Port of Seattle Commission Meeting February 25, 2020 Postgame

**[00:30] President Steinbrueck —** Good afternoon, everyone. This is Commission President Peter Steinbrueck reconvening the regular meeting of February 25th, 2020. The time is now 12:06. We are meeting at the conference center at Sea-Tac International Airport. Present with me today are Commissioners Calkins, Cho, and Felleman. We expect Commissioner Bowman momentarily. We begin today’s meeting by acknowledging the indigenous peoples of the Duwamish and Coast Salish, who have stewarded these beautiful lands and waters since time immemorial. We must commit to doing the same for the planet and for generations to come. This meeting is being digitally recorded and may be viewed or heard at any time on the Port’s website, and may be broadcast by King County Television. Please stand for the Pledge of Allegiance.

*[Pledge of Allegiance]*

**[01:56] President Steinbrueck —** Okay, item number three, approval of the agenda. Executive Director, is there anything we need to amend on the agenda? Are there any motions to add or rearrange the orders of the day, or requests to remove items from the consent agenda calendar? Is there a motion to amend? Hearing no motion to revise the agenda, please show the preliminary agenda approved without objection.

**[02:52] [Commissioner] —** I’m sorry — my glasses on here. I’d like to table item 8A.

**[03:00] President Steinbrueck —** There’s been a motion. Is there a second to table item 8A?

**[03:08] [Commissioner] —** Second.

**[03:08] President Steinbrueck —** It’s been moved and seconded. All those in favor, say aye. [Aye.] Opposed, say nay. Motion carries — item 8A is tabled. And, Clerk, typically under the rules you table to a specific future meeting; you don’t just table indefinitely under Robert’s Rules of Order.

**[03:31] Clerk (Paul White) —** Thank you for that, Commissioner. Because of the structure of the Port Commission, postponing indefinitely and postponing to a time certain have the same effect — the item will not be taken up during today’s session. So it’s not absolutely necessary to explain when it’s going to come back on the agenda.

**[04:03] President Steinbrueck —** But it probably is. Okay, that’s all I want to declare.

**[04:10] [Commissioner] —** May I add, for the record, I’d like to take this up as soon as possible because I think it’s important.

**[04:18] President Steinbrueck —** So we specify the next meeting. What’s the date, so we don’t delay this?

**[04:18] Clerk (Paul White) —** The next regular meeting would be March 10th. If that could be a friendly amendment to the motion makers.

**[04:27] [Commissioner] —** I don’t think we even need an amendment — just an intention to bring it up.

**[04:36] President Steinbrueck —** All right, March 10th. That addresses that issue. And I think we’ve approved the amended agenda. Executive Director’s report, item four.

**[04:43] Executive Director Metruck —** Commissioners, good afternoon. I’d like to begin by sharing five announcements. Recently the Port held its third annual Innovation Awards recognition event. Cultivating innovation throughout the Port is critical to our success as an organization. For this award we received 13 nominations representing innovative and collaborative projects by over 100 Port employees, all 11 Port Employee Resource Groups, and hundreds of college and high school interns. The winner was the media washing machine, also voted by employees as the People’s Choice Award winner. No, this is not a fake-news cleansing algorithm — it’s a machine to remove gunk from oyster shells used as filters for stormwater runoff. These machines were constructed by teams in Marine Maintenance from old spare parts, and were very inventive in making sure the oyster shells were used effectively.

The event also included the fourth-quarter winner, the Pier 66 shore power submarine cable project, which identified an innovative approach to bringing shore power to our cruise terminal at 66 — less expensive and with less impact on waterfront businesses, pedestrians, vehicles, and utilities. The honorable mention for stakeholder impacts went to the Shilshole Bay Marina interactive real-time map project, which will increase customer satisfaction, improve operational efficiency, and increase revenue.

Since we last met, our airport had its annual FAA inspection, also known as the Part 139 — a mandatory, extremely comprehensive four-day, one-night inspection that touches almost everything we do on the airfield. Impressively, the airport passed with no findings for a second year in a row. This is a very rare occurrence for any airport, and it speaks to the extremely high-caliber team, headed by Lance Lyttle, that we have at the airport in multiple disciplines. Please join me in recognizing our staff who work diligently behind the scenes to keep Sea-Tac operating safely daily.

**[07:05] [Commissioner] —** Could I just ask the airport staff to please stand up? I know there’s more than that — they’re a modest group to boot.

**[07:24] Executive Director Metruck —** On another issue, our staff at the airport and the seaport have been working hard monitoring the impacts of the coronavirus, COVID-19, on our operations. As you know, the Port follows the guidance of public health experts — the federal CDC, Customs and Border Protection, the U.S. Coast Guard on the maritime side, Washington State Department of Health, and Public Health Seattle-King County. During any public health incident we rely on these officials for the latest risk analysis and scientifically proven steps to keep employees and our community safe. Since the implementation of restrictions, CBP and CDC have screened hundreds of incoming passengers for signs of coronavirus infection. So far no additional infections have been found, and we’re continuing to coordinate with federal, state, and local representatives.

In response to the virus, we continue our use of disinfectants in cleaning high-touch areas, and are making more hand sanitizers available in our international arrivals Federal Inspection Service area. We’re continuing our sensitivity analysis for economic impacts of COVID-19. It appears revenue impact will come from lower spending in the airport — parking, taxis, TNCs, meals, gifts, and other items. At present, our financial operating reserve can cover these amounts. The lower spending results from our limited number of affected flights into China, which account for a reduction of 0.3 to 0.4 percent of travelers, limiting this year’s overall growth slightly year-to-date.

Switching to the cruise industry: Royal Caribbean has announced an added itinerary from Seattle for 2020 with their vessel the Millennium. Norwegian Cruise Line reported canceled cruises in other parts of the world, but cancellation rates have leveled off. A survey indicates over 60 percent of cruise travel booking agents are seeing a slowdown in advance bookings in other regions. Many travelers are waiting to see if the virus concerns continue, so we’re monitoring how it will impact our upcoming cruise season. Respondents indicated they believe North American cruises are safest. As a financial backstop, we have minimum annual guarantees in place on our leases. We’ll continue to monitor and report as impacts are felt.

**[10:19] [Commissioner] —** I think it’s important to note the MAGs that exist, so the impact on us is mitigated somewhat by that. But I was under the understanding that a cruise line is going to show up early while our factory trawler is still in place, and therefore there wasn’t a slip for them, and it would sit at anchor in Elliott Bay. Is that right?

**[10:41] Executive Director Metruck —** That’s typically an operational question. I know we have a cruise ship coming in starting April 1st, but I’ll have to report back to you on that.

**[10:50] [Commissioner] —** I’m concerned by such a suggestion.

**[10:50] Executive Director Metruck —** We have done this before — we have done cruise ships at anchor.

**[10:58] [Commissioner] —** I assume if 66 is open they would use a berth.

**[10:58] Executive Director Metruck —** I’ll look into that.

**[11:06] [Commissioner] —** I had a similar question about flights canceled to Asia. There’s probably no way, without speculation, to identify when flights might be restored or what would be required.

**[11:23] Executive Director Metruck —** I think it’s a combination of demand and the travel limitations put in place by the federal government.

**[11:37] [Commissioner] —** So a lot of uncertainty there still. I’d just ask that we be kept updated on additional flights that might be canceled. Right now it’s limited to China, but South Korea and other places are also considering the same. So if we could be updated on what the airlines are thinking — whether they’ll be proactive in canceling flights, or if the FAA or CDC suggests cancellation — I’d like to be updated.

**[12:00] Executive Director Metruck —** It becomes a combination of which flights — the China flights were canceled, but they’re also decreased based on demand. We’ll report on those developments as we go forward.

Commissioners, I’d also like to point out recent activities around the proposed new cruise facility at Terminal 46. As you may recall, we launched our SEPA EIS scoping period last fall. Earlier this month we released the scoping report summarizing comments on the topics for environmental review. Last month we released a revised request for proposals to the shortlisted proposers being evaluated as potential investment and operating partners. Their responses were due February 20th, and the evaluation team is reviewing what was received. The revised RFP included new language requiring homeport cruise vessels at the new berth to be equipped with shore power and to use it when at berth. In addition, the Port required cargo-handling equipment to have zero tailpipe emissions, participation in regional air quality planning, and prohibition of discharges at berth. Staff looks forward to an update at the March 24th meeting.

Over at Shilshole Bay Marina, progress is being made on the remodel of the south and central customer service buildings. Each will provide 2,700 square feet with restrooms, showers, and laundry rooms, plus family units that are all ADA accessible. The laundry area is nearly double what’s currently on site. Solar panels will generate 70 percent of the heat needed, and radiant heat pumps will keep the spaces dry and warm. The Northwest restroom will be an 800-foot structure with gender-neutral restrooms and separate shower rooms. The new facilities are expected to open by May and are on budget.

Moving to today’s meeting, I want to highlight four items. Item 8A — action has been taken on that, so I’ll pass. Item 8B is an authorization for additional funding to the existing Sustainable Airport Master Plan, enabling continued work on the environmental review, including additional stakeholder outreach. And item 9A is an update from the Biometrics Working Group. Commissioners, this concludes my remarks.

**[14:35] President Steinbrueck —** Okay, thank you, Director Metruck. At this time we’ll begin an additional item — committee reports, if there are any. Our commission policy manager, Aaron Pritchard, has some updates on committee activities. Aaron.

**[14:51] Aaron Pritchard —** Good afternoon, Commissioners and Executive Director. I’ll go through each committee and touch lightly on the subject matters. All the recommendations and committee matters eventually come before the commission; this just allows commissioners to dig in on a couple of topics before public session.

The Aviation Committee met Tuesday, February 18th, and reviewed two topics: ground transportation at the airport, and the airline five-year CIP. The conversation on ground transportation focused on the policy directive passed last year, with lots of discussion about implementing a transportation management association, which will bring together all the employers around the airport to reduce single-occupancy travel, among other things. We’ll see talking points on how we can help employers approve commute-trip reduction. The airline five-year CIP focused on changes the aviation team is making in how they bring major projects forward — in packages and programs versus smaller projects — so you get a better view of what the airport’s doing.

You’ll hear more about the Biometrics special committee meeting; they reviewed the biometrics policy recommendations. The Audit Committee met on 2/11 and closed out a meeting on a single topic — architect and engineers contracting levels — and I believe that issue is now closed for the Audit Committee.

The Energy and Sustainability Committee met on 2/12 for a very interesting presentation from WSU on a long-term study on potential Northwest regional feedstock production for sustainable aviation fuels. Dr. Wolcott came up from WSU and we discussed it for almost two hours. The committee recommended this come to the full commission as soon as possible in a study session, because of the importance of the issue. In that study session we’ll look at some of the environmental subjects already done, short-term improvements coming out of the MOU group, and a full briefing from Dr. Wolcott and the team.

**[17:15] [Commissioner] —** Aaron, on that topic, it would be beneficial at some point to hear from Delta Airlines, which has also announced a study of potential feedstock sources that are local, sustainable, and meet the basic criteria we’re seeking. I think they committed up to $2 million for that work here in Washington State. I’d like an update on that work as well, so we could share best practices and the research done here.

**[17:47] [Commissioner] —** That’s great. The WSU study was funded by the Port — we specifically tasked them to do that. As far as the biofuel, the cellulosic forestry products, Southwest Washington seems to be the richest area, and there might actually be dovetailing with Delta’s analysis too.

**[18:11] [Commissioner] —** It’s always good if folks concur. Industry voice is particularly important here as well.

**[18:19] Aaron Pritchard —** It definitely spurred some interest around municipal solid waste as well — a big outcome of the study.

The Equity and Workforce Development Committee reviewed a proposed workforce development policy, getting the concepts down so we can bring forward a briefing to the full commission, now pushed to March 24th. We also have community meetings in the April timeframe. That policy is under development, and we hope to review it back through the committee to see the proposed changes in short order.

**[18:51] [Commissioner] —** Will that work be informed at all by the memorandum of understanding with the city and county under Priority Hire, and the likelihood of an eventual interlocal agreement? Is that tied in with the Workforce Development Committee’s work program?

**[19:19] Aaron Pritchard —** They are related. Some of the analysis we’re getting from Legal will help us look at those contracts, but it’s not going to direct that work — those contracts are already functioning. So they have a relation.

**[19:35] President Steinbrueck —** All right, any other questions?

**[19:35] Aaron Pritchard —** I’ll just finish up. The Arts and Culture Board met and discussed the 2020 work plan and received updates on several ongoing art installations.

**[19:43] President Steinbrueck —** Always so important. I look forward to future reports that help expand transparency and the deliberative process here at the Port Commission. Thank you, Aaron.

**[19:51] Aaron Pritchard —** Thank you, Commissioner.

**[19:51] Executive Director Metruck —** I can give you a real-time update on the cruise vessel: it will not be at anchor. It will be at Terminal 91, plugging into shore power.

**[20:08] President Steinbrueck —** Clarification, good. Thanks. With that, we’re moving on to item five, public comment.

Here’s the public comment section. Speaker IDs here are solid — nearly everyone self-identifies by name and affiliation. I’ve kept a timestamp anchor at each turn.

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**[20:15] President Steinbrueck —** The commission will now accept public comment. Any written materials can be given to the Clerk for distribution to commissioners. If you wish to speak, please sign in and identify the specific item you are addressing. We’ll limit comment to two minutes per person, and we’ll begin with Jordan Van Voast.

**[20:37] [Commissioner] —** If I might, before you get started, sir — I just wanted to let President Steinbrueck know I’ve been subpoenaed to testify at a hearing, so I might have to walk out abruptly. If I walk out during anybody’s testimony, I apologize — it’s nothing personal.

**[20:53] Jordan Van Voast —** Good afternoon, Commissioners and staff. My name is Jordan Van Voast. I’m a licensed acupuncturist and co-president of the Dharma Friendship Foundation. I’m here to comment on the T-46 project. I sent you an email with a long list of concerns; I’ll limit it to the fuel for cruise ships. To the extent the cruise ships participate in the fossil fuel economy, all of these risks apply as part of the consequences of fossil fuels.

I did a little research on where the oil for Seattle’s cruise ships originates. The best I can figure, it comes from the North Slope of Alaska, is pumped to Valdez via the pipeline, and shipped via tanker along the same route the Exxon Valdez took in 1989, when it dumped 11 million gallons into Prince William Sound. That area is still recovering — you can still find oil oozing out of the sand. Orcas, pigeon guillemots, and one other animal haven’t recovered yet, according to science. Some of the oil may come from the Canadian tar sands, an environmental disaster of epic proportions. At each stage of this process there are multiple risks for oil spills, and with the Trans Mountain pipeline coming, they predict a 700 percent increase in tanker traffic through the same channels up through the San Juans, which are quite treacherous in any weather. It’s only a matter of time before there’s some kind of collision. We pray these things don’t happen, but accidents do happen — cruise ship involved or not. When we’re dealing with fossil fuels, we’re putting ourselves into that whole system. Thank you very much.

**[23:08] President Steinbrueck —** Thank you, Jordan. Our next speaker is Cynthia Speece, followed by Jennifer Lee.

**[23:33] Cynthia Speece —** Hi, I’m Cynthia Speece, an independent security researcher and Seattle resident. My comments are regarding biometric air exit — the use of biometric technology at the Port of Seattle. It’s a disturbing precedent, backed by a publicly elected commission. Make no mistake: this technology will not be contained. This lays the foundation for a future dystopian world where everyone’s movements are tracked and logged.

The Port is being two-faced, since RFP 19-86 was open for bids before any approval or policy requirements on the use of biometric technology had been finalized by the commission. The Port’s biometric report itself uses wording throughout that assumes not only that the commission will grant approval, but that such approval would support existing CBP implementations unaltered. Together, this implies Port staff are close-minded and biased against the concerns raised by the public, and that this whole process — especially the Biometrics External Advisory Group — is nothing but a pointless charade, with Port staff and commissioners ready to rubber-stamp anything airlines or CBP requests.

I’d like to point out that Congress did not mandate that anyone, including foreign nationals, be required to give their biometric data to airline or cruise ship companies. If CBP needs the data, CBP should be the one gathering it. The Port is under no requirement to operate this technology on behalf of CBP. Regarding the principle of voluntary, the report states two problems: the opt-in/opt-out procedure and unintended image capture. However, none of the Port’s own recommendations address the opt-in/opt-out problem, and none under the principle of transparency address the insufficient or non-existent opt-out signage or communication from CBP. CBP’s own materials show their plan for biometric tracking of all travelers — citizen and non-citizen, international and domestic. So it’s in CBP’s own interests and goals to have poor signage and poor communication; they have no reason to help travelers or the Port thwart them. CBP is not your friend. They’re not your partner. They’re paying you lip service. Don’t rubber-stamp the use of mugshots at the Port. Thank you.

**[25:30] President Steinbrueck —** Thank you. Jennifer Lee, followed by Stan Shikuma.

**[25:42] Jennifer Lee —** Good morning, Commissioners. My name is Jennifer Lee, and I’m the Tech and Liberty Manager at the ACLU of Washington. I’d like to thank the Port of Seattle Commission for being the first port in the country to push for a conversation on whether face surveillance technology is compatible with our democracy and civil liberties. However, as a member of the Biometrics External Advisory Group, I’d like to raise concerns on both the policymaking process and the recommendations for air exit.

First, we’re concerned that while we are in the very process of determining if and how the Port should allow facial recognition, the Port has already posted an RFP for shared-use, Port-owned facial recognition systems for airline use at departure gates at Sea-Tac. Though we’ve been told the sole purpose of the RFP is market research, the text of the RFP itself states that the Port is already committed to helping CBP install a biometric air exit system and that it “supports the industry trend of using facial recognition.” Commissioners who voted for the resolution on biometrics adopted December 10th, 2019, stated the resolution was intended to leave open all possibilities, including that the Port might not permit deployment of any public-facing biometrics. There is a contradiction here. The Port cannot legally state it is committed to deploying a permanent biometric system to prospective bidders while stating to the advisory group and the public that no commitments have been made.

Second, the Port staff draft recommendations on air exit recommend that the Port work collaboratively with CBP and airlines to roll out facial recognition. We strongly disagree. The Port should not be facilitating the infrastructural expansion of face surveillance technology that is rife with race and gender biases. Even if this technology were perfectly accurate, its use poses great threats to constitutionally protected rights and civil liberties. The Department of Homeland Security and the aviation industry have explicitly stated their common vision of widespread deployment of face surveillance. In our non-transparent system, where data is increasingly shared between public and private entities, it is difficult if not impossible for travelers to meaningfully consent to provide biometric information to some entities but not others. The Port should not provide cover for CBP to roll out its mass collection of biometric data. We ask the Port to reject participation in facilitating the expansion of face surveillance. Thank you.

