what it would look like in implementation. So, I liked that example. And I guess I'm curious what questions are there because I think I've been really surprised and delighted by the thought that people have put into our deliberations on this one.

Good. Thoughts, discussion from the commissioners?

Demi? Just want to, offer the thought that I I love this absolutely for charter review. I think maybe we should discuss this along with the additional proposal kind of at the same time since they're related. So, Chair, I don't know if you would be, open to entertaining both of those questions, not necessarily voting on them both the same. I do think they should be separate amendment proposals, but because they're the same concept

Sure.

So I wanna offer my comments on both of those proposals. I think charter review, I I think that is very, very clear, cut and dry. It it did not work for the public. We had so many folks who just did not feel that they were represented in the way that the votes were cast and counted for charter review positions before. I think we absolutely should move forward with considering this for, the next round. That gives plenty of time for educational processes,

which

I think is really important, and the most important thing is going to be the educational processes for the public. Or, with regard to the additional amendment, I think that the most powerful argument is that the people should get to choose their election method. For the sake of transparency, for the sake of respecting the public, I I believe fully that the people have a right to choose the way they elect their leadership, and I I know that that would be complex. I'm not sure that the public would, that this concept transfers across the public sphere so cleanly as might with the charter review because of the nature of these specific positions. But I think that people have a right to choose how they elect. Thank you.

Commissioner Dodd, I'm gonna I'm gonna move your proposal 12 up. So why don't you intro that, and then let's let's see if we can mix these, this discussion up and

Janelle has her hand up.

Come something out. Janelle, go ahead.

Thank you. My question, if I heard correctly that if it was just charter review as ranked choice voting, that would be mailed out as a separate ballot. Do we know approximately how much mailing a single ballot cost and, like, how much more the second ballot would cost?

Garth left.

Okay. We can raise

those that it's a second piece of paper in that same envelope.

Ballot. So I

don't think that would make the postage go up too much. And, hopefully, they get better rates than we do.

Yeah. I'm not sure. I'm not sure. I our thoughts are, Janelle, is that it's just two different pieces of paper in the same envelope, the same in the same mail out.

Right after that.

Okay. Mister Dodd, why don't you why don't you, talk about your proposal 12 real quick?

Yeah. So I sponsored a proposal from mister Bidstrup who spoke earlier. So he submitted it, and I saw it and said, yes. I like it. And brought it forward for discussion.

And it basically I mean, the title's really clear, but to use ranked choice voting for county level elected offices. I appreciated the context in mister Bidstrup's public comment that we have seen a lot of just lack of changeover in county council districts, for example. I think the example that speaks the most to me is we've talked a lot about how voters don't usually identify as one party or another. And I think there's been specific contests where it's like, especially in a primary, I wanna vote for a candidate who maybe I also feel doesn't have a great chance of advancing. So in this ranked choice voting environment, I could make that candidate my first choice.

But then if they don't get enough support, I can still vote for my second choice, and that vote will still matter. I think that that is a lot less disenfranchising than, oh, well, your candidate got 48%, and that's it. Have a good day. So I like that idea of getting to kind of say, like, this is my first choice, but I would also be okay with this person or that person. And I really like, as someone who has run for office, just nicer, more cordial elections. Like, I think that we could use a lot of that, and I think that it would be great to have our county offices be that example for everyone else who's running in local elections across the county.

Any pros or con discussions? Go ahead, Patrick.

So I followed some of when this was occurring in Utah and some of those elections that occurred, and there were claims. I wasn't part of it. I didn't see, you know, audit or any of that, but there were claims that, there was ballot casting for a lesser candidate in order to get a stronger candidate of one party against the lesser candidate deliberately so that two strong candidates didn't end up fighting each other at the end. And so by through a concerted effort, they were able to get a a not very strong candidate into the final portion of the count and thereby dilute the value of that second role so that the candidate that they that they actually wanted in office had a lesser opponent to compete against, during the election. And you can there were a lot of newspaper articles about that at the time.

You can go back and read those. But it was a it was a deliberate system using this ranked choice voting, in order to game the system and game getting a strong candidate, and a weak candidate there at that final at the final count. I also when I was looking at the numbers as they came out, I noticed that the final count was basically the same winning percentage for the top three. The top three after the first vote who had the top three votes are the same ones that had the most votes at the end of the ones that were actually in the office. So at least in this example, it actually didn't change the outcome at all. The you ended up with a few simply said, who are the top three based on votes day one? Those are the same three that ended up with the votes at the end of

the day.

And as an individual who has run for and held office, I actually think there is value in saying, look. I in my case, I got 61% of the vote. That's a strong majority in favor of what I have spoken to as part of my election. When these votes were ended up, the best anybody can say is I got the same as the other two. I got 25% plus one, which is a much less strained support for your positions.

It really waters down that the public really liked, what you were campaigning on and what you were gonna be pushing for as a candidate. So I'd hate to go from, hey. I want 60% to saying I want 25%. I think it dilutes the voice of the people and how they actually chose those candidates and kinda makes everybody equal at the end of the day for anybody that was in the office. So, those are my concerns about those are my primary concerns about this particular initiative. Okay. Caroline.

My thoughts. First of all, thanks. That was the first time I really could understand the process of rank rank choice. And, the concern that I had is what about the senior citizens that just don't quite get it? I'm curious if they lost. What was the voter turnout in Portland for this? Did we lose some of the seniors because they're they just stroke their hands and says, now I've had enough. I'm not gonna try to do this. And and it seems like if we did it every ten years, that means that we would continually be educating people, and that would be an expense. So those are my just thoughts right off the cuff.

So far, not crazy.

Any other Scott Mark? Alright. Thanks.

I got a few things. I looked, looked this up ahead of time just so I kinda be prepared for this. It's new. It's it's shiny. It seems like, oh, this might be something to to to try. I'm not sure that this commission is the right place to implement such a thing. I believe there are other ways to implement ranked choice in the county, either through the county council or or some other method, or even maybe voter, initiated, to change the processes by where we vote. The current voting system is very well understood. There's no confusion. There's a lot of apathy in our area, and people don't care or don't know and don't wanna know about what a what a charter review commissioner is, so they just don't vote.

