Now that committees are starting to meet and the Council has dealt with most of the substantive holdover legislation from last year, the waiting game begins for new legislation to start appearing. But first, we’ll hear about the city’s sweeps of unauthorized homeless encampments.
This week’s Introduction and Referral Calendar is a fairly tame beast: no legislation, but instead bill-paying and approving appointments. The most notable is Larry Weis as the new CEO of Seattle City Light, and even then it’s only controversial because of some disparaging remarks he made about his former employer, the City of Austin. His nomination will be taken up in Council member Sawant’s Energy and Environment Committee on January 26th.
Because of the Martin Luther King holiday, the regular Monday meetings — the council briefing and the full council meeting — are rescheduled for Tuesday. Tuesday’s regular committee meetings were bumped to Friday.
Probably the highlight of the week will be the Tuesday morning council briefing, which will include a briefing on the City of Seattle’s current (and controversial) “encampment removal protocols” aka “sweeps.” The council will also get an update on the state legislative session.
Wednesday afternoon’s Education, Equity and Governance Committee has a short agenda: review of three appointments.
Agendas have not yet been published for the Thursday and Friday committee meetings: Parks, Seattle Center, Libraries and Waterfront; Planning, Land Use and Zoning; and Sustainability and Transportation. The Sustainability and Transportation Committee is likely to take up an item from last week’s Introduction and Referral Calendar: CF 314388, a petition to vacate several alleyways for the expansion of the Washington State Trade and Convention Center.