**[28:17] President Steinbrueck —** Thank you. Stan Shikuma, followed by Elena Perez.

**[28:25] Stan Shikuma —** Good afternoon, Commissioners. I’m Stan Shikuma, president of the Seattle chapter of the Japanese American Citizens League, one of the oldest and largest civil rights organizations among Asian Pacific Islanders. I was quite happy at the beginning of this session that we all pledged to one nation with liberty and justice for all. I hope that was not a pro forma pledge and that we all take it to heart.

I’m here to offer a cautionary tale about biometrics — face surveillance in particular — and unintended consequences. In 1942, 78 years and six days ago, the President signed Executive Order 9066, which authorized the military to declare certain zones and clear people out of them, whether citizens or not. There is nothing in that order that specifies Japanese and Japanese Americans would be the ones affected. However, that is exactly how it was implemented. General DeWitt and his assistant Karl Bendetsen — who incidentally hailed from Aberdeen, Washington — wrote and promulgated the orders that cleared people out of the West Coast, including all of Western Washington, all the way to the Columbia River, for the duration of the war. This is the largest violation of constitutional civil rights in the history of this country.

Today we face arguments again of national security, and on the economic side, of efficiency in propagating new technologies. I would caution the commission that for marginalized communities — communities of color, Muslims, the poor — these are not incidental consequences. For most of us in this room, if we think of something bad happening with facial recognition, we think we’re going to miss a flight or ruin a vacation. But for marginalized communities, they’re thinking: we’re going to get arrested, we’re going to get deported, we’re going to be separated from our families. I hope you will take this into serious consideration whenever you decide on facial technology. Thank you.

**[31:02] President Steinbrueck —** Thank you. Elena Perez, followed by Andrew Kita.

**[31:14] Elena Perez —** Elena Perez, with Puget Sound Sage. I want to start by saying I was very encouraged in December to hear Port commissioners calling for greater transparency and accountability in response to decisions being made about facial recognition technology at the airport, and I’m very excited to have you here, Commissioner Cho, to continue this conversation.

On December 10th we urged you to defer action on the motion. We felt you had not fully heard from civil liberties and data surveillance experts, or from the communities most impacted, and that request was denied. Instead, a Biometrics External Advisory Group was established to respond to our concerns about lack of transparency and accountability. But that group, intended to be a space for community stakeholders, has instead been overwhelmingly stacked with industry and agency representatives who have already expressed their interest in having facial recognition at the Port. In fact, two corporations that stand to profit directly from this decision — Microsoft and Amazon — have seats at that table. These two are not obvious stakeholders at the Port, and they have a track record of lobbying in opposition to strong privacy regulations around surveillance technology.

To date, the impact of biometrics on communities of color, immigrants, and refugees has not been fully explored, and you still have not received substantive feedback on this issue. We urge you to not allow any further action by Port officials to lay the groundwork for facial recognition — like the RFP — until you hold a robust public hearing dedicated to this issue. We know that you as individuals are deeply concerned and feel obligated to protect the public. We are asking you today to take back control of this process and help the public achieve clarity about what you, the commissioners, are moving forward and what you are not. Thank you very much.

**[33:20] President Steinbrueck —** Thank you. Andrew — is it Kittle or Riddle? Sorry.

**[33:28] Andrew Kita —** It’s Andrew Kita.

**[33:28] President Steinbrueck —** Thank you, Andrew. I’m sorry for that.

**[33:37] Andrew Kita —** No worries. My name is Andrew Kita. I’m a resident of South Seattle and a member of 350 Seattle’s leadership team. I’m here to ask you to put real sustainability back in the Sustainable Airport Master Plan process. Real sustainability means clean air for the kids in South King County who must now breathe the ultrafine particles and other pollution that rains down from the flight path. Real sustainability means a stable climate for kids all over the world who are looking at a life lived in an escalating climate emergency.

Make no mistake — we already live in a climate emergency. It’s not like other emergencies; the communities hit rarely think disaster is around the corner. People in Australia were enjoying spring last October, unaware that in a few months they’d be driven to the edge of their continent by raging fires. People in Paradise, California thought they were living in paradise until the Camp Fire destroyed their town. People in Houston thought things were fine before Hurricane Harvey caused $125 billion in damage. I could go on. The climate emergency is like a Russian roulette gun, and the more climate pollution we emit, the more ammunition we put in that gun. The resulting disasters will be increasingly frequent and devastating.

We must stop pretending we can meet anticipated aviation demand over the next 30 years. Unconstrained aviation demand is projected to skyrocket, and along with it the associated climate pollution, which by recent estimate could grow to 27 percent of climate pollution by 2050. We have a choice. We can add more ammunition to the climate Russian roulette gun, or we can say enough is enough. It’s time to make the future safe for our kids. It’s time to say no to airport expansion.

**[35:45] President Steinbrueck —** Okay, thank you. Bernadine Lund, followed by Monty Anderson.

**[35:59] Bernadine Lund —** Hello, my name is Bernadine Lund. I live in Federal Way and I’m a member of Quiet Skies Puget Sound, also associated with 350 Seattle. For the last several months I’ve wanted to talk about the SAMP. I want to thank you for extending the time on the SAMP so that all the appropriate elements can be included, including a revised demand forecast.

The SAMP demand forecast shows an increase in both 2027 and 2032, but it does not show the increases since 2012 with the addition of the Third Runway. Showing all of these increases in comparison to what was originally projected would show that you are serious about getting a fair evaluation from the NEPA and SEPA reviews. The FAA only considers emissions for a few miles during an airplane takeoff, which is very misleading. Instead, you could calculate the greenhouse gases based on the amount of fuel pumped, which would give a more accurate picture of the airport’s impact on local and global communities. Once in the upper atmosphere, the gases and pollution circle the world. I don’t know how many people here remember Mount St. Helens blowing up, but I was in the area, and the smoke did circle — it ended up going across the country.

Rather than always projecting increases in flights, I suggest you have a SAMP that shows you’re maintaining steady scores. Why does it have to show increases? It could just say we’re holding steady, or even decreasing. That would reduce pollution. You could hold flights steady or reduce them until there are less polluting modes of transportation. Some cities are saying no to increases — Mexico City just said no to an increase on September 11th. I challenge you to look at other forms of transportation and think of other ways you can use the airport. Thank you.

**[38:14] President Steinbrueck —** Thank you. Monty, you’re up next — Monty Anderson, followed by David Goebel.

**[38:32] Monty Anderson —** Thank you. I keep wanting to call you CEO, but what’s your title, Steve?

**[38:38] Executive Director Metruck —** Executive Director.

**[38:38] Monty Anderson —** Thank you, Commissioners, for letting me speak. I came down today to touch on a couple of things. I want to once again thank you for your partnership. We have thousands of people out here working, making a fair wage with family health care, paid time off, vacation pay, grievance — and it’s very important to the community. I think people realize the Port is a huge generator and one of the best employers we have in this area. We have great numbers for apprenticeship, and I appreciate you folks and Workforce Development.

I wanted to comment briefly — I was talking with Commissioner Bowman about maybe an idea where we could have some in-house glaziers work on some of the local houses that are getting insulated from sound. I’d be very interested in meeting with the Port to find out if we could get more people from the community into these good-paying apprenticeships and work here at the Port. If there’s an opportunity, we’re open to work with you. Thank you very much.

**[39:47] President Steinbrueck —** Okay, thank you.

**[40:02] David Goebel —** My name is David Goebel. I’m the president of the 501(c)(3) Vashon First. I come today to speak on agenda item 7A, an update from the Port’s noise office. As all of you and a lot of people watching from home know by now, we’ve been engaged in a long struggle to get noise monitors on Vashon Island due to the implementation of NextGen. To this end, thank you again for Motion 2019-14, passed last November. However, since then the process concerning the noise monitor has been completely opaque, so I can only presume it’s making forward progress — this in spite of the most relevant elected government body on Vashon, the Vashon Park District, attempting to provide input by passing an official resolution. We don’t have a city; we’re unincorporated.

I would ask that the Port of Seattle find some way within its bylaws to deputize me personally to work more directly with the noise office on the Vashon noise monitor. I’m not looking for a badge or anything like that — just your blessing to volunteer my time, experience, and motivation to help bring about our shared goal of the most effective monitor siting and operation. My educational background is in physics and my professional background is in software engineering. I have a lot to offer, so please let me help. Finally, I need to take off — I have a two o’clock meeting at Microsoft in Redmond. So if I leave before other people have made public comment, or during the 7A presentation, please take no disrespect. Like Commissioner Bowman, I have something else I have to run to.

**[41:28] President Steinbrueck —** All right, thank you, David. Next speaker is Ernest Thompson, followed by J.C. Harris.

**[41:46] Ernest Thompson —** Nice to see you, Sam — I’m glad you got elected. I just barely got to hyperport level to get through two minutes here. First, I’d like to say — Mr. Kita and the 350 organization — I’d like to double down on that. It’s time to start thinking about not expanding Sea-Tac but downsizing or changing it, at least from Sea-Tac Airport to Sea-Tac Hyperport.

The state of Ohio — the Northeast Ohio Areawide Coordinating Agency — just committed $1.2 million to a feasibility study for a hyperloop between Chicago and Cleveland. At 300-plus miles, doing it at 700 miles an hour, that would be 28 minutes. They’re already at the EIS stage, and now apparently Pennsylvania and New York want to join in up there. Also, in June of last year, the Department of Transportation approved $5 million to do a budget study for hyperloop in general. It is time for us to get on board. It amazes me that with the budget the Port of Seattle has, we’re still, in our ever-so-progressive state, doing nothing. We can be using our airport people to prepare for that. We also have Boeing — instead of making jets, they should be making hyperport, because at the end of the day, in terms of domestic travel, it’s clear to rational thinkers and scientists that jets are actually zombies. They’re dead; they just don’t know it.

The other thing I want to bring up quickly is the coronavirus. There’s a website I’d recommend you take a look at. It’s for medical professionals, but I’m sure you’re all highly educated and can follow it — it’s medcram.com. They have daily updates on the big picture and medical issues surrounding coronavirus and where it is in real time. The N95 mask — my question is for the Executive Director: do you have quantities of those that you can give to your employees here, because you cannot get them on the open market now? I bring that up because as I was walking up the stairs, I noticed one of the Asian air crews was completely wearing masks and nobody else was. That creates an atmosphere of panic. Thank you.

**[44:17] President Steinbrueck —** Thank you. J.C. Harris, followed by Liza Rankin.

**[44:27] J.C. Harris —** Good afternoon, Commissioners. I have three asks in two minutes. First of all, thank you for your support of HB 2315, the Port Package update bill, and thank you for getting off the dime on the Port Package program in general in today’s presentation.

The first ask: I’d appreciate it if you would read the report I sent to former President Bowman six months ago, when she asked me about the history of the Port Packages — why the system had so many problems in the beginning. In 25 words or less, I’ll just tell you: it’s the old engineering aphorism — you can have it fast, cheap, or good; pick two. The Port was under tremendous pressure to provide systems for up to ten thousand homes as a predicate to doing the Third Runway, and that’s why we are where we are today.

Second: I basically got this whole Port Package thing rolling three years ago by canvassing about 3,000 homes in the area and all the AIP grant contractor invoices. We vetted the worst of the worst — we’ve done all of the triage. So when the bill gets passed, God willing, we will have a list for you of priorities. You’re going to need to decide who to do first. What I want is for you to look at our list and take it into consideration in prioritizing which systems to work on first. These people deserve it. We’ve already done 99 percent of the vetting.

Finally, my third ask: I would like my group — since we have identified all of the homes — to have a seat at the table with your noise program when they’re rolling out this program. You have not done anything to this scale in over a decade, and the community deserves to be able to watch and have a voice in how you scale up. It will give them the confidence that things are going to go better next time. I am preparing a memo for Director Metruck, and I look forward to a positive reply. Thank you.

**[47:15] President Steinbrueck —** Thank you, J.C. Liza Rankin, followed by Bernard Koontz. And I might say — Councilmember Harris, thank you for your upcoming participation on the advocacy trip to D.C.

**[47:36] Liza Rankin —** Hi, my name is Liza Rankin. I’m on the school board in Seattle Public Schools, and I’m also a born-and-raised, lifelong Seattleite. I came today prepared to listen to a conversation about the Maritime and Marine Science High School, but apparently that item has been moved. So instead I’ll take the opportunity to speak a little about my support of it, as a citizen of the area and as a school board director. To clarify, I’m here as a school board director but not speaking on behalf of the full board — we were just told about this meeting yesterday and mobilized to come down.

While I was campaigning, I was able to participate in Commissioner Calkins’ summit about the Maritime High School, and it’s really exciting to me, both as a Seattle citizen and as someone who writes policy for education. In our region, which is defined by its waterways, we have the potential for this opportunity to better engage the young people of our communities in the stewardship, knowledge, and active participation of taking care of and learning about our oceans and waterways. As a school board director, the potential for partnerships between the different entities is extremely exciting. I know Highline School District has expressed great interest in leading this project, which we are highly supportive of. The opportunities for our students, especially those furthest from educational justice, to access this kind of education and to be empowered as great stewards, with pathways to really great careers, is extremely exciting. I’d actually like to see it come down even into K-5 — engaging students in knowing about your work and about the ocean that supports all of us. So thank you very much.

**[49:54] President Steinbrueck —** Thanks. Bernard Koontz.

**[50:06] Bernard Koontz —** Good afternoon, Port Commissioners. My name is Bernard Koontz, and I lead the design and secondary instruction in Highline Public Schools. I’m here today to express Highline’s continued enthusiasm, support, and gratitude for the Port’s leadership in maritime education. Highline Public Schools appreciate the Port’s leadership in convening stakeholders to collaborate for the common interests of our students and the economic vitality of the region.

Specifically, I appreciate the alignment of the Port and Highline’s shared values around racial equity, highlights of which were shared at your last public meeting, and the work of your Office of Equity, Diversity and Inclusion. This is also evident in Highline’s recent equity policy, shared across the other partners being brought together. Highline is bold and innovative — the Maritime High School is an example of this, focusing on partnerships and career-oriented learning. Additionally, Highline’s bold goal to have all students graduate bilingual and biliterate is an example of our commitment to equity — specifically valuing who our students are and who they can be. With our experience and innovative approach, we are very excited to embark on launching this new school. As we enter the next phase of planning, we’ll begin tackling a thousand and one details and logistics, and through that work I know our common focus on equity will be our guide. I look forward to the ongoing work and the many benefits it will yield. Thank you.

**[51:34] President Steinbrueck —** Thank you. Unless there are others signed up — I don’t see that there are — that concludes our public comment session.

**[51:43] [Commissioner] —** I also want to acknowledge we’ve got former board member Jill Geary here, who has been instrumental in crafting the model selected by the advisory group. So thank you for coming, too.

**[51:58] President Steinbrueck —** Thank you. So we’ll now advance the consent calendar. I don’t believe there are any items requested to be removed. With that, the chair will entertain a motion to approve the consent calendar covering items 6A through 6E. Is there a motion?

**[52:22] [Commissioner] —** So moved.

**[52:22] [Commissioner] —** Second.

**[52:22] President Steinbrueck —** Moved and seconded. All those in favor, say aye. [Aye.] Opposed, nay. The motion carries; the consent calendar is approved. That brings us to agenda item 7A, noise programs briefing.

Noise Programs Briefing

Got the corrected spellings — **Lance Lyttle**, **Stan Shepherd**, **Arlyn Purcell**. I’ll apply those retroactively when we assemble the final `jch-` file, and use them from here on.

Picking up mid-sentence where 7A cut off:

—

**[59:00] Stan Shepherd —** *(continuing)* To start at the top, we have what we call a late-night noise limitations program, grounded in 2019 as a way to reduce noise from the loudest aircraft operating during nighttime hours. We established noise thresholds around the airport; aircraft that fly over those monitors and break that threshold are identified, and we contact those airlines to either remove those aircraft from nighttime hours or switch to quieter aircraft.

**[59:31] [Commissioner] —** And that’s a voluntary program, is it not?

**[59:31] Stan Shepherd —** Yes, it is.

**[59:31] [Commissioner] —** I just wanted us to be clear about that.

**[59:31] Stan Shepherd —** Very good point. One success: Eva Airlines recently gave us exciting news that they’ll be switching out the triple-seven aircraft during nighttime hours to a 787, a dramatic noise reduction. The other program is the runway use agreement, where we’re trying to reduce use of the Third Runway during nighttime hours. Working with the FAA, we went from approximately 20 aircraft flying into that Third Runway on approaches during nighttime hours to approximately one or two. Another success. We’re also undertaking a ground noise study now to figure out what noises are being emitted from the airport and whether there are ways to mitigate them — whether through operational procedures we can change or physical structures. We also have, on our 34R glide slope, a slightly lower glide slope than the rest based on some very old technology, so we’re looking at ways to increase that.

This one just gives you an idea of what we do in the office — we track every aircraft that comes into and out of the airport. I call it noise art, but it’s just showing every aircraft on approach. This is a South Flow operation: the red lines are approaching the airport, the green lines are departures. Each line represents an aircraft, and we know the statistics on that.

We also have what we call Part 150, the section of the FAA regulation that guides our Port noise programs. As long as we’re accepting grant money for noise programs, we have to follow the Part 150. It’s an opportunity to evaluate all our noise programs and see if there’s something we could do better. When we undertake a Part 150, we evaluate the noise impacts within the community and try to find ways to mitigate. Eligible mitigation includes residential housing and some public buildings for sound insulation. Once the FAA approves our mitigation plan, it provides us the ability to apply for FAA funding grants at approximately 80 percent of project value.

**[1:02:16] [Commissioner Calkins] —** Stan, a quick question. According to the memo, before 2014 the previous Part 150 was 1985 — is that correct?

**[1:02:25] Stan Shepherd —** No. The previous Part 150 before the 2014 was completed in 2002.

**[1:02:36] [Commissioner Calkins] —** Okay, that wasn’t in the memo. So when would be the next one?

**[1:02:36] Steve Rybold —** I’ll address that, because there’s overlap with the environmental review. As part of the environmental review for the SAMP near-term projects, we’ll be preparing noise contours, and those contours will show whether there’s been a change from the ones Stan is about to show you, and where. Based on that, we’ll coordinate with the FAA on the decision to formally update the maps for Part 150 and then do a Part 150 program. I don’t know the exact timing, but that was your question.