There's a lot of reasons that there might be under votes in that category on this election for this body. So I wouldn't I wouldn't wanna implement, a whole new voting system to try to fix a problem that's a perceived problem that may have other fixes that are gonna be easier, quicker, logical, and a lot less expensive. Educating the voters, you know, getting out and doing those kinds of things, can help increase our numbers and increase voter education. Those are all, ways to, I think, to attempt to to fix what we're I and I guess that's my question too is aside from the the large amount of, under votes on on the charter review ballots, what are we trying to fix? You know, re referring back to, you know, the general election and and all the other candidates that ran.

You know, I don't I don't know that we see any real problems there to try to to fix. So with that said, I think that that this change attempts to solve a problem that doesn't exist and introduces unnecessary complexity, for voters, imposes unfunded administrative and educational burdens on the county as well. Currently, charter review commissioners are elected, like I said, through the standard straightforward election process used for other county offices. The system is simple. It's transparent.

It's well understood by Snohomish County voters. And then I'll wrap up by saying if the commission wishes to explore alternative voting systems in the future, maybe we refer the matter to the Snohomish County Council for study through the normal legislative process, including public hearings, cost analysis, voter education planning, and this this will, preserve the integrity and simplicity of the charter while avoiding unnecessary complexity and expense. My comments.

Hey, Peter. For sake of time Yes. We're gonna have to put a minute timer on folks. Let

me see.

Alana, how do you make it to a minute?

Go ahead. You can change yeah.

Yeah. I'm just kidding. I would I would say we are not trying to solve a specific problem. We are offering the voters who choose which of our proposals advance. We're not doing anything that affects anyone other than saying, here's a choice. We're saying, here's a different choice for how to vote. They may be like, heck no, and that's it. But they should get the chance to say how they like to vote. I would argue that the system we have, both for the commission, is not working given all the under votes. That's a sign of something.

Whether it's not being interested or whether it's a system that's hard to follow. And I would argue that asking the county council to address it is also not sufficient because they are actively in office benefiting from a system that we're saying we might voters might wanna change. So to have the body that has benefited by being elected in our traditional way address it doesn't necessarily get at the root of the problem. I like the idea of the voters having a chance on their ballot to say what they would like to do, because that is the most direct form. I don't I've never asked any of the county council how they feel about ranked choice voting, but I would argue it doesn't matter how they feel.

It matters how the voters feel. So just kind of a level set. And as far as like, I think I won in the high sixties too for my city council race, I don't represent 60 whatever percent of Bothell. I represent everyone involved. So by whatever percentage, when you're in that office, you do that work. It doesn't matter how many votes you got or if you got more votes than someone else. So I just wanna really put a fine line on what that public service means. And I'm hopefully, that was a minute.

David, did you have some

Yeah.

I did a little re I've been doing a little research on this, and I think there's 19 states now that have said no to ranked choice. That's growing. And this is an interview from Steve Hobbs, secretary of state. He is not in favor of ranked choice voting, and he made a couple comments about it's an algorithm that determines the outcome. So it really changes the the whole chemistry of of counting and and everything and understanding. And then you said, what's the problem we're trying to solve? Is there really a problem there? Which someone already mentioned. He says the elect the electeds are we have very diverse electeds throughout the state in different areas. So some people say that'll help diversify those elected, and I

don't

know that that's the case because we have a lot of, diversity in different elected bodies. And he said it created a lot of misinformation. And there's a lot of money behind pushing for ranked choice voting. And if you look at it, there's one party is in favor of ranked choice much more than another party. And there do some study. Follow the money on this thing. There's huge money. There will be huge campaign dollars to get voters to vote for ranked choice voting. So it won't just be simply throw it on the ballot and do it. There's gonna be campaigns coming after it, and I think people need to be aware of that and transparent about that also.

Okay. Thank you, Dave. I think, so proposal six is, would be in our second procedure. So it's gonna need seven votes to move forward at this point. Is that correct, Peter? Okay. Let's take a shot at that. We've had some good discussion on it, and we need to move forward with the rest of our agenda. So, can I get a a roll call vote on proposal six to see if it goes to the next level?

Somebody could make a motion.

I move that we advance proposal six to the next phase.

K. I have a motion to advance

it. Second. And a second. K.

To and let's go ahead and have the vote, please. Toyer?

Nay. Fannie? Nay. Gregerson?

Aye. Aye. Yes.

Chatters? Yes. O'Donnell? No. Cass? No. Decker? No. Preston? No. Dodd? Yes. Mankey? No. K Mink? Yes. McGee? Eslik?

No.

James? No. Kaylee? I'm a no. We have four yes votes and one, two.

Okay. So proposal six at

this point

dies. So we will, maintain proposal 12, and I wanna go to proposal 13, because we have a guest on that one. Just, for clarification's sake, Peter, what time are we done tonight?

Security's letting us stay till 07:30. Right, Debbie?

Yes. Till 07:30?

Yes.

Okay. Buckle up. I've

got the minute timer, and I will be using it.

Alright. I'm sorry. Sean, you wanna take the floor and introduce, proposal 13, please?

Well, I'll

I'll introduce, Brian because I don't understand it very well, to be honest with you. And, but I've known Brian for years. He's a great guy, and he's done a great job for the community over all these years. And so I've invited him out here to explain it to us, and, don't be alarmed if I have some questions as well.

Absolutely. The podium if you wish.

Well, thank you, and good evening. I'm Brian Sullivan, the Snohomish County treasurer. I've been in office off and on for forty five years. My first election was in 1985. So, so I've seen quite a bit of change over the years, population, economic downturns, things like that. I actually sent up two proposals. I'm just gonna speak briefly to both of them. So I do my notes are short just just to let you know. And, chair Galey, congratulations. New adventures are always exciting. So Yes. They are. I just wish you all the best. We go way back to the ever police officer days.

So Thank you. Thank you, Brian.