**[1:03:19] [Commissioner Calkins] —** So hypothetically — let’s say the contours became narrower because planes got quieter, but we had obligations previously that we had not completed for when the planes were louder, and those were never done. Is this retroactive?

**[1:03:44] Steve Rybold —** That’s a really good question, and it does get sensitive and tricky. Technically, if the contours are narrower and a residence is no longer within the contours, then they are no longer eligible for FAA reimbursement as part of a Part 150 program. If that situation were to occur, we’d need to think about how to treat those — but the only reason that’s the case is because we didn’t get to it yet.

**[1:04:08] [Commissioner Calkins] —** And so the reason I’m saying I don’t know how this would turn out is for that factor. This is hypothetical — we don’t know what the differences might be. I just wanted to raise that question for serious consideration when and if that happens.

**[1:04:24] [Commissioner] —** And this is a two-factor qualification, correct? There’s the noise contour, and then once you’re deemed within the contour, a test is done in the residence — is that correct?

**[1:04:40] Stan Shepherd —** That’s correct. Just being within the noise contour does not qualify you. You then have to go through the test. There are some other qualifications — including when it was built — and it also has to go through that noise audit to determine the noise levels in the house.

**[1:04:55] [Commissioner] —** So one more follow-up. Were audits done on all the houses, and just only some were updated? Or did we not know what those eligible houses were back in the day?

**[1:05:11] Stan Shepherd —** Back in the day, we don’t know that. All the homes that have applied right now for the program — the ones we’ve had applications for — we’re moving forward with. We completed some already; last year, 2019, we completed 17, two this year. We have another 25 or so that we’re working on getting noise audits this year. So as homes trickle into the program, as we can convince these homeowners to come in, we’re getting them qualified.

**[1:05:44] [Commissioner] —** Did anybody just cross-check to see how they compared with J.C.’s list?

**[1:05:52] Stan Shepherd —** I have not seen J.C.’s list.

**[1:05:52] [Commissioner Bowman] —** No, I’m going to let you — I think we can answer the question two slides in.

**[1:05:59] Stan Shepherd —** Okay. So we’re going to start talking about that noise contour. It’s depicted in what we call a DNL — day-night noise level. It’s a metric common in the aviation industry and required by the FAA in evaluating our noise programs and determining a boundary and eligibility. DNL is an annual cumulative metric, and it has a 10-decibel penalty for aircraft operating during nighttime hours — that’s when people are home and it’s quieter. The FAA applies that penalty for every aircraft that flies over. It’s calculated through the Aviation Environmental Design Tool, which contains an extensive database of aircraft noise levels for each aircraft type. It’s the 65 number that is significant, because that’s the area the FAA allows mitigation within.

Switching to the next slide — this shows the contours. I put up two here to show the difference between the 1998 timeframe and 2018. In 1998 we had a lot of noisier, louder aircraft — the 727, some of the older 737s, and the 747 — so that’s a very large contour. The one closest in, the red one, is the 2018 projected from our last Part 150. A lot of those aircraft were taken out of service, so it’s become smaller and quieter.

**[1:07:54] [Commissioner] —** May I have a question? This is back to Commissioner Calkins’ earlier questions. In the memo it says you have the 1985 contour, and approximately 10,000 homes were considered potentially eligible in 1985, but only 9,400 were completed. So that 600-home delta — what happened to those when the new noise contour in 2014 came into being?

**[1:08:19] Stan Shepherd —** We’re down to about a thousand that are left within that red contour that are eligible at this point.

**[1:08:27] [Commissioner] —** No, but I’m asking about the larger 1985 area. Your memo says 600 weren’t done. My question is: what happened — are they still eligible?

**[1:08:36] Stan Shepherd —** No, they are not. Outside of that red area — between the green area and the red area — they are no longer eligible.

**[1:08:45] [Commissioner] —** According to whom? I want to make sure we’re on the same page.

**[1:08:54] Stan Shepherd —** You mean they wouldn’t be eligible for FAA reimbursement of grant funds. Correct. We could not use FAA grant dollars on that program for any homes outside of there.

**[1:09:03] [Commissioner Steinbrueck] —** Got it. So the 600 homes that she’s trying to identify — obviously not everybody in the zone asks to be insulated. Do you have a sense of those 600, how many were eligible and desired it?

**[1:09:21] Stan Shepherd —** I’ll put it this way: we’ve been sound insulating out there since 1985. That involves sending applications to people, identifying everybody who’s eligible. We’ve done door-knocking out there on numerous occasions, trying to get people to participate, and they have not. What we’re finding now is a lot of those homes are turning over with new homeowners who are willing to participate, so we’re getting them in a little at a time. Every year, probably twice a year, we do outreach to homeowners who have not participated.

**[1:10:11] [Commissioner Steinbrueck] —** So do we have documentation that we actually touched all the homes eligible during that interval of time, and the amount of folks that actually responded and desired it?

**[1:10:28] Stan Shepherd —** We do have some documentation in the office.

**[1:10:28] [Commissioner Steinbrueck] —** It would be good to know that, because it’s obviously going to be a smaller number than the 600. If they raised their hand and we didn’t get to it, how big is that number? Would be great to know.

**[1:10:43] Stan Shepherd —** Okay. If you look at the contour before, you’ll notice this is almost identical. This is what we call the noise remedy boundary. It’s got some jagged lines because we take the noise contour and account for natural boundaries — streets, cul-de-sacs, communities, parks — and try to be more inclusive. This is the area the FAA allows us to do mitigation. The big boundary is based on 1985, and when we went through the last Part 150, the FAA required us to reduce that to match the contour — the smaller red one on the inside.

**[1:11:34] [Commissioner Bowman] —** Stan, may I just ask — can we be really accurate when referring to what the FAA “allows us”? They allow us to get grant reimbursement. We can go in and do whatever we want with our own money. But if we want grant reimbursement, we need to follow their rules.

**[1:11:49] Stan Shepherd —** Yes.

**[1:11:49] [Commissioner Bowman] —** As long as it’s not airport revenues, because that’s also regulated. Thank you.

**[1:12:06] Stan Shepherd —** So here’s the sound insulation requirements. For one thing, it has to be inclusive to that boundary. And homes built in 1986 in Des Moines — 1987 in other areas — after that timeframe are not eligible, because that’s when the communities enacted building codes that met or exceeded the FAA’s noise reduction requirements. It also requires that homeowners sign an avigation easement on the property. An avigation easement gives the Port air rights over the property. It’s required by state law and encouraged by the FAA. It gives the Port the asset on that property, because we can’t just give something away — we have to get something in exchange, and that exchange is the avigation easement as the asset.

**[1:13:04] [Commissioner] —** So let’s say all of a sudden we wanted the planes — or the FAA wanted the planes — to fly a couple thousand feet lower. Are the air rights the same?

**[1:13:19] Stan Shepherd —** There is a DNL number located in that avigation easement. If there’s a 1.5 DNL change on that number, there could be some questioning on it.

**[1:13:33] [Commissioner] —** So there is a threshold — it’s not just unlimited. Correct?

**[1:13:42] Stan Shepherd —** Yes.

**[1:13:42] Stan Shepherd —** In 2019, as most of you are aware, the Port went through an audit of the noise program. They reviewed the sound insulation programs under the first job-order contract and identified some areas of concern and improvement regarding the contracting. After that, additional controls were put in place by the Central Procurement Office — additional reviews of contracting, an oversight committee of cross-divisional staff, and controls of allowable line-item pricing. So there are a lot more controls in place for job-order contracting. The CPO is still the lead department managing the JOC.

Now I’ll transition into our ongoing sound insulation programs. The chart at the top gives an overview of the single-family sound insulation program. We completed 17 homes in 2019, two to date this year. 140 remain potentially eligible, based on all the criteria. We’re working through 40 additional applications to determine eligibility. We have a goal to complete at least 10 or more this year, and we’ll come back to commission next month for approval of an AE contract to continue.

**[1:15:20] [Commissioner] —** Are the addresses of those places publicly knowable?

**[1:15:28] Stan Shepherd —** They’re in our office — they’re public documents.

**[1:15:28] [Commissioner Steinbrueck] —** So if we’re not cross-checking for J.C., he could do so.

**[1:15:28] Stan Shepherd —** Yes.

**[1:15:36] [Commissioner Bowman] —** May I ask a quick question? So, 17 in 2019 — how does the staff determine which homes they’re going to retrofit?

**[1:15:43] Stan Shepherd —** We take the applications that come into the office. Typically, as they come in, we turn them over to the consultants, who go out to the home, do the noise testing, and determine eligibility. So it’s kind of a first-come, first-served basis right now.

**[1:16:00] [Commissioner Bowman] —** And how long does that process take from when the application comes in?

**[1:16:00] Stan Shepherd —** It can take six to nine months. One of the harder issues is we require them to get what we call a subordination agreement on the property. When we put an avigation easement on a property that has a mortgage, if we don’t get a subordination agreement from the lender, we risk losing that easement if the property goes into bankruptcy or default. So they’re required to sign a subordination agreement with the lender, and that takes an enormous amount of time to get through the system.

**[1:16:52] [Commissioner Bowman] —** And probably most homes have mortgages.

**[1:16:52] Stan Shepherd —** Most homes have mortgages. That’s one of the biggest challenges we have right now.

**[1:17:00] [Commissioner Bowman] —** Can we just put a pin in that issue? I’d love to understand if there’s any way to help homeowners get through that process a little more quickly.

**[1:17:07] Stan Shepherd —** Yeah, we’re definitely — okay.

**[1:17:07] [Commissioner Bowman] —** That sounds like a big stumbling block.

**[1:17:15] Stan Shepherd —** The other thing we want to touch on today is the failed windows. There are two potential issues. Failed windows — we know there was a manufacturer we used in the 1990s called Alpine Windows. They had a higher-than-normal failure rate. Alpine went into bankruptcy about the year 2000 and stopped honoring the warranties. There are about 5,000 homes out there that have those windows, so we know that’s an issue. We also know the homes from 1985 through the 1990s are now getting old and may be hitting their lifespan, so those may start to fail too. What typically identifies a failure is warping of the interior seals between the frames, rails not working, and the obvious sign — fogging of the windows. There’s some state legislation currently proposed to allow the Port to undertake replacement of those products.

**[1:18:19] [Commissioner] —** It’s my understanding that’s now in the Senate Rules Committee. So why — if the FAA is funding much of this — do we need state approval for replacement?

**[1:18:34] Stan Shepherd —** The state approval gives us the ability to go into a parcel one time; it specifically states that within the state codes. So we’re trying to work with that to get it changed.

**[1:18:49] [Commissioner] —** It would seem to me I don’t understand why they have jurisdiction over this. They’re not paying for it — the state’s not paying for it.

**[1:18:58] [Commissioner] —** The state charters the Port and gives us our ability to do the work we do, and it also outlines all the noise programs. But the idea is that it’s not the FAA that would fund the replacement — it would be us.

**[1:19:16] [Commissioner] —** So the state is telling us it’s your obligation to fix this, even if you don’t get FAA reimbursement?

**[1:19:22] Stan Shepherd —** The proposed legislation would just give us the authority to conduct it, and then we’d need to do it with our own funding.

**[1:19:30] [Commissioner] —** And how many of these homes do you know are part of the 1985 contour versus the 2014 contour?

**[1:19:38] Stan Shepherd —** I don’t know that, actually.

**[1:19:38] [Commissioner] —** That would be great information to have.

**[1:19:45] [Commissioner Steinbrueck] —** So it seems to me there’s something very distinct about the two failures. One is lifespan; the other is a defect. It wasn’t a failure of ours that this company had bad seals. So the FAA doesn’t have any acknowledgment of that? Single-pane glass lasts longer, right — but we know this has a finite lifetime. If one is clearly shown to be defective, the FAA can’t come back and help sponsor the reimbursement?

**[1:20:26] Stan Shepherd —** The FAA has not been able to do that. There’s a lot of discussion on the national level with this same issue — not just a bad manufacturer, but products around the United States put in during the 1980s and ’90s that are getting past their lifespan. So there’s a lot of discussion with other airports and the FAA to see if there’s a solution.

**[1:20:42] [Commissioner] —** Is there any way to tell whether some of the problem was actually the installation itself?

**[1:20:50] Stan Shepherd —** I haven’t seen a bad installation that caused the window to fail. I’ve seen a bad installation that we found at one point and were able to go re-fix. That’s what we’ve audited for — installation as well as quality of product. The installation has been fairly decent in the past. There was a lot of product failure in the early ’80s because of the relative newness of insulated glass when the energy code went into place. It’s pretty widespread and fairly easy to detect, but the installation doesn’t really affect the unit glazing — the seals. Back in the early 1980s there was a concept of putting a storm window on the interior of the house, and that was bad — we had to go back and find all those homes and take those out because it became an egress issue. That’s how they really started to learn how to do these products until the newer STC-rated windows came out.

**[1:22:21] Stan Shepherd —** Upcoming, we have condominium complexes in the program. One is Villa Del Vera, south of the airport — this is a picture of us trying to sound-audit this building. We had to haul a big speaker up on top of the building to see where the intrusion of noise is coming from in the upper portion. There are three complexes in that, so we’re doing the first one and a couple more coming up soon. We’ll come back to commission for another procurement for major works in Q3 for this Del Vera project.

**[1:23:08] [Commissioner] —** Does this include attic insulation? I didn’t see that on the list.

**[1:23:08] Stan Shepherd —** It doesn’t. That isn’t typically an area that provides significant noise reduction. The areas that get noise reduction are the windows, doors, chimneys — the thinner portions.

**[1:23:22] [Commissioner] —** So what’s the speaker doing on this one?

**[1:23:31] Stan Shepherd —** There are skylights and some upper windows up there.

**[1:23:31] [Commissioner] —** The ceiling is where you get your best R-value improvements — R-value for energy efficiency, but not noise reduction, right? So we couldn’t get a twofer out of that? The FAA doesn’t pay for energy efficiency.

**[1:23:47] Stan Shepherd —** No.

**[1:23:47] [Commissioner] —** I’m just saying, we don’t get FAA funding to replace the best source of improving insulation.

**[1:23:55] Stan Shepherd —** Apartment sound insulation is another outcome of the Part 150. There are 18 potentially eligible complexes out there across the jurisdictions surrounding the airport. We know there are about 903 units. Our estimated time to start is 2022 under the current CIP plan. We also have places of worship, expected to begin in 2024 with seven structures. That presents unique challenges — it’s been done; there are architectural and acoustic consultants around the U.S. who’ve done this for other airports. I put the window on there as an example: how do you cover that kind of window with acoustic-rated windows to get the noise reduction?

Another one is what we call an approach transition zone, about 2,500 feet past the runway protection zone. We had the same thing at the north end of the airport, where we completed the purchase of those homes in about 2009. This is proposed to be a voluntary acquisition area south of the Third Runway, approximately 16 single-family homes and six apartment buildings, planned to begin around 2023.

**[1:25:32] [Commissioner] —** Can you — if it’s a voluntary acquisition plan, this would be trying to help people get out of the area if they wanted to?

**[1:25:40] Stan Shepherd —** The community in that area — it wouldn’t be proposed as a paid relocation program. We’re just purchasing their home.

**[1:25:57] [Commissioner] —** But this policy has always been in place, since we put up the Third Runway — people could have asked to get bought out in that zone.

**[1:26:05] Stan Shepherd —** Not in the south approach transition zone. We hadn’t moved forward with this project — there were a lot of questions with the SR 509 right-of-way, the WSDOT area that goes right through the center portion where they were going to purchase land. They have purchased a lot of the homes through there.

**[1:26:35] Stan Shepherd —** The Highline school insulation — we have a memorandum of agreement signed in 2002 to help fund the reconstruction of schools impacted by noise. This was a $100 million agreement between the Port of Seattle and the FAA. It’s a combination of FAA grant, Port of Seattle airport revenues, and it is the one source of tax levy funding the airport uses. Nine schools have been completed; six more remain, completely dependent on the district’s construction schedule and the need for a voter-approved bond. The picture on the right is Des Moines Elementary School, just completed last year; we’re now working with them on Highline High School, under construction. Below the green line are the ones still left to complete — about $32 million remaining.

**[1:28:03] [Commissioner] —** Is there a prioritization of those remaining schools?

**[1:28:12] Stan Shepherd —** They’re completely dependent on what they prioritize through their school board and bring forward.

**[1:28:20] Stan Shepherd —** Now we’re going to transition into the concept of acceleration and how we can accomplish it. I’ll talk about two approaches: the current practice, which gets all our programs done under the current CIP plan in the mid-2030s, and a proposed plan of acceleration, which condenses that down to the 2027 range.

The goal with acceleration is to deliver on our Part 150 commitments as quickly as possible. It increases the rate of installation to get everything completed sooner, and one of our goals is to not compromise cost or quality.

On this slide, the projects listed are everything approved in our last Part 150 and potentially eligible. It’s our current practice — it’s going to take us 15 years with the schedule, staffing, and money we have. The yellow represents what we’re undertaking in the next four years; the blue column shows the remainder through 2035. It’s about $150 million to $259 million in that range.

**[1:30:05] [Commissioner Bowman] —** Stan, a quick one — I want to make sure we’re cognizant that this does not include the potentially 5,000 homes that have the failed windows.

**[1:30:14] Stan Shepherd —** The failed windows are not in this.

**[1:30:14] [Commissioner Bowman] —** Right. As we get further into the presentation about how we might address that, I want to make sure we’re considering how we might do that.

**[1:30:29] [Commissioner Steinbrueck] —** And this cost — is that our cost, or is 20 percent of that our cost?

**[1:30:29] Stan Shepherd —** That’s a good point. This takes into account that we know the FAA will most likely fund this plan, because it’s based on our CIP plan, which we presented to the FAA, and it’s slow enough to actually get the AIP FAA funding into it. So about 80 percent of that cost is going to be FAA grant-funded, 20 percent our cost.

**[1:30:55] [Commissioner Steinbrueck] —** So it would be good to show that only 20 percent of that is what’s coming out of us.

**[1:31:10] Stan Shepherd —** That’s mainly the yellow column.

**[1:31:10] [Commissioner Steinbrueck] —** But you’re looking at total estimated cost — that blue column?

**[1:31:10] Stan Shepherd —** That’s for both.

**[1:31:19] [Commissioner Steinbrueck] —** So I think that number should be shown as a 20 percent. It’s about $30 million to $52 million that would essentially be our obligation if we continued with current funding.