You bet. Thank you for your service too, by the way. So tonight, I'm bringing forward two proposals that are really about one thing, disciplining government before the next crisis, not after. First, a proposal, which is the one Sean was talking about, was funding, for foundational government. At its core, this is a sum this is very simple.

Government should fund its essential departments and services first. Constitutional foundational governments such as public safety, the auditor, the assessor, the clerk, the treasurer, roads and infrastructure, and many other positions that are outlined by the RCWs. These are the basic services people depend on every single day. When budgets get tight, and I'm telling you, we're heading towards a cliff right now in county government. You know, we're talking about 11% cuts.

Those services that should be protected, not not negotiated. This proposal creates a framework that prioritizes those core functions so that we are not scrambling to protect them during downturns. In forty five years, I've been through a dozen economic downturns and five major recessions. Nothing hurts more than getting in an elevator full of employees with pink slips. It's, matter of fact, one of the worst experiences of my life.

The second, proposal is very simple. This is for charter protection and the general fund for the revenue stabilization fund, something I worked on for fifteen years, started on starting with the county council. And, that fund presently, what I created, on the idea based on Oso, we spent $22,000,000 in June. It almost bankrupted the county. And without reimbursement from the federal and state government, we would have we would have been in municipal bankruptcy essentially.

So so, this fund presently has $14,000,000 it during good economic times. There's a trigger mechanism in the ordinance that requires that that money goes to the stabilization fund or what I like to I I call a catastrophic fund. So but today, what I'm really worried about is, the prosecutor was joking with me not too long ago, and he said he said, you know, it takes a supermajority to expend the emergency dollars. Right? And he says, well, it only takes three votes to change the ordinance from four votes to three votes.

Right? And and, you know, and there's look. There's pressures on on our political system, pressures from our base, pressures politicians, pressure. And this this is a fund of last resort. As a matter of fact, that $14,000,000 we invest on behalf of the Saumas County taxpayer produces $450,000 a year that goes straight to our general fund.

That helps provide services, mitigates tax increases, all all kinds of things. So so my fear is is some future political pressure cooker, you know, will cause a future county council or a future executive and county council to change that ordinance. And so the idea of protecting that fund is really obviously very important to me. Finally, Moody's, the bond account you know, the bonding companies, Moody's and the bond rating companies, they've specifically in their reports after after their audits have said because of that stabilization fund that that is one of the primary reasons why we maintain triple a rating today. So having said that, I know probably the questions will come on the foundational issue.

I just wanna point out that it's not it's a proposal two proposals in a proposal. There's there's 3,250 counties in this country. Right? There's about two dozen foundational funding models. I took two extremes. Let's start with the Ohio model. The Ohio legislature passed a law that said god knows what happened in Ohio that caused the legislature to act this way. But if the county council, county commission, or county board of supervisors, do their budget, it then goes to a budget committee made up of the auditor, the prosecutor, the assessor, the courts, the clerk, and they have a right to veto that budget. Right? Very interesting.

Right? And then they send it back to their county council, and they have to rewrite it, until that core group of foundational government, electeds are satisfied. So very interesting. Then the other extreme is the Sonoma model. And I have a friend on the board board of supervisors in Sonoma County. He says that actually works pretty well. It's more more of a light version. It's in their charter. Basically, it just says you have to plain language, you have to, you know, we have we have to have deputies on the ground. You know, we have to have people working in the treasurer's office doing due diligence in the assessor's office.

And so this foundational government concept. Right? And then public pressure is what keeps that county of supervisors in line. So the idea is, if this is is put into the charter, you know, it it it really it really allows allows county government maybe to function in a more transparent way in in order because the mandate is, boy, you know, we gotta have deputies. I remember one one budget year. I served on the county council for twelve years. One budget year, we laid off eight deputies. You know? And, you know, it takes if it's a nonemergency call, it's twenty four hours before we get to it. Right?

This county, operates from the Puget Sound to the top of the Cas Cade Mountains. Right? That's the deputies are asked to do a lot. Right? And, and so we couldn't afford to lay off eight deputies. Right? And, we did furloughs. Again, issued three three hundred pink slips. We went fifteen years deep into, into our employees. You know? So so I'm I'm I'm trying to propose something that'll avoid that in the future.

So I I have a couple of questions. Sure. One, which which proposal is the stabilization fund?

That's the second proposal.

Which number is that?

Oh, I don't know if that I got a sponsor

for that. That one has not gotten a sponsor.

Okay. Okay. Good. Okay. Yeah. So let's let's But it's important. Make that happen. So proposal 13 Yeah. Explain to me, treasurer Sullivan, how do I how does a department that's in the fully funded category, how does it get constrained? I'm the prosecutor. Right? I currently have 20 prosecutors.

Right. Or a 175 here.

Whatever it is. Yeah. But I really, really wanna do lots of cool prosecutions. So I say I say my budget's 50. Mhmm. How do how does that get checked?

Well, sure. Well, it's still up to the county council and the county executive, and there's still a finite amount of dollars. Right? So so, you I mean, you'll get the sheriff. I mean, the sheriff is, you know, at least 50 deputies short right now, and partly because, they can't fill the positions and partly because of budget reasons. So so, the idea is it just it, you know, it puts bookends on the budget. So so let's someone say comes and say says, I wanna start a whole new program. And, and right now, the federal government's giving us a lot of money. And so I'm gonna start new part maybe three new programs. I'm gonna hire a 100 new employees.

Right? And and then suddenly that money disappears, and now we're we're heading towards a cliff. And so I part of the idea is to give the county council and county executive cover to say, look. These are the things we have. There's still gonna be constraints and shortfalls and, and a big fight, sometimes behind closed doors on these things.

But at the end of the day, I think as electeds, we wanna feel that our employees are safe, right, and that we have a mechanism at least that we can use publicly to try to protect our employees. So we we we process $13,000,000,000 a year. A lot of people don't realize I'm the treasurer for 14 school districts, districts, 92 special service districts, water districts, sewer districts, fire districts. And we do a lot of work. And but there's probably very little chance we're gonna be adding any people as our population grows. Right? So we have to figure out how to fund what we have and how to be more efficient at the same time.

Patrick.

Thank you. Gonna try and make sure the audience can hear me and still look at you because I don't like having this conversation. So clock already started. You're doing good. Coming from Linwood and being on the council where we went from having a budget surplus to having a $25,000,000 budget Yep. Shortfall. Yep. I've lived this for the last three years, basically. Yep. And I'm just trying to figure out how the mechanics on this actually work because when we had a surplus, everybody said, great. Here's some money. Here's some money. Here's some money. Grow your department. Grow your department. Every department was growing. The budgets all came in. Public safety came in. Everybody everybody came in. They all had their budgets.

And then bad news, the economy turned, and suddenly, we're not gonna have the projected revenue. Mhmm. So I'm I'm at I'm in favor of this. I just don't understand the mechanics of how it works because in Linwood, what happened was the mayor went to her department heads and said, hey. Tell me who you can cut, how much you can cut Yep.

In order to make in order to balance the budget and then other tools as well that we use. We had a rainy day fund and some things like that. I'm I'm not clear how this proposal would the public safety ended up not hiring people in order to offset this and then cut a couple of programs that they felt were luxuries we couldn't afford at the time. So public safety made it work for the budget, but we're just like everybody else, we're short police officers that we actually really, really need. Yep.

Mechanically, how does this work? How does would would this then force the city to say, hey. During times of surplus, you asked for a budget of 50,000,000 I don't know. $10,000,000, but we're in bad times now. We can't afford 10,000,000, but this law says we still have to fund you to $10,000,000. How does

that work?

And so that's think Hey, Brian.

Brian, one second. Before you answer that Sure. Can I do a real straw poll real quick? I I we're gonna get down some deep rabbit holes, I think, in trying to understand this, and I do wanna understand this. I think it's an intriguing proposal. Sure. I would like what I would like to do is do a straw poll to see if there's enough interest to move this with five votes and then bring you back and really, like, let's let's Drill into it. Yeah. So we can get into some other subject. Just real quick straw poll. Yeah. North, south, east, west ish.

Yeah. And I spoke with the treasurer too earlier, and we can we'll get together next week and maybe put together something a little more concrete that we can that we can propose.

Okay. Can I get a motion then?

Propose to move this forward to the next step in the process. Second.

Do you have a motion and a second to move forward? Any discussion?

Which one? Point of

information, chair. Are we talking about because it was mentioned that there are two, proposed amendments here. Are we talking about both of the amendments?

No. We're we're only talking proposal 13. Oh,

specifically proposal 13. Correct. Okay. Because I would like to see both of these come back. So I would like to sponsor the prioritization through the stabilization not the I'm sorry, the stabilization fund portion. I would like to propose to bring them both back for further discussion.

Well, let's put that as proposal 14 or whatever we need to do, and let's bring that the stabilization one back on as its own K. Proposal.

Thank

you, Chuck. Okay. We have proposal 13 on the floor. All those in favor?

Aye.

Aye. And any opposed? Hearing none? Okay. We're gonna move that forward, and let's keep that discussion, Satria.

Great. I really appreciate everybody what they're doing here. So thank you very much.

You bet. Thank you.

I I I beg I like, Garth, I have to run to the salary commission down below. That's Okay. Perfect. Any thanks?

Yes. I was gonna ask, would it be beneficial to vote on the new eight proposal 14 now so that when we're scheduling for, mister Sullivan to come back, he can do both things in one night.

Change it. And it's it's more complicated, I think,

just technically. Yeah. I think, technically, because it's not on the agenda and maybe someone wanted to comment it, that might be problematic.

That's fair.

Okay. Thanks, Brian.

I was just trying to

I'm with you. I gotcha. Trying to be efficient. Sometimes you just can't. Alright. So we are into, proposal proposal number seven. Post related to criteria used by the county. No. We were do we did an agenda change to do new proposals first. Proposals related to criteria used by the county assessor's office when determining the value of property. David, you have the floor. Thank you.

An example of this would be when someone's property is valued by the county of best use. Like, you could put 45 condos on your property versus what the property owner wants to do. I had a example in Edmonds where somebody had just a little bit of acreage, and the county said you could have six lots. This is quite a while ago, but he went to the city and said, I wanna put six lots, and then the city said, no. You can't. So the county did come back and change that. But, right now, there's there's been more and more people saying that they're getting told that their taxes are based on what the best use is gonna be. So we can protect people from what the someone else determines the best use is versus what they'd like to do with their property. So that's what that this is about.

Okay. Pros, cons. Christian Dobb.

I have a question about this one. So if there is then, like, permit activity and redevelopment activity, what would trigger the revaluation, just the next annual valuation? Or

My understanding is there's there's times when the county can say the best use of this property would be x y z. There's, some friends in in Chelan County that had agriculture. There's a lot of ag over there, and you could be taxed as agriculture. If you have a little Christmas tree farm, if you take those trees out, then it's gonna get taxed as best use, and you could put houses there.

So I guess what I'm saying is if this were to pass and be the law and then I have a former farm that is now somehow in an urban area and I build a bunch of condos on it, when would my property valuation get reassessed? At the point of redevelopment, when it's certified for occupation, at the next valuation?

When something happens, would that would sure. And we need to vet that out. Gotcha.

K. So I'm actually

in favor of this. This is happening in Lynnwood right now to our residents, particularly a lot of our seniors in the city where they have they've been there a long time. They have a larger property. They maybe have a 9,000 foot property, even a 12,000 foot property. And, Sesser's coming in and saying since there are no single family residential zones in the state, their property now can put a fourplex on there and, therefore, the value of the property because you can, by zoning regulations, put a fourplex on it.

That property is now worth a fourplex value. And these seniors, who've lived there, they're now gonna be paying taxes on a value that's fourplex when they're gonna live there the rest of their lives. They're never going to recognize or see that value. It's just the count or the county or the state or whomever is increasing their taxes, and they get no additional value from that. And in fact, in cases, it drives them out of their home because they can't afford those additional taxes.