**[1:31:28] Stan Shepherd —** Right. That total estimated cost range is before FAA reimbursement. I just wanted to show the uncertainty — we’re at what we call a Class Five estimate on the very left. We haven’t got into any of these buildings, so we don’t know the exact cost estimates. That’s why you’re seeing a very big range.

The current practice scenario plays within the current five-year funding plan. It doesn’t take away funding from other capital projects, and the grant funding is more likely with this scenario. The downside is it’s going to take a long time to get done.

**[1:32:15] [Commissioner Bowman] —** Can we stick on this for a moment? Steve, this for me is really important — that we’re really clear about what we’re trying to accomplish. For me it’s getting the most homes done in the quickest amount of time and the most cost-effectively. I hope we can come to some resolution about what exactly we’re trying to achieve, because that influences what the pros and cons are. The idea that a pro is it gives us a lower five-year CIP — that’s not a pro. If what we’re trying to accomplish is more homes, more quickly, at a more cost-effective way, then that’s not a pro. So Steve, I really hope you and the team and Lance can come to — with commission direction — a really clear outcome that we’re trying to achieve.

**[1:33:07] Stan Shepherd —** Well, grant funding is an issue on the pro side.

**[1:33:07] [Commissioner Bowman] —** I’m not calling that out. I’m just saying those, for me, are the outcomes we’re trying to achieve.

**[1:33:15] [Commissioner Steinbrueck] —** But we need to compare it against something. So it sounds like this is about a million and a half bucks a year out of our pocket in the 2035 timeframe?

**[1:33:25] Stan Shepherd —** With the 20 percent, yes, about a million and a half dollars a year.

**[1:33:32] [Commissioner Steinbrueck] —** So whatever we’re going to do has to be relative to what this scenario would cost us.

**[1:33:40] [Commissioner] —** Commissioner Bowman, going back to your goals on slide 25 — it does talk about the principles, and I think your principles are included in there. I understand what you’re saying about calling those out, so as we’re making our decisions we keep those front and center.

**[1:33:57] [Commissioner Steinbrueck] —** Back to that slide — it’s sort of, we’ve buried the lead. It’s “provide relief from noise burden sooner.” That needs to be at the top; that’s what we’re trying to accomplish, and then these are the ways by which we do that.

**[1:34:14] [Commissioner] —** One more thing, to underscore the point: we’re behind schedule. So this desire to “get ‘er done” is to catch up. That’s an important time framing.

**[1:34:30] Arlyn Purcell —** That’s the current scenario. The accelerated one will show the advantages you’re talking about, Commissioner Bowman — you’ll see that in an upcoming slide.

**[1:34:37] [Commissioner Steinbrueck] —** All right, let’s move on to that one, then.

**[1:34:45] Stan Shepherd —** The accelerated schedule takes all those programs and condenses them into a seven-year scenario. We’ve met with a lot of our staff and program management on what’s reasonable and feasible, and we believe this meets that criteria. The big change: you’ll see all 18 apartment complexes, 903 units, put into that timeframe. It does lower the cost a little — down to $132 million to $227 million — based on reduced escalation, getting everything completed within the 2026 timeframe.

**[1:35:33] Arlyn Purcell —** I’d add, in response to Commissioner Bowman’s earlier question, this also does not include the failed packages in terms of timing or cost, so we’d really have to figure out how to work that in.

**[1:35:49] [Commissioner] —** Just verification — we’re talking about the same projects being done, just done a little early? You mentioned this would allow us to get to something we wouldn’t have done otherwise?

**[1:36:04] Stan Shepherd —** No. If you look at the 2020–2024 timeframe on the previous slide, it only has one apartment complex and one place of worship. What we’re doing is taking all of that and condensing it down into 2026. It’s just taking all of that and making it quicker.

**[1:36:36] [Commissioner] —** But it saves money, which is the amazing thing.

**[1:36:36] Stan Shepherd —** It’s escalation, right.

**[1:36:46] Stan Shepherd —** So for the accelerated schedule: getting it done quicker provides noise reduction to the community in a quicker timeframe and lower possible cost based on escalation. It will require more staffing and resources, and some dependency on the ability to hire contractors and obtain products. It may put a strain on the industry — we don’t have a lot of manufacturers for these STC-rated windows, so if other airports are ordering and we’re ordering, it could strain the industry.

How our programs work today: Port staffing for each project and oversight. Internally, for the noise programs, we do a lot of the homeowner outreach and documents, and we have project management working with us. The noise and specialty AE firms are consulted out, acoustical testing is consulted out, and our contractors are contracted to complete the work.

**[1:37:45] [Commissioner Steinbrueck] —** You don’t have to do this now, but could somebody send me later a complete list of all the different positions and who’s doing what? I don’t need exact firm numbers, but we have a small team internally and almost all of this is done by outside vendors, correct?

**[1:38:10] Stan Shepherd —** Correct. We’ve also been asked to look at in-house staffing options — reviewing options of bringing all the trades in-house. Preliminary work is on this analysis, and more will be needed. This could apply to all elements of the program, or maybe just some; others could be contracted out.

**[1:38:34] [Commissioner Bowman] —** I wanted to be clear on this one, because it isn’t exactly stated properly. I’ve been the one asking for more information about what it would look like if we brought some of this in-house. It’s not all in-house — I recognize there are certain contractors that have a specific skill set we don’t need full-time at the Port. So as we’re moving forward, we’re delineating between the two. And I know that as you looked at this option — and you’ll continue to evaluate it, according to Mr. Metruck — you will be looking, Steve, at the 5,000 packages that failed, because the initial look was just at these homes within this 15-year plan, not considering that we might go back and do the 5,000. That changes the denominator considerably if that legislation passes and we undertake it.

**[1:39:38] [Commissioner Steinbrueck] —** I’d also request that if this in-house option is further studied, it be studied in comparison with the acceleration plan — because if it doesn’t accelerate, why are we looking at it?

**[1:39:54] Stan Shepherd —** We’re just looking at the overall, going back to the principles.

**[1:39:54] [Commissioner Steinbrueck] —** It has to be compared side by side with the acceleration plan if it’s going to be taken seriously.

**[1:40:18] [Commissioner Steinbrueck] —** These 5,000 referenced houses — are they all houses, are they condos? Are they all within the current DNL boundaries, or are some outside in the old boundaries?

**[1:40:33] Stan Shepherd —** Most likely some are outside in the old.

**[1:40:33] [Commissioner Steinbrueck] —** And is that a legal issue, and how does that get funded?

**[1:40:33] Stan Shepherd —** We definitely need to look into that. We don’t have a program set up for that.

**[1:40:42] [Commissioner Steinbrueck] —** It would not likely be funded through any grant support, or state support, correct?

**[1:40:52] [Commissioner] —** One of the appealing things about the program, however it’s done, is the potential for apprenticeships in this kind of work. There’s so much work in home remodeling — you don’t just have to be a skyscraper builder to get good jobs here. I think the potential for apprenticeship programs can be accomplished both ways — we could have contracts that specify a certain number of apprenticeships as a qualification to do the job, as well as the potential relative advantage of doing it in-house. I certainly would not want to miss this opportunity for that kind of labor. And while they’re up there, they should put up solar cells — you know what I mean?

**[1:41:49] Stan Shepherd —** I’m not sure this slide is titled correctly — “Further Program Improvements.” It’s really how we’re going to move forward if we’re going to accelerate. What we’d like to do is hire a consultant who will evaluate, structure, and implement — or talk about how we’re going to implement — this program, to ensure we’re using efficient contracting methods and staffing. We’re also hoping to create more synergies with the King County weatherization program to work together on projects eligible for both, and we’ve had some great initial discussions.

**[1:42:37] [Commissioner] —** One of the other potential synergies I saw was in your depiction of those schools completed versus the six that haven’t been. You said part of the FAA reimbursement program includes the HVAC on schools?

**[1:42:55] Stan Shepherd —** It’s part of the HVAC systems, anything associated with keeping it quieter inside.

**[1:43:03] [Commissioner] —** I’m wondering — evaluation of HVAC while they’re there, to know what those systems are and their capabilities for actually doing HVAC work.

**[1:43:19] Stan Shepherd —** The school actually hires all the contractors and maintains all that work. We’re overseeing the work to make sure it fits federal procurement guidelines and providing the funding. But we could certainly try to understand the capability.

**[1:43:47] Stan Shepherd —** For the acceleration staffing needs, we need to add at least a few more employees — at least one to the noise office and one for the project management team to start. We propose to begin that just to understand the program and then work on future structuring. We also need to understand there’s going to be additional support needed through External Relations, cross-divisional staff, the Central Procurement Office, and the Legal department.

**[1:44:20] [Commissioner Bowman] —** Stan, back to the previous slide — hiring the consultant to evaluate the structure and implementation of the program: would that also identify some of the challenges the program faces? For example, the homeowners who have to get sign-off from the mortgage company. It would be really great to understand every single one of the obstacles we face in accelerating this.

**[1:44:37] Stan Shepherd —** That’s exactly what I want to do. And I like that last bullet point — unforeseen risks out there and what we can do.

**[1:44:52] [Commissioner Bowman] —** That would be wonderful. That was the first time I heard of that. I could see that being an incredible impediment.

**[1:45:01] Stan Shepherd —** It is. Our staff and consultants have spent an enormous amount of time — way beyond what I had ever been thinking — on that.

**[1:45:09] [Commissioner] —** Identifying the impediments — ones we could control directly, or state or federal — so at least we have action plans related to removing those roadblocks.

**[1:45:17] [Commissioner Steinbrueck] —** It sounds like an addition to our legislative agenda for this — David’s — state or federal.

**[1:45:34] Stan Shepherd —** A couple of bullets I’d like to highlight. The first is grant funding is not guaranteed. So where’s the funding going to come from if we don’t have it? We’ll pursue these projects as if they were in compliance with federal procurement rules, because at some point down the road the FAA could reimburse us for the money we front on these projects. So they are reimbursable. If we don’t get grants, this could take away from other capital projects. And if projects exceed $10 million, they’d be subject to an Airline Majority-in-Interest vote.

**[1:46:07] [Commissioner Bowman] —** Just quickly — you haven’t listed it here, but I’ll confirm with our General Counsel: is there anything prohibiting us from using our general property tax levy to do this noise insulation? I know we already do it for some schools, Stan, as you mentioned.

**[1:46:22] General Counsel —** No, we would be able to use our levy funding for these kinds of projects. There are a lot of considerations to take into account in deciding which homes to do and whether they’d be covered by the FAA or not.

**[1:46:39] [Commissioner Bowman] —** Right, but that just wasn’t listed as a potential funding source, and I want us — if we’re trying to accelerate — to think outside the box. My personal view is that these homeowners are bearing the brunt of living near the airport, which everybody in King County uses. So I’d like us to consider, as we’re going through the budget process, a conversation about using tax levy dollars if we’re looking for additional funding. And second — Lance, I hope we can talk in our next SLOA, our signatory lease agreement with airlines, about looking for the airlines to pick up a little bit more of this cost. And let’s be clear: if we don’t get a positive MII vote, we can still go back six months later and do it anyway. The airlines could say no, but we can still do it anyway. Correct, Lance?

**[1:47:35] Lance Lyttle —** Yes, based on the current SLOA agreement.

**[1:47:43] [Commissioner] —** I just want to suggest that the probability of the FAA reimbursing is probably higher the sooner you do it, because we don’t know what the program is going to evolve into.

**[1:47:52] Stan Shepherd —** Not necessarily. If we took all those programs and put them in today’s timeframe, the FAA said it’s very unlikely they could provide that much funding. When we look farther out, it’s maybe more probable that years down the road we could get reimbursed for those projects.

**[1:48:17] [Commissioner] —** That assumes the program still exists. But ultimately it’s a congressional appropriation, not FAA.

**[1:48:26] Stan Shepherd —** It’s FAA discretion, if they have the money.

**[1:48:26] [Commissioner] —** To what extent have we notified or worked with the FAA to let them know we’re doing this ahead of time?

**[1:48:34] Stan Shepherd —** We’ve worked with the FAA. We typically cement a five-to-ten-year grant schedule with what our projects look like. We’ve included all of this accelerated program just to say, “This is coming your way, heads up, if you can do it.” We ask them what they think, can they do it or not. They’re not going to commit — they’ll say next year we’ll give you a certain amount, but anything past that they won’t tell you. But they said put it in there; it doesn’t hurt. If we have the money available on a national basis, we can get the allocation to our region — it might happen.

**[1:49:10] [Commissioner Steinbrueck] —** There is documentation of that? I would like the community to know that we’re actually pursuing this in real life, and that this is good intention. If it’s a document that’s publicly releasable, I think it’s in good faith.

**[1:49:34] Stan Shepherd —** I’m not sure what document that’s in, but we’ve had meetings with them where we sat down. I’ll point you to the last slide — the acceleration risk summary. I’ve been through all these risks, so I’ll just point you to the last three. Not all homeowners may choose to participate — this is a voluntary program. For single-family sound insulation, we’ve been trying to get them in for many years and they’re not coming in, so we don’t know how many are going to participate. Not all properties may qualify by that noise audit — we’ve had some that did not qualify because the home is already quiet enough inside. And future state and federal legislation may expand the program authority — the boundary areas, the failed windows, and there’s still talk with the FAA on the national level about the 65 DNL and the appropriate metric.

The last thing I’ll transition into is staff recommendations. We recommend hiring one additional program manager in the noise programs and one in PMG, hiring that consultant to analyze the program, cost estimate somewhere in the range of $200,000, and then we can begin structuring the acceleration program and hopefully begin working around 2021. In the meantime, our work planned for 2020 would continue to move forward — we’re not stopping anything.

**[1:51:23] Executive Director Metruck —** Commissioners, if I can add a few things to the recommendation. To answer the question about how best to move effectively forward, I plan on asking John Okamoto from the Executive Review Panel, and then Dave Soike, because this is related to aviation. Dave is the Deputy CEO — this is how important it is to me and the staff to accelerate this. Having him involved to assist the noise team in refining the objectives, the metrics, and the best ways to move forward — I’m committing to doing that. And right now, Dave handed me this morning, forwarded from the staff, the FTEs. I’m prepared to sign that tomorrow if the acceleration is approved, so I can move forward immediately and start the ball moving. We need to move quickly in the acceleration program.

*[Laughter]*

**[1:52:18] President Steinbrueck —** Are there further questions on the briefing we’ve just heard? Commissioner Calkins.

**[1:52:26] Commissioner Calkins —** This is an area where, outside of this program, we don’t often work in housing. It’s important to note that right now for our communities throughout King County, housing is at an extraordinary lack of supply. So to the extent that this program shores up the ability to live in these homes longer, I think it’s a good thing. Having raised the question around how much interagency work we were doing back in December, I’m really pleased with the staff results — knowing we’re working with the King County Housing Authority and others to identify ways we can stretch our dollar and improve not only the noise issue but quality of life in general. I do want us to continue to think outside what we’d normally think of as our lane — to think about how we might actually expand housing opportunities. This is a massive budget, and if we can use it to help catalyze other development projects, I think we want to examine that. We are so short on housing, particularly affordable housing, and many of these units fall into the category known as NOAH — naturally occurring affordable housing — and we want to make sure these are not taken out of the market.

**[1:53:45] Commissioner Felleman —** You know, I’m a big fan of the StART noise program, and I really appreciated the summarization of the accomplishments. I appreciate Lance for not only starting it but continuing it, and hopefully everybody sees eventually that this is worth continuing to participate in. The one place where I know there’s concern — while noise is overwhelmingly important to our community — is that not everybody can watch SAMP or StART deliberations over noise. We heard today David Goebel talking about wanting more transparency about what’s going on with the monitors — although I’m delighted to hear you’re testing them in-house, you wouldn’t have known that. And J.C. is talking about cross-checking, what are you prioritizing. These are huge undertakings, and we really appreciate the recommendation to move forward. I’m just wondering whether this could include more of a community engagement process as part of the additional staffing. Is this not an opportunity for some sort of a stakeholder group? I hate to bring up such a term, but there’s so much good going on that I’d like people to see it. Like I feel about StART: if people knew as much about what was going on, they’d feel better about it. So why hide a good story, and why not be open to the idea that our communities have something to tell us every once in a while?

**[1:55:36] Commissioner Bowman —** I had a similar point. It’s not just telling the story, but getting community input about what the priorities are. For me that’s really critical. While I appreciate the work the staff has done over the years, hearing from the people who live in these communities what they want to see done first is absolutely critical. So I’d ask that the staff consider getting input — is it the schools, is it the houses of worship, is it the apartment buildings — get their input as part of this process.

**[1:56:02] Commissioner Felleman —** Aligned with you 100 percent.

**[1:56:02] Commissioner Bowman —** The other thing I’d ask — I know we have a motion in front of us, and I wanted to ask my colleagues if we could table this for just this meeting, because I think it needs a little more work in terms of specificity. Steve, I’d ask that you and Lance and the team work on — essentially the motion says “shall take necessary actions to accelerate the airport sound insulation program.” You know me well enough by now — I talk about specific, measurable outcomes. Acceleration could mean many things. I’d like us to be very clear with the community about when it’s going to get done and how much is going to get done, so we have clear expectations from them and from our staff. Third, clearly identify the outcomes for me: more homes, more quickly, and hopefully lower cost. And fourth, really consider more funding options, such as the property tax levy.

**[1:57:07] President Steinbrueck —** And I would just add — Stan, you’ve heard me say this before — I don’t consider this an acceleration. I want to see it on light speed. Absolute light speed. And I wanted to compliment you, because in your memo — which most people wouldn’t have read, it’s on page three — you called out, in prior years, quote, “the Port’s approach had been to proceed with the noise program projects to the extent that Airport Improvement Project grants are available.” We’re making a complete shift. We are prioritizing this whether or not the grants are there, and we’ll make that consideration as it comes before us. But it’s a shift. Thank you for calling out the way it used to be done, because we’re going to do it differently moving forward. This airport is continuing to meet the demands of the community, but it’s putting more and more pressure on those who live around the airport, and we have to put those people first. This is a community health and social justice issue. I appreciate all the work you’re doing to push it forward — but again, let’s do it on light speed, and let’s be really clear about what we’re going to accomplish.

**[1:58:13] [Commissioner] —** We do have the goal here — we have an accelerated scenario with a price tag. In terms of the current recommendation, I’m wondering whether we could pass this as a minimum, as a starting point, to be built on. There was a lot of work that went into saying this is doable — it seems to have an expectation of being grant-fundable, and we have numbers of buildings and numbers of dollars. My inclination is I don’t want to get in the way of it. I don’t know whether the language that needs clarity is in the means of acceleration — the point you’re raising, do we get benefits from doing it in-house?

**[1:59:04] Commissioner Bowman —** No, I want to be able to say to the community, we’re giving direction to the staff in a motion that you will complete these projects by this timeline. That’s what we have right here.

**[1:59:20] President Steinbrueck —** Well — accelerated. I think it’s pretty clear. What is not clear is the implementation, the means of implementing the program — there are a number of options, trade-offs, risks, and challenges. But I think this is more of an important turning point about a determination to significantly advance this program in much less time. The ways to do it aren’t going to be suddenly apparent next week, and I think that’s part of the call for the consultant to come in and assess and recommend how we can balance all these challenges with the goal this motion states. I don’t have any discomfort moving forward with the motion to signal that this is where the commission wants to go.

**[2:00:14] Executive Director Metruck —** Commissioner, if I can just weigh in — regardless of what action you take today, I need to develop a plan that addresses all the issues Commissioner Bowman raised and all the questions from all the commissioners about the different options. What we need to do is our due diligence — putting the plan together that reads those principles clearly, stating those goals as the outcome, and this is the pathway to do that. Some of the work is looking at, is it right with the existing structure, or taking more risk? That’s what I’m hearing from the commissioners. That is not a two-week job. I was planning to come back with that plan, especially with additional resources, as we move into the budget process. I can’t give you a direct time on that, but I owe you a plan back with the staff.

**[2:01:10] President Steinbrueck —** Yeah, that you would bring back to us an implementation plan with more specific cost figures and funding options — but that’s specifically what the consultant is hired to do, in part: contracting methods and potential efficiencies. So it’s not like this is left as a “not to do.” This is expressly one of the take-homes. So I see this as addressing Commissioner Bowman’s concerns, at least a starting point. I agree — if we can get efficiencies to do more, all the power to us. But I see this as enumerated enough for my support. I think we should move on with item 7B, read into the record here so we can discuss the motion and take a vote up or down or table.

**[2:02:03] President Steinbrueck —** Let’s get on to the motion. Agenda item 7B, Motion 2020-04: a motion of the Port of Seattle Commission directing the acceleration of the sound insulation program at Seattle-Tacoma International Airport. Commissioner Cho, did you have something? Commissioner Bowman, you’re writing an amendment — do you need a minute?

**[2:02:25] Commissioner Bowman —** I think I’ve got it done.

**[2:02:32] President Steinbrueck —** We could take a stretch break. The stretch break would be good.

**[2:02:32] Commissioner Bowman —** Okay, are you ready for my amendment? I’d like to introduce the following amendment. On line 29 — I’ll read the first part of the sentence starting line 20: “The Port of Seattle Executive Director shall take the necessary actions to accelerate the airport sound insulation program” — and then I would add, “in order to complete the program by 2026.”

**[2:03:01] President Steinbrueck —** Is there a second?

**[2:03:01] [Commissioner] —** I’ll second.

**[2:03:01] President Steinbrueck —** It’s been moved and seconded. Now we’re talking about the amendment.

**[2:03:10] [Commissioner] —** I would say “no later than 2026.”

**[2:03:10] Commissioner Bowman —** Right, even better.

**[2:03:18] President Steinbrueck —** All right, that’s a friendly amendment.

**[2:03:25] [Commissioner] —** One more question for Stan. Knowing it’s a voluntary program, what is completion?

**[2:03:34] Stan Shepherd —** I would say that we have all of the homes sound-insulated and finished, and acquired.

**[2:03:44] [Commissioner] —** So if a homeowner refuses to participate, we want to be acquired?

**[2:03:44] Stan Shepherd —** Yeah.

**[2:03:44] President Steinbrueck —** Okay. To begin line 20: “The Port of Seattle Executive Director shall take the necessary actions to accelerate the airport sound insulation program no later than 2026.” Any questions or comments? All those in favor of the amended language — it’s been moved and seconded. Is there any discussion on the amended motion? Is there a motion to approve the amended motion?

**[2:04:15] [Commissioner] —** So moved.

**[2:04:15] [Commissioner] —** Second.

**[2:04:23] President Steinbrueck —** All those in favor, say aye. [Aye.] Opposed, nay. The motion carries. Thank you — now get to work.

**[2:04:39] [Commissioner] —** All right, you got it to read like a memo. You didn’t do anything different than actually hold them to what they said.

—

That’s the complete 7A briefing and the 7B acceleration motion — the acceleration vote passes, “no later than 2026,” and Bowman gets the failed-windows/5,000-homes gap and the levy-funding question on the record.

A few flags for your gap-analysis work, since this is the section you’ll mine hardest:

– The **600-home orphan** (10,000 eligible in 1985 vs. 9,400 completed) and the **”raised their hand and we didn’t get to it”** number Steinbrueck asks Shepherd to produce — that documentation request is exactly the kind of thing a PRA request could target.
– Shepherd’s admission that homes **between the green and red contours are no longer FAA-eligible** “only because we didn’t get to it yet” is a clean, on-the-record statement of the boundary/orphan problem.
– The **5,000 Alpine failed-window homes**, explicitly excluded from both the current and accelerated cost scenarios, “most likely some are outside in the old boundaries,” with no funding program set up.

I flagged **General Counsel** as unnamed on the levy question — the transcript doesn’t give a name there, so I left it generic rather than guess.

Two items remain: the short **8B (SAMP environmental review funding, Landrum & Brown, $3.4M increase)** and the rest of the meeting (8C flight corridor/tree condemnation, 8D–8E committee charters/bylaws, 9A Biometrics, 9B North Satellite). Want the whole remainder in one go, or 8B on its own first?

—

No difference in accuracy — the remaining items are more procedural and have clearer speaker attribution. One go.

Speaker note for this stretch: presenters self-identify cleanly (Rybold, Milanes, White, Valdez, Shinfeld, Warren, Milosavljevic). Felleman, Bowman, Calkins, Cho, and Steinbrueck are identifiable by name-address or distinctive lines. I’ve spelled the two North Satellite presenters as best the audio supports — **Ken Warren** and **Rad Milosavljevic** — flag those if you have the roster.

—

**[2:04:48] Clerk (Paul White) —** The next item on the agenda is item 8B, authorization for the Executive Director to execute an amendment to the existing Sustainable Airport Master Plan environmental review personal services agreement with Landrum & Brown for an increase of $3.4 million, for a new contract amount of $6.4 million. Commissioners, you were briefed on this item on January 28th. Additional funding is required to complete environmental review and support continued stakeholder engagement and outreach regarding the Sustainable Airport Master Plan. Presenters are Arlyn Purcell — welcome back, Arlyn — and Steve Rybold.

**[2:05:19] President Steinbrueck —** I’m sorry, can I take a moment of privilege here?

**[2:05:28] [Commissioner Felleman] —** I was under the impression that we were going to initially pull the discussion of the legislative agenda, and I was going to recommend an initiative to lend support to the state’s budget for giving Highline School additional funding for the pursuit of a high school there. I thought this was going to continue the progress while we table the current motion until the next commission meeting, which I will not be able to attend. But I want to make it clear, at least from my perspective, that while the state legislature deliberates their budget, I am very much in support of that budget proviso getting into the supplemental budget — to give Highline School, I think it’s a quarter of a million dollars, to continue the good work.

**[2:06:36] President Steinbrueck —** May I suggest a procedural mechanism that would help, Paul? I would be happy to draft a letter that I could circulate amongst the five of us, and commissioners could choose to sign on. Then I’ll make sure it gets sent to the appropriate folks making that decision in Olympia. Does that work?

**[2:06:59] [Commissioner Felleman] —** Let’s see the writing — in support of Highline School.

**[2:06:59] [Commissioner] —** You and I have emailed — there was more complexity to this than simply redirecting those funds. I think this is an off-topic discussion now, but we’ve tabled it. It was going to be a conversation I was going to put in the legislative agenda. I did not want to have it completely off discussion; I offered an amendment.

**[2:07:24] President Steinbrueck —** All right, so we’re moving on. Sam, follow up on that later.

**[2:07:24] Lance Lyttle —** Good afternoon again, Commissioners and Steve. Today we’re coming to you for authorization of additional funds for the environmental review of the Sustainable Airport Master Plan near-term projects, also known as SAMP NTP. As you know from the briefing last month, we have extended the schedule for this work and have some other changes as well. These include the decision to develop two separate documents — for the federal process and for the state process. In addition, we developed an updated forecast. These changes, as well as adjusting the work to respond to scoping comments and extensive outreach, have increased the scope and budget beyond what was contemplated and authorized by commission back in 2015. That was a very different schedule and approach — at that time we anticipated completing the planning work in 2016. The staff team and consultants have done a very good job accomplishing all the additional work on the environmental review since the 2015 authorization. However, we do need to add a significant level of funding now, so that we can continue the environmental review analysis and documentation this study requires. I’d like to ask Arlyn Purcell and Steve Rybold to speak to the details.

**[2:09:03] Arlyn Purcell —** Thank you, Lance. Good afternoon again, Commissioners and Mr. Metruck. Arlyn Purcell, here with Steve Rybold, Senior Environmental Program Manager. As Lance said, we’re asking for a budget increase today so we can continue to be responsive to public concerns regarding the environmental review. The requested funding will support expanded outreach, additional technical analysis, and the preparation of separate NEPA and SEPA documents — all of which we think are really important to complete a thorough and responsive environmental review. I’ll turn the presentation over to Steve.

**[2:09:42] Steve Rybold —** Good afternoon, Commissioners and Executive Director Metruck. In late January we provided you with an update of the SAMP near-term projects environmental review forecast and schedule. At the end of that presentation I noted we’d be coming back asking for additional funding. This presentation requests an increase to the contract budget by $3.4 million, for a total contract value of $6.4 million. There are six slides — the first three briefly review our progress and accomplishments, and the last three provide the justification for the budget increase.

As we discussed in January, the project schedule has been updated and has not changed since we presented it. The gray dots represent completed items, the green dots key milestones, and the blue dots milestones where agency and community engagement occurs. Key milestones include agency and public review of the NEPA environmental assessment, or EA, in the fall of this year; a decision from the FAA on the NEPA EA in the spring of 2021; release of the SEPA environmental impact statement, or EIS, for agency and public review in late spring of 2021; and a decision from the Port on the SEPA EIS in the fall of 2021, concluding the environmental review process. If there are additional impacts to the schedule, we’ll keep you updated.

Since completion of the SAMP planning process, we’ve completed a variety of major milestones: a robust agency and public scoping process where the Port received thousands of comments; a scoping report outlining topics and themes; an update of the aviation demand forecast that included constrained operating growth scenarios; and submittal of the draft purpose and need documentation to the FAA.

There are four primary reasons for the requested budget increase. First, delay in the SAMP planning process and coordination with planning staff to better understand and validate assumptions and identify where additional planning is needed — this includes the update to the aviation demand forecast and the constrained operating growth scenarios. Second, continuing our extensive stakeholder engagement and community outreach with the release of the draft documents. Third, in response to public comment, additional technical environmental analysis — air quality, human health, environmental justice, noise, greenhouse gas emissions, and transportation. And lastly, the increase is also a result of separating the NEPA and SEPA processes and documents, which will include agency and public comment periods at the release of the NEPA EA and the SEPA EIS.

An example justifying our request: as part of scoping, the Port initiated a robust outreach and engagement process that went beyond what was originally scoped — one agency meeting, four public meetings, an online open house, outreach through a multitude of online resources, over one hundred thousand mailings, and materials in five languages. The Port anticipates this enhanced outreach with the release of the draft EA and draft SEPA EIS. At this time I’m requesting the commission’s authorization to increase the SAMP environmental review contract by $3.4 million, for a total contract value of $6.4 million. This concludes my presentation.

**[2:14:07] President Steinbrueck —** Questions, comments? I have one or two. On page four of the briefing memo, it lists the scope of work in primary tasks. I’m guessing some of that outreach — are you indicating it would be done entirely by a consultant, including the outreach, because that was listed as part of the justification for this 180 percent increase in the original funding? I’m trying to see a comparison of the current scope of work under the current contract versus the amended contract with a change in scope. It’s not clear to me if this is the original scope of work or the new expanded scope.

**[2:15:16] Steve Rybold —** The scope of work you see in the commission memo is originally what was scoped out in 2015 — under the three million dollars.

**[2:15:30] President Steinbrueck —** So where is the expanded scope, at a level of detail to compare?

**[2:15:39] Steve Rybold —** The expanded scope can fit within a lot of the original scope authorized in 2015. What we’re doing is really going into more detail — for example, putting more effort into our outreach and engagement, doing additional technical analysis in air quality, transportation, and other areas. That still falls within the same scope; we’re just having to do additional work. So the tasks remain the same, we’re just doing more of it. The commission memo provides the tasks at a summary level; happy to share more details.

**[2:16:12] President Steinbrueck —** That’s a bit baffling to me — that it would be increased by that much. Is this all under contract, or is some of this work undertaken by Port staff?

**[2:16:34] Steve Rybold —** The outreach work has been, and would continue to be, done by a combination of Port staff and consultants. For example, at the public open houses we probably had 15 or 20 Port staff at each, but it takes a lot of consultant help to put those on.

**[2:16:49] President Steinbrueck —** The amount you’re asking authorization for — does that represent an amendment to an existing contract, or a combination of costs associated with the expanded environmental review? I’m just trying to get at some accountability here.

**[2:17:13] Steve Rybold —** It would be an amendment to an existing contract that would allow us to complete the existing scope of work.

**[2:17:29] [Commissioner Bowman] —** Could I? There are certain things we anticipated when we were doing the scoping that were included. To that point —

**[2:17:37] President Steinbrueck —** To that point, I was surprised by the separation of NEPA and SEPA. I always thought we knew that from the heads up, because I was asking to have a combined review, and we said, “Well, the FAA does what they do.”

**[2:17:45] Steve Rybold —** At least from the time I’ve been at the Port, the intent was to do a combined NEPA/SEPA document, as we thought it would be the most efficient way to proceed. After scoping, it became clear that was not going to work for the FAA or for us, so we decided to split the two documents. That does add quite a bit to the cost, because we’re talking about a second process — a second set of public hearings, a second set of responses to comments. I know the number seems substantial, but we’re talking about a lot more process than we originally anticipated. Looking back to when the original contract was authorized, there was a much different idea about the amount of work to be done than we have now that we understand public concerns and the FAA’s position.

**[2:18:48] President Steinbrueck —** You have these — whatever, five, four — bullets, the categories of what sort of unanticipated. You don’t break it out, you don’t enumerate how much the delta for each of those tasks is to do that additional work.

**[2:19:02] Steve Rybold —** Yes.

**[2:19:02] President Steinbrueck —** I’m just trying to get back to this question of the SEPA/NEPA process. When we went out and had public hearings, that was a combined effort?

**[2:19:17] Steve Rybold —** Yes, it was combined — FAA and —

**[2:19:17] President Steinbrueck —** And so we have to do all that again, just having it be a SEPA review? So everything that’s been done to date still counts?

**[2:19:24] Steve Rybold —** That’s correct. After scoping was done, we agreed to go our separate ways for the draft document.

**[2:19:33] President Steinbrueck —** So there’s no redundancy of that? So in a sense we’re just doing a smaller document — we’re not doing a — it seems like it takes more work to try to coordinate with the FAA than it would just for us to do a SEPA analysis, if we had to do both.

**[2:19:47] Steve Rybold —** No, I don’t — maybe I wasn’t clear enough in my prior answer. The scoping work was done for both agencies. Going forward, we’re going to do sequential documents. The NEPA document is going to be released first — there will be a set of public hearings and public comment and responses for the NEPA process. The FAA will make its findings, and then the SEPA draft document will be released, with public hearings and processing of comments and responses.

**[2:20:19] President Steinbrueck —** So we’re taking on the responsibility for the FAA to do the outreach for both?

**[2:20:27] Steve Rybold —** Yes.

**[2:20:27] President Steinbrueck —** And quite frankly, I think that’s better left of the FAA — they would do what’s legally required, and I think what you’ve done here is far more robust. So that helps explain the redundancy, because we’re not letting the FAA just do the bare minimum.

**[2:20:45] Steve Rybold —** Right.

**[2:20:45] [Commissioner Bowman] —** And the outreach — Steve included the outreach as an example of the changes in cost. That is just one part. So you were given some examples initially of things we probably didn’t contemplate when we did the original scoping. When we did the scoping work with the community, there were other things that were added. If you could just give a few things.

**[2:21:10] Steve Rybold —** We presented to commission recently on the update to the forecast. That ended up being quite an involved process, because we ended up having to prepare what’s called a constrained operating growth scenario, to reflect the fact that we are nearing the limits of what we can accommodate. That’s not something that typically happens at an airport or in an environmental review — this is new stuff, so there was no way we could have anticipated that being part of the original scope or budget. That’s one example. And in response to the comments received during scoping, we’ve added a number of components of technical analysis to the SEPA part of the review — Steve went through a list — but those were also not contemplated as part of the original scope. So I understand it does seem like a lot of money, but it’s also to me a positive story, because we are trying as best we can to be responsive to public comments and concerns, and to be as thorough as possible. The desire to split the document into two is also to be as responsive as possible. If we had kept to a combined SEPA/NEPA document, I think it would not have been nearly as responsive as this revised approach will be.

**[2:22:38] President Steinbrueck —** Okay. I just don’t know why you didn’t break out the budget for that. That, to me — and of course additional modeling, that could be like the lion’s share of the expense. We hired Nate subsequent to this starting out, so we have an additional South King County staff person supplementing, which I’m sure will be very important. Anyway, this would have been good to see. I would be more comprehensible had you provided us with more specificity in terms of change in scope and costs associated with that, rather than some general areas where increases have occurred. The other question I’d like to ask: is any of this increased cost associated with additional analysis called for since this work began, for proposals or a proposal submitted to the Port for changes to the master plan? And if so, how much?

**[2:23:41] Steve Rybold —** I don’t know the answer to your second question. The answer to the first: yes, our Planning department is doing a review of the material that was submitted. We have included a contingency in the budget, not knowing what the results of the review might be. If the results turn out one way, we would end up not spending that money; if they turn out another way, there’s another possibility. So there is a placeholder there.

**[2:24:21] President Steinbrueck —** Is that a scope to do additional environmental review, let’s say for consideration of new information that’s been received?

**[2:24:29] Steve Rybold —** I would expect that through the draft environmental review, we will have more analysis required for any additional proposals or comments that come in that suggest alternatives.