So this goes a long ways towards protecting particularly seniors and other members of our of our communities who bought the property. It's valued at a reasonable rate for their current use. You can't pretend or imagine that in some future state, it's gonna be the new office for some high-tech company, and therefore, it's not worth, you know, $5,000,000 because it could be. This just lives in reality. Property should be valued for its current use, not what somebody imagines it might be able to be used for in some future point.

Jennifer.

Should it move forward? I think I understand how it would impact property tax revenue to the county and to cities. Like, it wouldn't because the set amount is like a big old bucket that just gets split amongst owners. So if some owners some properties values go down, others sort of make up the difference at a global scale. But I that's something to, like, consider if it moves forward and there's analysis of it.

And then another angle, I would be curious if it would like, if there would be any kind of it's very theoretical, so good luck to Peter if he's asked to do this research. But if there'd be any kind of development impact on growth, like, would someone be incentivized to kind of let their property sit? I mean, like, there are some parcels in Everett that we would love to see something happen with. But this result in a, you know, kind of a depression of, you know, property taxes are, like, the small part of a development project. Right?

So maybe it wouldn't really have an impact. But I don't think folks in our council districts would want that kind of impact. I think I know in the city of Everett, we like growth. So

K. I probably can't answer that question, but, I did talk to commissioner Preston. And if this does move forward, I'll reach out to assessor Yelley and have her come speak on this at the next meeting.

Okay. Any other discussion on this? Go ahead, Demi.

So I I used to be in real estate, so I actually was an appraiser. So I I I think that we're maybe talking in two different ways. What commissioner Greg Gregerson just mentioned, I think, is a key part of this, which is the way the public believes their taxes work is a one to one relationship between their assessed value and their taxes. And it kinda sorta is, but it actually is not Because the total levy, the total permissible legal levy amount for any taxing district, that is layered across the total assessed value for an entire district. And so, really, it's a ratio that chops up the pie and assigns the portion of the total legally permissible levy to each parcel.

And so, like, for example, the way it would work is in this commission of 15 commissioners, if the total legally permissible levy across this what this taxing district if we made up a taxing district, the total permissible levy, if it was $15 total and each of us had a piece of property that was worth a thousand dollars, that gives us a total assessed value across the entire taxing district of $15,000. And what that breaks down to is roughly a dollar of tax, well, exactly a dollar of tax per parcel of land. So, like, 10¢ per $100 of value. But if it changes where my property is worth, say, twice as much, mine's worth 2,000 and and Don's is worth 500, then that effectively changes the ratio of how we chop up that total, legally permissible levy request for this taxing district. So it's not a one to one ratio.

So my and there's another layer, which is that the state has a law in place which mandates that counties assess on the basis of fair market value. So that's another layer to consider is whether or not individual counties have the ability to reevaluate. The other layer is that when assessed value is determined, it actually is determined by the land value plus the improvement values. The land value is directly tied to zoning, location, those types of attributes, whereas the improvement value is exactly current use. So for example, your land may be in a location where the the zoning has modified over time through, for example, the comp plans that many of our cities just went through.

And so the land value may increase as a result of that, but you are still taxed as far as the current improvements. Just because you can build an apartment building there does not mean that that is incorporated into your assessed value because the appraiser would say, what improvement is on the property? What is the quality of the build? What is the age? What is the condition? And those things would would give you an improvement value, which is reflective of current use, not highest and best use. So how would you meld those? The other attribute Give me I'm gonna have I'm gonna have you wrap it up. Okay. I'm gonna wrap it up.

But the other point is that we often see people want their property rapidly reassessed when they go to sell. And the reason is because banks look at whether or not a parcel of land is in alignment with whatever they are going to lend on it. So this is part of this is not the only thing they look at, but it's part of the bucket of things they look at to determine whether or not they will lend on a property. So if we change the underlying methodology of how property is valued, there is a ripple effect that would cause adjustments throughout the entire market, including the lending market. And so how does that dovetail into a proposal such as So I I would like more information on on the implications of something along these lines.

And I'm also not sure that this would achieve the public's goal in what sounds like they want an effective tax reduction. Changing the underlying methodology, if it is applied across the Board, it actually does not change. It just changes it changes what the ratio kinda looks or it changes what the numbers look like. It doesn't change the underlying ratio, which is what determines the the tax.

Thank you.

Rob's Three words.

Rob's hands up. Stop. Rob's hands up.

Rob's got his hands up? Okay, Rob. Go ahead. Yeah. I'll I'll make it brief. I I support it.

Okay. Yeah. Well, three seconds. What

why don't we do a motion real quick, and let's see if we can do a vote on this?

Move to move this forward to the next step in the process?

Second.

K. I have a motion and a second to move this forward. Any further discussion?

Go ahead.

I think, should this come back Mhmm. I know you said you'd bring the assessor in, Peter. I think having worked with elected officials on my own council, which is in two counties, it is rare to find a local elected official who can explain property taxes I've got this weird reverse pizza metaphor that I go with, but it's not great. So a a foundation of how it works now, I think, is gonna be a really important part of

that. Okay.

And that's not at anybody here. It is across the board.

Oh, it's it took me years.

And one last thing, Joe, I'd like to have examples of dollars with properties, not just thanks for the ratios of the explanation, but I I I need to see dollars like this property was like this if it gets assessed a different way. How much more money and more tax would that cost?

Okay. I'll call for the vote. All those in favor?

Aye. Aye.

Aye. And any opposed? Okay. Proposal seven passes. Peter, time to get to work. Alright. Let's go to proposal eight. Proposal learning the number of offices a county elected official or employee can hold David back up back up.

So some people have mentioned this, that we've got, some elected officials that might sit on this dais over here that have more than one office and that they're really two full time positions, that might not be something that, the people really want. We argued that they get elected to both and the voters picked them. So just wanted to bring this forward and let's vet it a little bit.

Okay. Any discussion on this? Amanda first.

Krishna Preston, I was wondering, would you entertain changing this to say if you have a full time elected position, which is county council, county executive, all that, no outside employment. Your full time job is meant to be with the county. Because I think a second elected office is a type of outside employment, but we've got people who make consulting income that grows every year they're in office, and that's kind of on the backs of the taxpayers who expect them to be focusing on their work. So I wonder if we could make this a little more comprehensive.