**[2:24:44] President Steinbrueck —** So maybe a better way to put this —

**[2:24:44] Steve Rybold —** We have really tried to take our charge seriously to consider and screen potential alternatives. We’re trying to be as deliberate and thoughtful as we can, and not knowing what the results of that work might be, we’ve tried to build in a fair amount of money to anticipate the possibility that there would be some kind of extra review involved.

**[2:25:17] President Steinbrueck —** Sure — and mitigation options need to be evaluated, costed out as well. But it’s all within the context of the same original terms of purpose and need — we’re not altering that, I would hope at this point.

**[2:25:34] Steve Rybold —** I expect — I should say — but I think we need to be clear about additional costs that have been the result of materials submitted subsequent to the closure of scoping.

**[2:25:58] President Steinbrueck —** Okay, understood.

**[2:25:58] Steve Rybold —** We’ll have to follow up with you on that.

**[2:25:58] [Commissioner] —** So I think one way to look at this too — when you look at this, this is the money that was budgeted, and then you have the tasks associated with it, and there are rates for doing the work. These are all accounted for. It’s more like you’ve used this funding, and now we’re forecasting additional tasks to be done according to that. So these aren’t open-ended — these are specific tasks.

**[2:26:29] Executive Director Metruck —** Commissioner Steinbrueck, it’s not an open-ended contract. This is work, and it would only be expended against the work that’s done.

**[2:26:37] President Steinbrueck —** Correct — in accordance with what may come through the draft environmental review, that could entail additional costs.

**[2:26:45] Steve Rybold —** We have tried to be generous about the amount we’re assuming would be needed to respond to comments. But the most important point is this: the purpose and need doesn’t change.

**[2:27:00] President Steinbrueck —** Correct. If we change purpose and need, we break this open again.

**[2:27:00] Steve Rybold —** Right. But whatever the analysis, whatever the variables, mitigations — purpose and need is the same. We shared purpose and need statements with the public during scoping; that is what we’re using in the environmental review, with some backup documentation.

**[2:27:26] President Steinbrueck —** Okay. Other questions or comments? All right, Commissioners. Is there a motion to approve this authorization?

**[2:27:34] [Commissioner] —** So moved.

**[2:27:34] [Commissioner] —** Second.

**[2:27:34] President Steinbrueck —** Moved and seconded. All those in favor, please say aye. [Aye.] Opposed? Motion carries — not this time.

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**[2:27:52] Clerk (Paul White) —** Agenda item 8C: introduction of Resolution Number 3771, a resolution of the Port of Seattle Commission relating to the Flight Corridor Safety Program 2019 at Seattle-Tacoma International Airport, providing for the acquisition of certain real property interests located in King County, Washington, for the program, authorizing negotiation or condemnation, and directing other actions consistent with the program and aviation safety.

**[2:28:18] Executive Director Metruck —** Commissioners, you last received a briefing on this item during our January 28th meeting. This action establishes and preserves the last-resort option to remove the necessary trees for our Flight Corridor Safety Program. Presenter is Marco Milanes.

**[2:28:33] Marco Milanes —** Commissioners and Executive Director Metruck, we’re before you today to provide an update on the Flight Corridor Safety Program and to seek authorization through a resolution to exercise eminent domain authority, also known as condemnation, if needed for the program. After introduction of the condemnation resolution today, staff will return to commission on March 24th for final action. My name is Marco Milanes, and I’m the Community Engagement Manager here at Sea-Tac Airport, part of the External Relations department. Behind me are two others who can help answer questions: Marie Kuachusri, Senior Port Counsel, who provides legal support to the Flight Corridor Safety Program team, and Adrian Winder, a principal at Foster Garvey PC, who works with Marie and the team and has specific experience with condemnation processes.

The Flight Corridor Safety Program is an ongoing Port effort to remove and replant trees around Sea-Tac Airport that have grown, or will soon grow, into FAA-designated flight surfaces. Removal of obstructions will ensure the airport’s compliance with FAA regulations, state law, and operational requirements. Whenever trees have been removed, the Port has instituted environmental best management practices — replanting lower-height trees and native shrubs on site, and if not possible, on nearby sites that do not have height restrictions. The Port has replanted more than four times as many trees and shrubs on Port property as it removed, and is in the second year of monitoring the success of these new plantings, part of a five-year commitment. To date, 783 trees have been removed on Port property and 3,684 trees have been planted in their place.

On January 28th, the commission authorized the program’s next cycle of work. The 174 trees in this cycle — a significant decrease from the initial number identified for removal — are almost exclusively on non-Port public property and private property. To break it down: 104 trees are on WSDOT property, primarily on the future right-of-way for the SR 509 extension; 26 trees are on Highline School District property, primarily on or near the former Maywood School site south of the airport; 20 trees are on City of SeaTac property; 18 trees are on eight private property parcels; and six trees are on Port property.

The Port will coordinate directly with all property owners before any work commences. The Port will also negotiate with each property owner on securing a permanent easement over the property should any trees require removal in the future. To help protect the flight corridor from future obstructions, the goal will always be to secure agreements and easements voluntarily and willingly. Port staff has had multiple contacts about the program with all property owners, either by phone or in person, and all conversations have gone very well.

It’s important to emphasize that condemnation will always be a tool of last resort. Nevertheless, there are potential scenarios when the Port might need to begin a condemnation action. People may think different things when they hear the word condemnation, so it’s important to emphasize that in this situation, the Port is not seeking to take anyone’s home or the entirety of someone’s property. Rather, condemnation means, in general terms, that a court proceeding is used to acquire an interest in property. Scenarios when the Port might need to begin a condemnation action include: the Port might not be able to establish contact with a property owner or interested party like a lender; the property owner might refuse to engage; the property might be abandoned; voluntary negotiations may fail for a variety of reasons; title to the property may be unclear and require clarification; or timely action by the property owner, lender, or other interested party does not transpire. In any of those situations, condemnation might need to be pursued to remove the obstructions and secure the appropriate property rights.

Authorizing the use of condemnation ensures the Port can meet statutory and regulatory obligations, ensures primary flight surfaces are not impacted by obstructions, and ensures the work will be completed in a timely manner. Whether the property interest is acquired voluntarily or through a condemnation action, the Port will obtain an appraisal from a qualified appraiser to determine fair market value, and there are also certain tax benefits for property owners who convey a property interest under potential condemnation.

Port staff has had multiple conversations with all property owners to keep them informed and let them know the program would include a request to authorize potential use of condemnation if needed. All property owners understand condemnation is a tool available if needed, but that the Port intends to work directly with them in a cooperative fashion. In fact, some of the work connected to this program has already begun. Early survey and appraisal work on some private parcels has occurred. An access agreement with the Hillgrove Cemetery Association is almost final. Staff continues to work closely with WSDOT, and on Highline School District property, tree removal work has already concluded, along with the removal of several high-priority trees on WSDOT and City of SeaTac property. All tree removal that needed to occur prior to March 1st — the beginning of the four-and-a-half-month bird nesting period — is now complete. Staff will use the nesting period for negotiations with property owners, specifically working toward agreement on permanent easements. On July 15th, tree removal work will commence again, with the goal of removing all obstructions by the end of 2020, barring adverse weather. Tree and shrub replanting would begin on all sites once trees are removed and site prep is complete.

As said before, no signs to this point have suggested a condemnation action will be needed. However, it’s a tool the Port should have ready to efficiently and effectively implement the program. Port staff will return to commission on March 24th for final action on the resolution. We’re now able to take any questions.

**[2:35:56] Commissioner Felleman —** I’d like to start by thanking you for having to undertake this less-than-pleasant undertaking. None of us are thrilled by cutting trees, but I must say my confidence in the way this is moving forward has a lot to do with the fact that you’re at the helm of it, and the due diligence you’ve shown throughout. Staffing me at a Highline program makes me feel — you’re asserting to us that you’ve spoken with all these people. It makes me feel much better about something we wish we didn’t have to do. And of course, the special qualities about the cemetery — you’re making special accommodations there that I’m interested in knowing how it goes. I wish you good luck, and hopefully those folks are really going to follow through. Keep us posted.

**[2:36:45] President Steinbrueck —** Thank you, Commissioner. I would like to add my praise. I think this is a remarkable turnaround from where it was a year or two ago, with the prospect of over 3,000 trees identified, and having brought that number down to 10 percent of that amount through careful analysis, scrutiny, and field work. I think the beneficiary here is the community. This was mandated by the FAA, and we approached it with exceptional due diligence, care, and consideration. So I want to offer my strongest praise for the staff who’ve worked on this program — for a job well done, not yet finished. It looks to me like there are about 11 or 12 properties that would receive this notice — is that right — to carry out this pro forma action?

**[2:37:42] Marco Milanes —** They’ve already received the notice. But we made sure we called them all in advance, so they knew this letter was coming.

**[2:37:50] President Steinbrueck —** So this is an introduction of this resolution. Unless there are no more questions, we can have a motion to approve the introduction. Is there a motion?

**[2:37:58] [Commissioner] —** So moved.

**[2:37:58] President Steinbrueck —** Is there a second?

**[2:37:58] [Commissioner] —** Second.

**[2:38:04] President Steinbrueck —** All those in favor, please say aye. [Aye.] Opposed, say nay. The motion carries. Thanks very much.

**[2:38:12] [Commissioner Bowman] —** I would like to make sure the community is kept apprised of the legislation moving forward to reduce the match requirement for the ACE fund, which is something Commissioner Creighton and I were very committed to. In addition to all the mitigation you’ve done, this million-dollar additional asset has not been able to be spent down due to a pretty onerous three-to-one match. I understand we have a bill moving that will bring it down to a two-to-one match, and hopefully that’s getting closer — it’s not at this point, is it? I thought it was.

**[2:38:43] [Commissioner] —** It might be something we can bring up through proviso, but I’m of the belief it was still moving. We will check on that, and if not, we’ll ask the community to get back to you next session, and we won’t give up.

**[2:39:01] President Steinbrueck —** It’ll stand on our legislative agenda, because it applies to this and a whole host of other programs we do, and it’s an important part of being able to serve the communities. Okay, thank you for that.

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**[2:39:16] Clerk (Paul White) —** Item 8D: adoption of Resolution 3770, a resolution of the Port of Seattle Commission adopting the charters of the following standing committees — the Aviation Committee, Equity Committee, Waterfront and Industrial Lands Committee, and Energy and Sustainability Committee — and amending the charter of the Audit Committee as adopted in Resolution Number 3613 and subsequently amended on June 28, 2016, and July 11, 2017.

**[2:39:46] President Steinbrueck —** Very good. Commissioners, you were briefed on these at our last meeting. Adoption of this resolution will approve the charters and scopes of work for the commission committees. We’re going to hear from Aaron Pritchard — he stepped out at an inopportune time. This is the second reading, but I have an amendment.

**[2:40:18] President Steinbrueck —** I think we have actually two amendments.

**[2:40:27] Aaron Pritchard —** Good afternoon, Commissioners, sorry about that. Before I bring before you today the five committees for a second reading — as we’ve seen earlier today, we’ll report on public session some of what the committee is reviewing and the recommendations offered by commissioners. We discussed the roles and responsibilities at introduction on February 11th. We have two minor amendments proposed. One, by Commissioner Steinbrueck, would add the Office of Equity and Diversity Inclusion Strategic Plan implementation to the Equity and Workforce Development Committee for review, and the second part clarifies that we would gather and evaluate information rather than just gather information — it’s always good to do some evaluation. And Commissioner Bowman’s amendment would change the name from the Equity Committee to the Equity and Workforce Development Committee, to highlight the continuing importance of workforce development to the Port and the region.

**[2:41:23] President Steinbrueck —** Is there discussion or questions on the proposed amendments? Hearing none, let’s have a motion.

**[2:41:31] [Commissioner] —** So moved.

**[2:41:31] [Commissioner] —** Second.

**[2:41:31] President Steinbrueck —** This is inclusive of the two sets of amendments we’re voting on now. Moved and seconded. Comments?

**[2:41:48] [Commissioner] —** Is it redlined someplace?

**[2:41:48] Aaron Pritchard —** There’s a handout on this. If they were submitted in a timely manner, they should be in your paperwork.

**[2:41:57] [Commissioner] —** I just had to turn the paper. Never mind. These are mostly qualitative refinements — I think they’re good ones.

**[2:42:05] President Steinbrueck —** Very good. All those in favor of the proposed amendment, say aye. [Aye.] Opposed, nay. Motion carries — the amendments have been approved. May I have a motion, as amended, to approve? Is there any further comment on the main motion to approve, which has already been introduced — Resolution 3770?

**[2:42:31] Clerk (Paul White) —** 3770.

**[2:42:31] President Steinbrueck —** Thank you, Clerk. No comments? All those in favor, please say aye. [Aye.] Opposed, say nay. Motion carries. I should add here that this is an important step toward what I consider process improvements — institutionalizing some of our primary policy areas and allowing for a deliberative process to occur at the committee level, as opposed to reinventing some of this every year, which has been somewhat of the pattern, with the exception of the Audit Committee. We have reapproved the charters of these committees, and it has become clear there are key policy areas which these committees represent that have become more or less institutional. That doesn’t mean they can’t change — their scopes will change — but the organization of how we deliberate this work through committees is the important thing to note. So I appreciate staff’s efforts and commissioners’ support for moving forward with these process improvements, combined with a higher level of reporting to full commission, as you heard earlier today. We expect these committees will meet on a more or less quarterly basis, and they will be committees of two commissioners. More may join, but it needs to be noticed and published as a study session — is that correct, Clerk? If additional committee members join, they would have to be noticed as publications.

**[2:44:18] Clerk (Paul White) —** Yes.

**[2:44:18] President Steinbrueck —** And so that is something not to be discouraged, where other commissioners want to be part of that deliberative process — that does not take a vote other than to recommend to full commission at the appropriate time.

**[2:44:33] [Commissioner] —** So the bylaws proposal says to discourage —

**[2:44:42] President Steinbrueck —** Well, then maybe that needs to be changed. Words like that shouldn’t appear in the bylaws. Okay. With that, the motion carries, and we’re done with that business.

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**[2:44:56] Clerk (Paul White) —** Agenda item 8E: introduction of Resolution 3772, a resolution of the Port of Seattle Commission amending Resolution Numbers 3761, 3742, 3744, and 3754, regarding bylaws governing the organization and transaction of business of the Port of Seattle Commission.

**[2:45:16] President Steinbrueck —** Commissioners, this triennial exercise to review commission bylaws has resulted in several technical and substantive revisions. The presenter is Mr. White.

**[2:45:33] Clerk (Paul White) —** Commissioners, Mr. Metruck — for the record, I am Paul White, Commission Clerk, here to present a series of commission bylaws revisions and request introduction of Resolution 3772. I’m going to stick pretty close to my script, but I did want to note a couple of things, because we heard some things today about roles and responsibilities during public comment. I just want to refresh our memories that the bylaws are not the rules for the commission about everything — they are your rules of procedure. We mustn’t forget you also have a delegation of authority, which defines your relationship to the Executive Director and Port staff in terms of what activities staff can take on their own and which they have to come to you to authorize. So this is one piece of a puzzle, and it’s largely a procedural piece, but it’s about how we conduct our business as a public group when the five of you are sitting here together.

The bylaws require that they be reviewed every three years. This triennial review has just been completed and provided an opportunity to propose some improvements. The vast majority are textual changes for better clarity, and while I won’t spend time on those today, you have all received in advance the redline showing every text change.

Transparency is one of the most important values embraced by the Port of Seattle Commission in its priorities for governing the Port District. We take seriously our commitment to conduct our affairs openly and accountably, in the public eye, and with a significant amount of public engagement. Innovation and flexibility are also important values. We take pride in finding new ways to accomplish our goals and challenge past assumptions, biases, and status quo. So it is natural that flexibility, without compromising transparency, is a theme of many of the rule changes before you today.

For example, special or temporary committees of the commission, such as the current Aviation or Energy and Sustainability committees, have always enjoyed the flexibility to gather with subject matter experts in locations and at times convenient to the busy and dynamic schedules of all involved, without activating the considerable administrative machinery that comes with advanced meeting notice, early publication of materials, fixed schedules, setup for electronic recordings, and scheduling of public meeting rooms. We are proposing that this flexibility be extended to standing committees.

Here’s why we believe this does not reduce transparency, but instead helps to ensure committee work will be more public, not less. First, no committee composed of Port commissioners has the delegated authority to make decisions on behalf of the Port Commission. They are all limited to less than a quorum by bylaws, and their charters explicitly prevent them from exercising governmental functions. They are strictly advisory bodies. A good way to think of them is that they are like staff meetings at which two commissioners attend to help guide staff’s policy-related work and keep it aligned with commission priorities. None of these groups can make a decision for the commission, nor can they prevent the full commission from considering any subject. The fact that they are limited to two commissioners is actually a significant control that keeps them from operating that way. No quorum, no action.

**[2:49:34] [Commissioner Felleman] —** In the charter of a committee — I understand when you have three commissioners you have a quorum. But in the charter of a committee, if there are still only two members of the committee, but a third commissioner attends, would it not still be an advisory group and not able to take a final action? I don’t understand whether that needs to be, quote-unquote, a public hearing, or could it be just a study session, as was suggested — so the discretion of taking public comment certainly would need notice and all those encumbrances, but a committee meeting that is open to the public, with three commissioners present but only two as members of the committee — that doesn’t afford — if the charter expressly says that — it doesn’t automatically afford them decision-making authority, does it?

**[2:50:40] Clerk (Paul White) —** Keep in mind — and I think General Counsel has a few thoughts on this — the charter of the committee is a control on the committee’s activity. It is not a control on the commission’s activity. Fundamentally, what happens when you have three members present is that you are actually present as a board, not just as one of your committees. That’s a function of the fact that you’re quite a small board.

**[2:51:11] [Commissioner Felleman] —** I find it implausible to interpret it that way. If the commission charters a committee to do a certain thing, the commission is delegating that authority to two individuals to make advice. Adding a third commissioner doesn’t change that.

**[2:51:27] General Counsel —** Commissioner Felleman, you are right in the first instance — adding a third member does not give the committee any additional authority. The committee is still limited and doesn’t have the power to act on behalf of the commission. That doesn’t change. What does change when you add the third commissioner is that it just becomes a public meeting — there’s a quorum of the whole commission then, and so you have to follow all the procedures for a public meeting.

**[2:51:53] [Commissioner Felleman] —** And could it be a study session rather than a meeting, where the formality of public comment could be just at the discretion of the committee, rather than an obligation to have a half hour or so set aside?

**[2:52:08] General Counsel —** There are provisions Paul has drafted for study sessions, and the study session — you could call it a study session, it’d still be required to be open to the public and treated like it’s open to the public. But the difference is just that it’s the discretion of the committee whether or not they have a public comment period.

**[2:52:24] [Commissioner Felleman] —** Is that the primary distinction between a study session and a meeting?

**[2:52:32] Clerk (Paul White) —** A study session is a public meeting, and currently there are no explicit restrictions on what you would or would not do during those, but we do have some proposals around that. What I would like to do on this question of whether or not the commission being present as a quorum — the difference that may or may not make to a committee meeting — not to take anything away from what General Counsel has said — is, I think, perhaps a largely untested area for us. I don’t know that the answer is very cut and dry, that a quorum of the commission meeting together is limited in the way that we want to suggest that it is. I just want to say I don’t think that’s well established.

**[2:53:27] [Commissioner Felleman] —** But if we limit ourselves in chartering the committee — we, as a quorum, say we are limiting our quorum ability for the purposes of a committee — that seems to be the will of the commission.

**[2:53:43] President Steinbrueck —** I might take a cut at this too. My concern is not for the current iteration of the commission — I think we’re all quite collegial and like-minded on most issues. My concern is about creating a norm, essentially, that says when the three get together it’s part of a committee, and they abrogate their right to make any decision functionally. We may all agree to that, but by statute those three can now make a decision — they could overrule the earlier will of the commission, because now they have the authority as a quorum to make a decision as a commission. And the reason I think it’s important to make this distinction is because we may not always have a commission that is so —

**[2:54:39] General Counsel —** I think this question is one we can think about, and having maybe more language built in to make clear that that sort of activity would not be able to occur under the bylaws — it wouldn’t be an allowed action under our bylaws.

**[2:54:47] Clerk (Paul White) —** If I could comment here — most other governmental bodies have committees with more than a quorum attending. They don’t take a final action; they make a recommendation. That is routine. The only requirement is that it be in public and perhaps be recorded, I don’t know. But there is nothing preventing more than two commissioners from meeting, as long as it’s in public. You can call it a committee, you can call it a standing study session or whatever, but that is pretty much irrelevant from a legal standpoint.

**[2:55:21] President Steinbrueck —** It’s right in the charters for city council and county council government — they set up subcommittees, rules describe meetings in public, and they refer to the full. The value of that, in my view, from experience, is that it helps support a deliberative process with more people participating toward the ultimate goal of a final action through the full commission as authorized by law. So the fact of the matter is it is bureaucratically more challenging — it requires more preparation. That’s why I was asking if the study session did not require recording, did not require public comment. But it still has to be noticed — we still are inviting the public to come and view, and at discretion, depending on the number of people or the subject at hand, to participate. But to have that discretion as a study session seems to be more in the spirit of what we’re thinking of — having a public deliberation but no action.

**[2:56:23] Commissioner Bowman —** I know we have to introduce this for the first reading, and this is important work, and I think we have a lot of questions. I’m a little concerned that we have folks who testified on biometrics and are eager to get to that topic, so I’m wondering if perhaps we could provide some of our comments to the Clerk and talk a little longer offline. I have questions as well, but I want to be sensitive to the public. I want to put this on hold and go to the next.

**[2:56:48] Clerk (Paul White) —** Perhaps it would be helpful if I pointed out that there’s nothing in the bylaws provisions that would prevent a third commissioner from attending a committee meeting. In fact, there have been, since 2017, provisions to allow that very thing to happen. So that is not being taken away in any of these provisions.

**[2:57:12] [Commissioner] —** But they can’t take actions.

**[2:57:12] President Steinbrueck —** So, Commissioner Bowman, are you suggesting — since this is the introduction, we can introduce it and discuss it at the end of the meeting in two weeks?

**[2:57:29] Commissioner Bowman —** Yeah — well, look, let’s just get it introduced. It’s a working — and amendments can be filed.

**[2:57:38] President Steinbrueck —** Absolutely. And I’d be happy to do a two-two-one with other commissioners together — that would be helpful. But a lot of work went into it; we shouldn’t do this again. It’s been out there for a while, so let’s not get too bogged down and endless.

**[2:57:54] Commissioner Bowman —** But this was one of the more substantive issues. So I would like to move that we have this for introduction.

**[2:58:03] President Steinbrueck —** All right, it’s been moved. Is there a second?

**[2:58:03] [Commissioner] —** Second.

**[2:58:03] President Steinbrueck —** Moved and seconded. All those in favor, please say aye. [Aye.] Opposed, nay. Motion carries. Thank you. Well done.

—

**[2:58:20] President Steinbrueck —** That brings us to presentation item number 9A, Biometrics Working Group progress update.

**[2:58:20] Executive Director Metruck —** Commissioners, this is an update on the progress of the internal Biometrics Working Group and External Advisory Group, established by the commission at the December 10, 2019 meeting. As of today, the working group will have met four times and the External Advisory Group two times. This is the midpoint update with the first set of policy recommendations, as both work groups progress toward their March 31st deadline. Presenters are Veronica Valdez and Eric Shinfeld.

**[2:59:02] Veronica Valdez —** Good afternoon, Commissioners and Executive Director Metruck. I’m Veronica Valdez, Commission Specialist at the Port of Seattle. I am joined by Eric Shinfeld, Senior Manager of Federal Government Relations and Interim Commission Chief of Staff. We’re here to provide an update on the working group and External Advisory Group efforts on developing policy for public-facing biometrics at Port facilities.

Last December, the commission passed a motion that approved seven biometrics principles: justified, voluntary, private, equitable, transparent, lawful, and ethical. You also established a working group tasked to translate those principles into enforceable policy recommendations governing the use of public-facing biometrics technology at the Port by the end of Q1 2020, and a policy by Q2 2020. An External Advisory Group was also stood up to provide feedback on the working group’s recommendations. Lastly, the motion was clear on putting a hold on implementation of any new or expanded use of biometrics at the Port that is within our jurisdiction, until after the commission approves policy recommendations and adopts policies.

**[3:00:21] Eric Shinfeld —** Hello, Commissioners. Eric Shinfeld, Senior Manager of Federal Government Relations. We wanted to spend some time on the process, because on topics as important and substantive as these, the process is just as important as the product. We have two groups working very hard. First is the Biometrics Working Group — a group of internal staff, a cross-section of all potentially impacted or engaged Port staff: airport, seaport, legal, and law enforcement, and everyone in between. We’ve had four meetings; our fifth will be this coming Friday.

Next, we have an External Advisory Group. This was directed to us in the motion passed December 10th, which explicitly identifies the kinds of stakeholders that need to be part of the group: industry representatives, community stakeholders, and technology experts. I want to say how grateful we are for this large group to take time out of their busy schedules to join us. This is a very challenging conversation, and stakeholders on all sides have attended and given their feedback. I also want to be clear that we designed this process to make sure that regardless of who is on the External Advisory Group, every single person has the opportunity to have their opinion expressed, respected, and captured. That is why we hired a facilitation firm, BDS, who not only designs the agenda for each meeting but also facilitates to make sure that not one group or set of stakeholders dominates the conversation. To their credit, BDS has not only managed the meetings but reached out to individual stakeholders between meetings to make sure all perspectives are captured.

As I mentioned, the working group has met four times, and the External Advisory Group two. One of the most important decisions we made — we started out to say, how do we develop biometric policies for public-facing biometrics portwide? What we quickly realized is that would be incredibly challenging, with a numerous set of caveats for each recommendation, because each use case is so different. Biometric air exit and air entry, which is mostly under CBP federal jurisdiction, is very different from ticketing and bag check, which is different from how law enforcement might use biometrics. So rather than cram that all into one use case, we are actually going to develop five different use cases.

The first you’ll hear about today is biometric air exit — CBP’s program for using facial recognition for departing international air passengers. We will also have recommendations for biometric air and cruise entry — CBP’s use of facial recognition for arrivals of both international passengers and individuals departing a cruise ship, who are technically considered international passengers. We have drafted, but not yet vetted with the External Advisory Group, the non-federal biometric passenger processing use case — facial recognition for things like bag check and ticketing; CLEAR would fall under this category. Biometrics for customer functions would be biometric uses for access to corporate lounges, parking garages, rental cars. And finally, biometrics for law enforcement and security functions. There will be many similarities between those recommendations, but we’re doing them separately because of the very different issues related to federal versus non-federal jurisdiction.

The last thing I want to say before I turn things over to Veronica: we have really tried to have as much transparency and accountability in this process as possible. In addition to the meetings, we have a project webpage on the Port website that has the minutes and all materials of the External Advisory Group, the drafts of all the policy use cases, and we have communicated by email and in person with external advisors and other external stakeholders. It’s really important to us that we do this process right and be really clear with everybody about every single thing we’re doing.

**[3:05:27] Veronica Valdez —** I wanted to spend some time to level-set on what biometric exit is. At the airport, it is a CBP function — CBP is congressionally mandated to have a biometric entry and exit system. CBP can exercise their authority to implement air exit themselves, or they could work with airlines or the airport to do it for them. It basically verifies whether the departing individual is truly the same person who entered the U.S. It also allows CBP to determine if a foreign national overstays their authorized time.

Biometric air exit occurs at the departure gates of international flights. This is a five-step chart of how it works. The first step: the airline sends a roster or manifest of all travelers on that international flight to the Department of Homeland Security, DHS, and they prepare a temporary gallery of images of these travelers. Those photos are pulled from images taken by CBP during entry inspection, U.S. passport photos, U.S. visas, other travel documentation, and photos from previous DHS encounters. The next step is at the departure gate, where each international traveler’s photo is taken, either by a CBP-owned camera or equipment provided by the airline or airport authority. The next step: these photographs are encrypted, personal identifying information is stripped, and they’re sent to a cloud-based matching system via a secure connection. CBP’s biometric matching service is called the Traveler Verification Service, TVS.

**[3:07:20] Commissioner Bowman —** Veronica, I just want to make sure we clarify — it’s step number two, that’s where passengers have the ability to decline the biometric, right? Can we make sure we highlight that this is the point where you do not have to do this?

**[3:07:28] Veronica Valdez —** Correct. Thank you, Commissioner. The next step, step three, is the photographs are encrypted, as I said. Step four, the TVS compares the new photo taken at the gate with the gallery DHS has prepared. Then TVS responds with the identity verification match results and returns a unique identification number, just a string of numbers. If there is a match, the traveler is able to board. If there is no match, the traveler’s documents are screened manually with a gate agent. I just want to be clear that airports and airlines are not mandated to participate in the CBP biometric air exit program, but the two dozen or so airports nationally who do it, do it voluntarily, because they believe in the benefits.

**[3:08:32] [Commissioner Felleman] —** So that means you have the choice to do it yourself, but if you don’t, they will. Correct? And it’s not necessarily that they’re opting for that — they’re just not doing it, and CBP is doing it for them. I was wondering — several of the comments from the public were, why are we complicit? What is the benefit of us doing it if CBP is going to do it anyway? The one place I’ve always felt where our responsibility really lies is to make sure the opt-out option is explicit and clear. But what is the value added, Eric, to take this on?

**[3:09:10] Eric Shinfeld —** I think that’s really the essential point, Commissioner, because absolutely — the real fundamental choice here, because CBP has the authority to come in and do biometric air exit in our terminal without our permission, as they are currently doing right now — the real choice is whether we want them to do it, or we want our staff or airline staff to do it. That is ultimately a policy decision the commission will make. But the difference, to your question: if CBP does it, CBP will do whatever CBP does — they will follow their guidelines and rules. If airport and airline staff do it, they will be more compelled to follow the policy recommendations we’ve included here. The things we would have more control over include signage, communication, training standards, and layout to ensure no unintended image capture.

**[3:10:10] Veronica Valdez —** One of the things in particular that training and communications are about — as Veronica said, no one, U.S. citizen or not, is required to use facial recognition on a departing international flight. It is a voluntary system. So it’s really essential that whoever is doing it, particularly if it’s airline staff under our choice, makes it really clear to people — our communications, our signage make it clear — if you do not want to use facial recognition to board your departing international flight, you do not have to.

**[3:10:49] [Commissioner Felleman] —** Just to be clear, nothing precludes the airport from doing more than CBP or the airlines in terms of signage.

**[3:10:59] Eric Shinfeld —** That’s exactly what I’m saying — that’s what the new recommendations are.

**[3:10:59] [Commissioner Felleman] —** No, but I’m just saying — the airlines or CBP could do the program, but we could put up as many signs as we want. So it doesn’t preclude us, at least from the signage.

**[3:11:15] Eric Shinfeld —** That is correct.

**[3:11:22] Veronica Valdez —** And as Eric mentioned, CBP has already begun implementing this at Sea-Tac with Lufthansa flights, and they have begun conducting screenings on Hainan, Emirates, and Virgin Atlantic flights.

**[3:11:37] Eric Shinfeld —** So this is a matrix that is obviously very small and hard to read. We did not put it up here for people to read — we’ve included in your packet and the public materials the full 30-page biometric air exit policy recommendations, so anybody who wants to follow along can. What we wanted to do here is show you visually how thorough we’ve tried to be at the task assigned to us in the December 10th motion, which is to translate the biometric principles you passed into tangible, enforceable policies. What we have not done — and I want to make this clear, because the word “recommendations” may be confusing — we are not recommending whether or not the Port should install a biometric air exit system. Our task is to put in recommendations that, if the Port authorizes itself and/or its airlines to do a biometric exit system, here is how they would comply with the biometric principles you put forward. Ultimately it is your decision whether or not you want to approve that, or just defer to CBP to operate the program.

You’ll see seven columns — those are the seven principles you put out there. You’ll also see in the report, starting on page eight, that not only have we laid out the recommendations, but we’ve laid out all the stakeholder concerns and feedback. Just because this is the internal working group recommendation, the staff recommendation, there is not full consensus from the External Advisory Group. We don’t want anyone on the group to feel they’ve been railroaded into agreeing to something they don’t agree with, so we’ve listed the concerns in the document as well, for full transparency, so that when you make policy decisions you know where everybody is on all these issues.

**[3:13:35] [Commissioner Felleman] —** There isn’t a column for cost. So if we took it on, would there be cost to us?

**[3:13:37] Eric Shinfeld —** If the Port installed a common-use system, there would. If it was the airlines that installed a proprietary system, we would not have a cost.

**[3:13:51] [Commissioner Felleman] —** It just seems to me that’s one of the variables. If CBP did it, are we obligated to do it for them?

**[3:13:51] Eric Shinfeld —** No.

**[3:13:51] [Commissioner Felleman] —** So could we get a sense of how much it would cost for the Port to do?

**[3:14:00] Eric Shinfeld —** There would be additional staffing as well as equipment — mostly equipment. We didn’t include cost here because our task specifically is how to map the principles to enforceable policies, and that’s the task we’re focused on. But we could get a ballpark — it would be very easy. We have that ballpark.

Let me briefly talk about the kinds of things in each of these categories. This is meant to be exemplary — not everything in every single amount of detail. We are still in process getting feedback from our External Advisory Group.

**[3:14:39] [Commissioner Calkins] —** Are any of these recommendations contrary to anything CBP would require or disallow? We do not have authority to deal with federally regulated issues.

**[3:14:55] Eric Shinfeld —** We are very clear in this document what is CBP regulation and what is within our ability.

**[3:14:55] [Commissioner Calkins] —** And are the participants clear of that as well, in terms of the recommendations coming through this work group?

**[3:15:11] Eric Shinfeld —** It’s certainly a topic we’ve had a lot of discussion on. CBP is part of our External Advisory Group, and there was very robust discussion last time from all stakeholders trying to get from CBP what the program is and isn’t, what jurisdiction they have and what is outside of it. We continue to have that conversation.

**[3:15:37] [Commissioner Calkins] —** Are we confident that, to the extent CBP’s basic task is achieved, these will be complementary — that they’ll be honored and adhered to in the overall project, if CBP implements biometric air exit?

**[3:15:53] Eric Shinfeld —** If CBP implements biometric air exit, we will have no control over that. We can still do, as Commissioner Felleman said, some signage and things like that. If we are more in control of the program, we would have the ability to implement many more of these recommendations.

**[3:16:10] [Commissioner Calkins] —** I see — so I think that needs to be well understood.

**[3:16:10] Veronica Valdez —** But this application goes beyond CBP’s jurisdiction as well. Some of our recommendations are the ones fully within our jurisdiction. It was very important for us, regardless of whether CBP comes in and exercises its jurisdiction, that our number one priority is our travelers — making sure they’re informed of their rights, those rights are respected, and doing everything we can to ensure transparency and accountability, even in areas we don’t have control over.

**[3:16:41] [Commissioner Felleman] —** Could we not have an MOU with CBP adopting the protocols that I think are appropriate? You already have their letter endorsing your principles.

**[3:16:56] Eric Shinfeld —** We certainly are always engaging with our federal agencies to talk about what they can do and how they can work with us best. But ultimately, it’s very important to understand — CBP has federal jurisdiction on Customs and Border Protection, and they will follow their rules and guidelines.

**[3:17:13] [Commissioner Felleman] —** So the point is, even if we wanted to assert ourselves, we can’t. So we’re asking them to adopt things we think are important, where we couldn’t do it if we ran it ourselves.

**[3:17:29] Eric Shinfeld —** We are not asking them to do anything. We are talking about what we will do, whether or not they do it or we do it. The recommendations are about us. We don’t have any recommendations that tell CBP what to do, because we can’t tell CBP what to do. These are recommendations about what we should do if CBP implements, or if the airport or airlines implement. And this letter in Appendix D is their expression of support for our principles.

Justified is obviously the principle: is there a justification for using biometrics for this purpose? We talk in this section about how this is essentially an automation of a CBP process, so it has sort of inherent justification. But regardless, it’s really important for us to ensure it is not mass surveillance. Our definition of mass surveillance, as included in the December 10th motion, is that it is a one-to-one use of facial recognition, not multiple people, and certainly not without their acknowledgment. Our recommendations under Justified are things like making sure that, if it’s airport or airline staff requesting this, there is an approval process, it is fully vetted against the principles, against CBP’s regulatory policies, to make sure it’s in compliance with federal law. And importantly, if the Port decides to implement a common-use system — us purchasing the cameras that every single airline would be required to use — we would not have multiple proprietary systems competing with our common-use system, both for simplification and for control and maximum transparency and accountability.