I'm I'm open to that. I think with a state a state rep position tends to be it's not called a full time job, but it is becoming

It's a full time job without the pay. I mean yeah.

Right. So I'm I'm open to ideas and thoughts.

Yeah. Okay. Patrick?

Yeah. I wasn't clear on what commissioner Dodd was saying there. The our representatives in Olympia, we may we may want them to only do elected official work, but the fact is they're only doing elected official work for a short period of time during the year. And then the rest of the year, they are doing other things. They may be lobbyists. They may be, consultants. They may have a private business, or they could be retired. It's it's hard to say. I don't see a conflict for how long is the short term to in in Olympia? It's right. Two months, basically. Right? And the long term is ninety days. Hundred and five. Close.

Okay. So, shows you how much attention I pay to Olympia. Zero. I I don't see a conflict of somebody if the if the electorate says, I'm fine with them working sixty days in Olympia and then working full time up here the rest of the time or a hundred and five days and then working here the rest of the time, I don't have an objection to it. I actually don't I think it's up to the voters.

If the voters think they can't do it, then vote no. I'd I would hate to put I would hate to put that control in place when the voters evidently don't think it's a big issue. So in this case, I'm not gonna be, at this point, not in favor of this. I just don't think it's a big impact. I can see where if if they were on it to do this and then he wanted to an assessor, both at the same time, yeah, I would I would have a conflict with that. But I I have concerns about the part time electorate and then the full time elected officials at the same time.

So I guess a point of clarification on the proposal. As I read the proposed amendment, it's you can't hold an elected position. No county elected officer shall hold any other office or employment within county government. So that would not preclude State? State rep spot.

Is that the intent? Sorry.

I think you're reading

it. The existing.

The existing language. The second portion, the underlying portion is the new language.

No county elected office holder or employee will hold another elected officer during their term in county office for employment.

I think the wordsmithing could be done, but I think the intent was that No other elected. No other elected. While they're in a county elected position Yeah. They can't hold any other elected position, I think, the intent of the language. Okay. Only because we had a very similar language come to Linwood.

Okay. I just wanted to clarify that. Okay. That is

that correct?

Yes. And you mentioned there were problems in Linwood if that wasn't enforceable. So people had dual offices.

Correct. We could potentially, if this moves forward, we could potentially ask I don't know if we can or not, but we could ask the Linwood City attorney to come and speak to this because she actually spoke to case law that said if there was no demonstrable conflict of interest, then the statute at as written in Linwood, which said you can't hold two, was not in effect because there was no de facto conflict of interest. And she actually made an official ruling for Linwood that said, no. The particular council member in question could not be forced out of office based on the statute because there was no de facto conflict of interest in it. So we vetted this in Linwood, and the attorney said they can hold both positions despite what the statute says.

So it was kind of a statute that was unenforceable and didn't really hold up under scrutiny.

Okay. Jennifer?

Anyways, Anyways, I I have, like there's, like, five different scenarios that are swirling around. One of them to clarify. Maybe I'll do it this way. So, county elected official, this is part of your vision. County elected official can't have another elected position, like state rep or whatever, another office. Like, just your full time county elected official. Or and the employment with county was illegal anyway. So, or an employee. So an employee couldn't run for the fire commission and where they live if they work for the county.

That's that's how The intent. Intent. Yes. But I'm like commissioner Dodd said, I'm open to petting.

Different question there. But so I don't I don't like that part about the employee thing. I think there's I mean, I hadn't like, I think all the electeds on here, you might have, at times in your career, have another full time job, and and you could run for the city council and still have a full time job. And feels like somebody could work here at the county and serve on a city council somewhere. So I don't wanna preclude our Agreed.

County employees from that opportunity. What about the idea of county elected officials having, like, any outside employment? So the sheriff or the county council or the auditor has, like, a side gig. Is that your intent that they couldn't have the side gig?

I think commissioner Dodd was I think you're mentioning

Is it okay to I I don't wanna break the rules, but, that was my idea. So not, commissioner Decker, I think you mentioned state reps not having an option to employment. I'm not talking about state reps. That's an example of outside employment for a county official, but it's not I don't care what they do because they don't work full time. But for for full time county electeds because I think with employees, employees, I I have have the the same same concern. Concern. I I serve serve with with two two Snohomish County employees on my city council, and I wouldn't like, there's no conflict there. I think the type of office depends. You know? So I don't know how we would find the right level there.

But with county elected officials, there's a trust that we as the voters impart upon them. And I don't think it's appropriate for them to take that that reputation as this elected official and then have outside employment. That is the part that makes me concerned. If anything, I'm more comfortable if it's voters giving them two kinds of trust than, oh, I do this and I work over here, but don't worry. I don't cross the streams. That makes me

nervous. So Janelle.

So I think sticking to the intent of not having elected officials double dip on the taxpayer versus if you're an elected official and you have some other private gig. I mean, if you're a musician on the side, I don't see that that is a conflict if you're a full time employee or a full time elected official, I should say. But, yeah, having a full time county employee also to paid for by the taxpayer there and then again as an elected official or, like, if you're a county council member and you're serving the state rep. I think that's the essence of the intent of this kind of language, and I could see where taxpayers would be eager to get that clarified and say that, you know, they want representation diversified, not doubled up.

Ben, go ahead.

Thank you, chair. I also asked the same question when I was running for this position about incompatible offices. I think we have enough laws around incompatible offices. I think my main concern is if you're employed as a full time employee as an elected official with the county and you're taking sixty days one year, a hundred and five the next as a full time employee with the state, but you're not taking leave from your county office, you are essentially trying to work two full time jobs at the same time, and you're not able to really do that. So I think that's where my concern is is if you're unless you're taking leave from one job to go to the other job for a short period of time and then coming back, you're trying to serve two full time jobs at the same time, and you just you can't do that.

I mean, I you you can't. You can't when when the state's in session, the state's in session, and it gets really busy, and you can't be in two places at the same time. So I think that's where my my concern lies.

Representative Essela. We can't we can't hear you, Caroline.

Really? Yep.

We gotcha.

That is it. K. So so I worked down let's talk about the state reps positions and the and the county council positions and the two that are there. I have never seen two people work so hard in my entire life. And so I must say that for those two positions that held by the same person, we let the voters decide. Are they doing a good job or aren't they doing a good good job? And I think that's where the deciding factor is. As far as an employee, I, of course, know somebody that's an employee, and I know somebody that same employee is also an elected official, not a full time job. I don't see that as a conflict of interest. I think it works well.

And, again, there's ways if they are not working and not doing their job, they either get fired or they're not elected. I mean, it's simple. So I think we're going down a rabbit hole. We don't need to go down.

Okay. Great. Go ahead.

Thank you. I I believe I understand the intentions of commissioner Preston, and I believe that you are exactly where the people are at. I have had so many members of the public raise this issue and ask us to do something about it. I will be supporting this amendment. I think we can come to an agreement on language that meets, the intentions around, what the public is asking us to do.

I I I think that we have some admirable, representatives slash council members who are extremely hardworking, and I do not think this should be made a personal matter with them. I think this is a conflict of interest framework that protects the interest of the people, and that is what the people are asking for. They're asking for their interest to be protected, not to rely on the goodwill of any individual person, with regard to how hard they're willing to work. I've also heard from the public that they were not aware that when they voted for someone who held a county council position, that when they voted for them for state rep, they were not aware that they held the county council. They were thinking, oh, this is a name.

It's familiar. I voted for them in the past, and they were voting for who they thought was their state rep. They did not know that they held dual positions, and they were surprised and angry, frankly, to later find out that this person held both positions. So I I think that marketing, works, name recognition works, and the public is not always aware that last year they voted for this person for this position. They're on the ballot again this year for another position, and and they're not recognizing that unless it is clear. There's no disclaimer in the voters' pamphlet that makes sure the public is aware of this. So I believe this is where the people are at. Thank you for bringing this amendment, commissioner Preston. I will be supporting it.

Can get a motion on this?

Yeah. I'm gonna say something. I, I think it, is a bad practice to have two jobs like that. I think the the the voters get, probably shortchanged. That being said, I'm not gonna support this one. I I don't think I think it's up for the voters to decide. And in, case of a state rep, they get a chance every couple of years, and and so that's kinda where I'm at.

K. Can I get a motion on that?

Motion to advance proposal number eight.

Second.

I have a motion and, was Ben Reed the second?

Yeah. He was.

Okay. Great. Any further discussion?

I'd like to offer an amendment to make it, to remove county employees and to add outside employment for county electeds. So not just another elected position, but any outside employment outside of their elected.

Okay. So I have an amendment to the motion to, remove county employment.

Should that be two amendments for cleanliness?

I I mean, I don't think we technically need to amend. I can wordsmith it and bring it back. I don't think if we

We don't wanna okay.

Well, we're gonna need to vote on the amendment here. So, yeah. Why don't you make two amendments?

So we'll one at a time is the rule. So first one first. I would like to say instead of, no county elected officer shall hold any other office or other elected office just so they should not have other outside employment. And, I mean, we can I'm comfortable waiting it. Like, it can't be more than 50% of your income as an elected or whatever

it is. Yeah.

Okay. Do I have a second on the amendment?

Second.

Can I make a friendly amendment to that or friendly, offer to say not, another full time job? I think it's okay to have some part time work on the side, but I I wouldn't wanna prohibit people from having the ability to earn a little extra income if they wanted to, say, go and work at the Aqua Sox game as a concessionaire.

That I

don't think that's gonna Yeah.

Yeah.

That would be adorable if you're like, it's my county council member at the Aqua Sox game. I I fully friendly accepted. I think how we define that can be figured out later on.

Okay. So let's all those in favor.

Aye. Aye. Aye.

What are we voting on?

That's a great question, Sean.

So on on the amendment to say not just a second elected office, but outside full time employment.

Yeah. Okay. So let's, let's revote that.

You want

me to call the roll on

on this?

Speak to the amendment? I'm sorry.

Yes. Go ahead.

Aren't there elected officers whose county job is a very small percentage of their work? Like, maybe it's only 25% of their of their time. Are there any county elected positions that are 100% that are considered?

I

yeah. Yeah. I know in the city. I mean, on this Success. At a city level, of course, the council members are very part time.

I think all elected counties are full time. Right? Okay. Yeah. Success. Okay. Peter, can you give us a roll call vote on that?

Toyer? Nay. Fannie?

Nay.

No. This is on the amendment.

Gregerson? Chatters? Yes. O'Donnell? No. Cass? No. Decker? Preston?

Yes.

Dodd? Yes. Menke?

Yes.

K Mink? No. James? No.

Hailey? I'm a no. Do you wanna do your second amendment?

That did get six, though. Did that get six? Yeah. That got six votes.

But it didn't pass the amendment.

How many do we need to pass an amendment?

Well, it would be majority. Right?

Oh, is that what okay.

Yeah. Yeah.

Okay.

I'm not a Robert's rules expert, but I do it sometimes.

You didn't pass. The amendment does pass.

Yeah.

The other one was to strike county employees. I feel like we are really at risk of taking a full time county employee with a fire commission, city council, you know, whatever it is, and saying, nope, you can't do that anymore, which feels too restrictive. I don't know that that was the intent with refined language to say not like a second full time or majority time position, I'd be okay with that. But I just really worry we're really needing a lot of people. Okay.

So that's a second proposed amendment. Is there a second? And I have a second from commissioner Gregers.

So the amendment is to strike or employee?

Yeah.

Okay. Any discussion on that that one? Okay. Let's see if we can do a a vocal, vote on this. All those in favor? Aye. Aye. Any opposed?

Nay. No.

Okay. Roll call for me there.

Dyer? Nay. Vanny? Aye. Gregerson? Chatters? Yes. O'Donnell? Yes. Cass?

No.

Decker? Preston? Yeah. Yes. Dodd? Yes. Menke?

Yes.

K Mink? Eslik?

No.

James?

Nope.

Gaily? No. 1234567. Seven yeses. It's a tie.

Ties fail. Right?

Ties fail.

Ties fail. But Minh Minh fails. Alright. Let's go back to the original motion. Any further discussion on the original motion, which is to pass proposal eight? Probably the most clarified motion we have so far. Okay. It could

get wordsmithed. Can it can get wordsmithed. It'll get Peter ized. Okay. Ready?

Alright. Let's go ahead. And all those in favor of, moving forward proposal eight, and we, this would be a five vote need.

Do you want me to call the roll on that? Sure. K. Toyer? Nay. Fannie? Nay. Gregerson?

Nay.

Chatters? Yes. O'Donnell? No. Cass?

Yes.

Decker? No. Preston? Yes. Dodd? No. Mankey? Yes. K Mink? Yes. Eslik? No. James? No. Kaylee? No. We have five yes.

You have five votes? Yes.

We do.

That moves forward then to the next round. Hey, Peter. Just clarification. Do we need to be out the door at 07:30 or prior to?

The all the doors will be locked at 07:30, and nobody will be able to come back in. So yes.

Could we leave? Because I wouldn't mind you know, we're gonna all hang out tonight all night if we're stuck inside.

Well, the meeting needs to end because of the of the OPMA.

Okay. I agree. That OPMA thing. Other people I would say that we probably don't have time to, what do you think, Patrick? Do you think we can do the proposal nine in five minutes? Yes. Okay. Let's do it.

So I'll introduce proposal nine. Essentially, this is a proposal related to the duties of the county auditor. Currently, in, most government, there is a lack of responsibility for any party and entity to own the decision about whether a candidate meets all required all requirements to be voted for and hold that office. This is simply saying that the county auditor would hold that responsibility for the county. So the auditor would be the person who would say, yes.

I certify that all of these individuals meet all the requirements to be elected and to hold office. Two separate things. And it simply has now designated an entity to hold that responsibility because that's currently lacking as we have found out recently quite frequently across the county. Simply put, that's where we're at.

Okay. Pros, cons, quickly. What was the one that we missed? You'd referred to something that's been an obvious problem.

So we had an Everett issue where an individual was not a resident, and it was basically common knowledge they were not a resident, but there was no body that would actually make the determination. I mean, nobody in an official status would say I think somebody's gonna speak to this. We also had it in Lynnwood where we had a resident Yeah. Who lived but moved out of the city. Everybody knew where the individual lived outside the city, but there was nobody that said, you no longer live here. Therefore, you are not qualified to continue holding office. This would now designate for the county who that what that office elected official would be so that they could make that determination on behalf of the public.

Okay. Jennifer?

In the Everett example, because there was not a step that's like, okay. Yep. You've been you're you meet these requirements, all the candidates were on the ballot, and it took a a court case to, like, say, do you what's your proof? Where's your, you know, sort of where's your utility bill that proves that your residency and kind of a a longer process? If it's something that had been had, like, a a step where there was a legal determination earlier in the process, it prob it would have helped voters sort of either way.

Maybe that person could have proved that right away, and so the their primary votes would have made more sense versus they got pulled from the ballot after the primary. And then the third place candidate, who's now our city council member Yes. With advanced.

Okay. Can we make a motion on this?

So moved.

There was a second. Second. Can I have a second discussion?

I have a a question. I appreciate how that would've this looks like it would handle the Everett example. But for the Linwood example, where they moved after running, is this something where you're envisioning that, like, a resident could ask for an investigation? Like, while serving if you move out of that district, what is the process to handle that, or is that not addressed in this?

The actual process is not only who the final determinant would be. There would have to be some process, and then Lynn would propose a process surrounding it of how it would actually work. All we're talking about here is not making a decision on what the process would look like, only who the determinant would be short of court proceedings. In in as a matter of fact, in Lynnwood, there is no requirement. You don't even have to show up with a utility bill. You can claim you are a resident of Lynnwood. And how do I prove how do you prove that I don't live in Lynnwood?

I've never tried.

But, yeah,

fair enough.

It's impossible to prove a negative. I could simply be sleeping on somebody's couch, and that counts as a resident of Lynnwood. And so this would place the responsibility to a purse, of a specific office to make that determination rather than whomever favors one way the other.

Give me thirty seconds.

Yes. Point of information. I read it as run for office. So at the time of election, not throughout the duration of serving. Is that accurate, commissioner Decker? That is your intention?

There is wordsmithing there that actually should have when I we're just running out of time. The wordsmithing is that to hold office and to retain office meeting all requirements. So, essentially, it's saying the person would judge whether you are qualified to run for office and whether you are qualified to hold office after elected if something changed in your circumstances. Okay. Well, again, we're not talking process. How would it come to that person, etcetera, etcetera? Process can be solved, but the intent is to identify the person who makes the call. You you were qualified to run. You're still qualified to hold the office. You were qualified to run. You're no longer qualified to hold office.

I wanna mention with regard to Everett, that situation, the argument of the candidate who did not live in the district was that they did not have to prove their address. Their word was good enough. So I will be supporting moving this forward for additional wordsmithing. Thank you.

With that, all in favor? Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. And any opposed? Excellent. Well done. Whoo. Five five and a half. Think I can do it. Five and a half ish.

I do have few item just quick items unless you wanted to do yours.

Let me do mine real quick. I am concerned on time and timing. I would listen to ideas of proposing that we start to meet weekly.

That was one of my ideas.

Start to meet weekly.

I'm on for that.

Could we get a budget estimate on just having security stay later too? I I will tell you that starts to conflict with a lot of other stuff Yeah. If we go weekly. I'd rather

I'd rather start early and

go late. Okay. So let me do this. We will get

Debbie says it's $55 an hour. $55 an hour.

So, I mean, for a $100, we could add two hours to the meeting.

And I'm okay with going later to Yep.

Yeah. $10.

And and I will say too, we are starting our process of outside meetings. So the April 8 meeting will be in Lake Stevens.