Private is obviously extremely important. Most of the privacy rules are controlled by CBP, because ultimately the data goes to their database, in their system, using their algorithm. However, the opportunities we have here really have to do with our ability to make clear to people what CBP’s privacy policies are. They have published a very long privacy impact assessment, and we have the ability to share that and make sure people understand those policies. And where we might have control, if the airport or airlines do it — really make sure there is absolutely no third-party access, no other use beyond CBP use for anything other than boarding an international flight. This is not, “Oh, the airline’s going to take that data and sell you a flight to Hawaii.”

**[3:20:25] [Commissioner Felleman] —** But how do we guarantee that?

**[3:20:33] Veronica Valdez —** CBP has an auditing process, and we have some recommendations about how we can work with CBP to get that audit data, as well as look at how we can do our own additional performance evaluation.

**[3:20:41] [Commissioner Felleman] —** If I remember correctly, when CBP testified, they had not even done their first audit.

**[3:20:49] Eric Shinfeld —** They have not done their first audit yet — they are starting to now for Atlanta. And one of the things CBP said in our last External Advisory Group meeting is that they would be willing to — I don’t know if they used the word MOU, Commissioner Felleman — put into agreement with us access to audit data, if that was something important to us, if we decided to implement biometric air exit.

Equitable — incredibly important. This issue around whether or not the system is as good at recognizing non-white men: NIST, a federal agency, did a study of every single algorithm and looked at whether they’re good or bad at recognizing different subgroups. Some are really bad — some are a hundred times worse at recognizing Black women than white men. That is not good. The good news, if you want to call it good news, is that CBP’s algorithm was either the first or second most accurate in all of those NIST tests. And the CBP algorithm is required, whether it’s CBP, the airport, or airlines doing the work, because ultimately they’re all feeding into the CBP TVS system, which uses CBP’s algorithm — judged by NIST to be one of, if not the most accurate, in terms of overall accuracy and specifically within subgroups. We also have recommendations around our Welcoming Port policy, engaging with diverse groups — immigrants and refugees — to make sure they understand their rights and have a clear understanding of the complaint processes, in multiple languages and culturally sensitive ways.

Transparency is really where we get into what Commissioner Felleman has come back to several times — signage, a communications plan, an accountability report we would publish annually that talks about not only what we’re doing but whether it’s working: audit data, performance evaluation data, any complaint data. And I’ll be really honest with you — I have stolen a lot of this language from Senator Wyman from the state legislature. He has a bill moving through the state legislature. I don’t know if that bill will pass, but it doesn’t matter, because we are going to use all of his language around accountability and accountability reports, because it’s really good language.

Lawful — pretty straightforward, we should follow the law. But maybe less straightforward is that we are going to become one of the lead advocates at the state and federal level for stronger laws as it relates to facial recognition and biometrics. I’ll give you an important example: right now CBP says, by their regulations, they will not require anyone — U.S. citizen or not — to submit to facial recognition to board a plane. It’s entirely voluntary. But that’s just a CBP regulation. It would certainly be better if that was a congressional law, so we were sure of its permanence, because they could change their mind. That’s an example of the kind of thing we would advocate for — making some of CBP’s very good privacy and voluntary regulations into permanent law.

Ethical — one of the recommendations here is the creation of a technology ethical advisory board. This goes back to the Justified principle, where folks said, okay, you have a process for approving these, but how does the airport managing director know whether this is a good thing to approve? Some of it is, is it aligned with the principles and policies. But we believe having a technology ethical advisory board will really help us think through the pros and cons — is it really worth the cost-benefit analysis of convenience versus loss of privacy and civil liberties? That board would be helpful for biometrics and probably a number of other technology issues.

And finally, but certainly not least, voluntary. We are very pleased that CBP’s regulations say — whether CBP is doing it or the airport and airlines are — that it is not required that anybody submit to facial recognition to board an international flight, fully in line with your principle that it be voluntary. But that regulation doesn’t matter if people don’t know it’s the regulation, or they feel pressured to do it regardless of whether it’s allowed. We have heard stories from other airports of people complaining that nobody told them it was voluntary, or they asked to opt out and the gate agent said, “Do we have to? That’s annoying.” We don’t want that. We need it to be really clear in our communications, and we also need training standards — if it’s the airport or airlines doing this, everyone must be trained to a certain standard so they’re really clear with customers: you don’t have to do it. And if customers opt out, it’s done in an incredibly respectful way that doesn’t disadvantage or inconvenience them. And the voluntary piece around unintended image capture — we can design standards for how cameras should be pointed, the kinds of cameras, different filters, different backdrops, to make sure nobody just walking by in the background gets their image captured. Even if it were captured, it would be thrown out, but it shouldn’t happen anyway. This should be a hundred percent voluntary, no mass surveillance — one-to-one and willing participation.

So those are the kinds of recommendations. We’ve gotten feedback from stakeholders, which we’ve included in the report as stakeholder concerns. We will be able to accommodate and edit our recommendations to include those concerns, but we didn’t do that yet because, for transparency’s sake, we wanted to show you what those concerns were before we incorporated them into the final report. I realize that’s a lot in a very short amount of time. Let me end, before turning things over to Commissioners Cho and Calkins, who are part of the Biometrics special committee, by saying: we don’t have a ton of control over a lot of the CBP biometric air exit program. It will happen at Sea-Tac Airport whether we do it or not. We don’t have control over their algorithm, their privacy standards. But I hope you see from this very long list of recommendations in this 30-page document that we do have a ton of things we can and should do — whether it’s CBP or us doing it — to maximize our efforts to protect the privacy, civil liberties, and general rights of our travelers and visitors. Let me stop there.

**[3:28:49] President Steinbrueck —** Thank you, Eric.

**[3:28:56] Commissioner Calkins —** Just a reminder — Sam and I met with staff to go over the recommendations on February 18th in our first committee meeting. We have another coming up at the end of March. I will say, it’s bracing to be told you don’t have the power to do something. In certain areas there’s no two ways about it. I am deeply appreciative of the work staff has done to delineate where we do and don’t, and to make a clear case for why — when we have the ability to select control, we can do what we think is especially important, even though there is a budget implication and some reallocation of personnel. After reviewing this, I think carving out the biometric air exit policy in particular, so the ongoing work of the committee and working group can be focused on the areas where we do have control, is a wise recommendation.

**[3:30:07] Commissioner Cho —** First, I just want to thank the staff for their stellar work on this. I think it’s true when we say we are really the first port in the country to have this extensive a conversation on this issue. And I want to thank the folks who came and testified today — we really value your perspective. I want to preface my statements by saying I share your concerns on the potential biases these systems may have. I tend to believe that if it’s created by humans, then it probably has human biases involved as well. As the son of immigrants, as a person of color, this is at the top of my mind when we think about biometrics and the use of artificial intelligence at the Port, and that’s why I volunteered for this special committee.

But we’re faced with a tough decision here, and let me be clear about our options. The choice is not whether or not the biometric air exit plan is executed — that is not the choice. The choice is whether or not we as a Port want to take this on, or if we want to abdicate that to CBP or the airlines. It’s not an ideal choice, but those are the options. The External Advisory Group has come up with seven principles that I think should be applied to every use of biometrics and AI at the Port, and it would be a shame if we let CBP or someone else run with this and then these seven principles are not adhered to at all. Right now I am leaning toward making sure we do as much as we can to adhere to those principles, and that might mean we take on this system ourselves as a common-use system. I know that scares people, but at the end of the day, the choice is not whether we use this system or not — the choice is who uses it, who executes it, and who has control over whether those seven principles are adhered to. I don’t like the idea of kicking the can down the street — “that’s not our problem.” I think as a commission we should take responsibility for this, push these seven principles, and make sure we’re doing everything we can to not break them.

**[3:33:04] Commissioner Calkins —** A couple of other issues I wanted to raise. First, while we as a commission don’t have the ability to set federal policy, we do elect representatives who can. So we have an opportunity, and as the leading port on this issue, our voice will carry significant weight. As we look at both the biometric air exit policy and biometrics policy writ large, I would hope that by the next federal legislative agenda, we have recommendations for how that federal legislation can be improved. The other: as we’ve drank from the fire hose of biometrics information, I am quite stunned at the range of technologies with potential for abuse or breach or harm — things applied through crowds, through large numbers of people, with very few filters and controls, where access to the data is loosely held. Very high concern for breach or abuse. But I would suggest that from our communications with CBP — because this is not the establishment of a new database as people come through, but verification against an existing database that dates back decades — on that spectrum of potential for abuse or harm, it’s fairly low. That’s encouraging to me. Even though we don’t have control over it, I at least rest somewhat assured that the likelihood of abuse is fairly low. And it is an area where, if we take control of the establishment of the system at Sea-Tac, it gives us the opportunity to put in place best practices immediately that would even lower the threshold for abuse.

**[3:35:16] Commissioner Felleman —** Getting back to the relative merits of us doing it versus having others — the airlines have been doing this longer than anybody else and have developed their own expertise. But the point raised was the uniformity of having the airport do it. Whoever’s whiz-bang technology we choose is one thing, but the fact that it would be consistent across all systems, so that if a problem is identified it can be corrected across the board — that’s one of the real upsides, besides the protocols. How much weight did you put on that consideration?

**[3:36:12] Eric Shinfeld —** There are really three scenarios. Scenario one: we do not allow ourselves or the airlines to implement, and it’s just CBP — they have their system, technology, and process. Second: we do not take control, but we allow airlines to implement their own proprietary systems. And third: we put in a common-use system. The reason there is a recommendation in this document that if there is a common-use system, all airlines use it, is both practical and policy. The practical: most of our gates for international departures are used by multiple international carriers. The only thing worse to some people than the idea of a facial recognition camera at the gate would be six facial recognition cameras at the gate. But much more important than practical considerations is our belief that if there are going to be Port or airline uses of facial recognition to board international flights, then if we choose the vendor, the camera, and the software, we have the most control over how it’s pointed, where it’s used, what kinds of filters we use to avoid unintended image capture, and ensuring certain privacy standards. To be honest, if this is happening and we decide to allow it, we should only allow it if we are exerting the maximum amount of control to protect our travelers, and the common-use system would provide some advantages to do that.

**[3:38:05] Commissioner Calkins —** I would also suggest that a common-use system controlled by us ensures a high and consistent level of training for those who administer it. What we found in examining complaints about this system in other places is that although people are advised it’s an opt-out system, when making the decision to opt out, if the person staffing the camera makes it difficult — even something as minimal as rolling their eyes or creating a big deal out of pulling them out of the line — then effectively it’s not an opt-out system. So we need to make sure training is up to the standards where a passenger who has chosen to opt out can do so without any negative implications.

**[3:39:09] Eric Shinfeld —** Of course, even if we have a common-use system, it would be the airlines using it, so the training issue would be in place regardless. Let me add a couple things. This is a technical standard, so there’s not a lot of variance on which equipment can be deployed or how. There is a difference in equipment, but there’s a technical standard on a lot of these systems.

**[3:39:34] Executive Director Metruck —** Going back to Commissioner Felleman’s point on standardization — the compliance with the technical standard is where CBP is looking for compliance to meet the criteria for the standard. That’s part of their approach — making sure you don’t have variance on how it’s done.

**[3:39:51] [Commissioner Felleman] —** I think the standard was really at the capture point. You can have a certain DPI on your camera, but lighting and angles and all this sort of stuff is probably where you have more control. There is a standard, but there’s probably more control over that. I would imagine that would be one of the potential upsides. I had another thought that I had a senior moment on — I’ll get back there.

**[3:40:32] President Steinbrueck —** Other questions or comments?

**[3:40:32] Veronica Valdez —** Some really quick final comments. As Eric mentioned, the next steps are to continue drafting policy recommendations for the several use cases listed. We’ll continue to engage with the Biometrics special committee, Commissioners Calkins and Cho, and additional community members, with various outreach and communications channels. Everything is posted on the program page, so anyone listening to this presentation right now can go ahead and look into that and provide feedback. And lastly, we are marching toward the March 31st deadline to provide all policy recommendations for the remaining use cases. It is aggressive, and again we thank all the working group and External Advisory Group. We plan for a full commission briefing on those recommendations on April 14th, so stand by for that.

**[3:41:45] Eric Shinfeld —** I’ll just say — I’m not sure why there are two question marks after “complete all policy recommendations by March 31st.” That is the direction you have given us in your motion, and we plan to do that. I will, however, say that even more important to me than meeting your deadline is to fully vet these recommendations through our External Advisory Group and external stakeholders. So while we will have drafts of all those recommendations delivered to you by March 31st, we very well might continue to engage our external stakeholders for feedback over the next several months after that.

**[3:42:18] President Steinbrueck —** And Eric, those two question marks —

**[3:42:18] Eric Shinfeld —** There was an emoji with the fingers crossed.

**[3:42:26] Commissioner Felleman —** One thing that dawned on me — this is ultimately a great upside for CBP if they don’t have to pay for it. This is sort of alleviating that budgetary concern.

**[3:42:41] Eric Shinfeld —** What I would say, Commissioner — not to get too much into the cost-benefit, because we’re not here to recommend whether CBP should do it — we would, quote-unquote, not have to pay for the cameras. However, the quote-unquote cost to us of CBP doing it is that they would take officers from international arrivals, which is already on average about an hour to 90-minute delay, and use them for international departures. So the cost to us would be increased delays in our international arrivals. Again, we’re not here to say one’s better than the other, but it’s not just a free lunch.

**[3:43:28] Commissioner Felleman —** These are critical considerations. The cost is one thing, but these other considerations are real. I guess the only other thing — one of the other public comment issues was the timing of the RFP with regard to the deliberations, that we were ordering this equipment as if we already decided to buy it ourselves.

**[3:43:52] Eric Shinfeld —** Let me be clear — we were really clear with our External Advisory Group, both by email and in person, about what we did there. We told them: we are moving forward with this so that we can receive feedback from the vendor community about the state of the technology, to better inform our policymaking decisions. We cannot make a procurement on that RFP, because you as a commission have not voted to authorize a procurement. Whether people want to believe us, the staff, or not, it would literally be illegal for us to make a procurement. So that RFP, while released, in no way commits you or the Port to doing anything unless and until you implement these policies and make a decision to authorize that. Those data are to inform our decision whether we would buy it for ourselves. If the airlines did it, they have their toys; if CBP did it, they have theirs. We need to understand the state of the technology — this is just to educate.

**[3:44:54] President Steinbrueck —** And as long as it was over $300,000, we’d have something to say about it.

**[3:45:02] Eric Shinfeld —** What we did ask is to ensure that the vendors were given the principles you passed, and to ask them, show us how you can meet these principles that apply for this RFP. That way we can ensure that if they are not meeting the privacy principles we laid out, that’s one vendor we won’t look further into. The state of the technology is great, but if it’s not meeting our principles, will we not go forward with something like that.

**[3:45:41] Commissioner Bowman —** I wanted to add — I think the case Ms. Lee from the ACLU made was more about the RFP language, that it indicated we were moving forward. Commissioner Cho did an excellent job of delineating exactly what the question is before us — it’s not if, it’s how. So I just think we need to really be clear about what the problem statement is moving forward, and perhaps we weren’t when we formed the working group. There was so much confusion about what it was — everything was on pause, are we going to do this — but the fact of the matter is it is already happening. So going back to the how — how do we do it so that it protects the public as much as possible and we have the most control? But I will say, as a commissioner, we don’t read the RFPs.

**[3:46:32] Eric Shinfeld —** So I apologize to the public, and let me be clear — we have agreed already, yesterday, to remove any of that language from the RFP. We will release an addendum to all of those vendors making it clear that language should not be in the RFP, because ultimately the only commitment we can make is a commission decision whether or not to move forward. It doesn’t matter what the airport staff agreed to a year ago or two years ago — you are the policymaking body, and your motion is very clear that we will only move forward if you approve to do so.

**[3:47:02] President Steinbrueck —** Thank you. One final question — we have one more item before we wrap up. What is the expectation with regard to tracking the opening of the international arrivals facility in the fall, with the implementation of whatever system we decide on?

**[3:47:25] Eric Shinfeld —** Just to be clear, Commissioner — we are discussing here today biometric air exit, which is departing international flights. CBP has full control over what is called the FIS, the Federal Inspection Services area, which is where arriving international flights are. The International Arrivals Facility we’re building right now is an FIS. CBP will make a decision to install facial recognition technology into the IAF, into the FIS. We have absolutely zero control over that whatsoever. So these recommendations are not about arrivals — they’re only about exit. What they do in the FIS, we will continue to monitor and track, but it’s not in our control.

**[3:48:03] [Commissioner Felleman] —** Can I just add one thing? I want people to understand this, in particular with the International Arrivals Facility. Lance, I wanted to give you some information — I arrived in Miami from an overseas flight about three weeks ago. I went through their FIS, took the train to the second terminal about eight minutes away, and got my bags checked the second time to go domestic, all within 70 minutes. It was remarkable, and it was because they must have had 50 of the kiosks — you would probably know the number, Lance — but it was significant, and the pictures make a big difference. There aren’t enough CBP officers to go around; there’s never going to be. So this is an important technology. But again, if we’re going to spend a billion dollars on our International Arrivals Facility, it needs to work — we can’t have the delays we have right now.

**[3:49:00] President Steinbrueck —** On that one — it sounds like we either have no control or less than no control.

**[3:49:14] Eric Shinfeld —** That’s for international arrivals, which is a separate topic that is not part of this. So we have exit and arrivals, and then as you move along the whole list, you get more and more control.

**[3:49:22] Executive Director Metruck —** As it builds toward that, that’s why you shouldn’t anchor yourselves just on this one application. If you look at some of the concerns we heard from people who commented — some of those implications with surveillance, some of the other ones that are clearly out there — the commission has some of those principles that can clearly be applied outside, in the airport itself.

**[3:49:53] [Commissioner Felleman] —** It does seem like, if this is happening, having our control over it is the best we could do to assure public safety.

**[3:50:01] [Commissioner] —** The good news is, in our rough analysis, my perspective is that the areas where we have more control — cameras located in our lobbies — is that information used for purposes of mass surveillance? That we do have control over. So the next phase of the work is going to be really essential to making sure we establish a good policy that ensures it doesn’t go that direction. And the good news is we do have control over that.

**[3:50:25] Eric Shinfeld —** Let me highlight that point, and I’ll get over my skis just a little bit. It is my belief that there will be many potential uses of biometrics the Port does not endorse. I do not think we will allow biometrics in every single nook and cranny of every single Port facility. This use case we talked about today — fortunately or unfortunately, depending on your perspective — we don’t have that luxury. But some of these others that are bulleted here, we’ll have a much different set of recommendations.

**[3:51:02] President Steinbrueck —** So the point being, just because we make a decision one way today, it doesn’t necessarily mean we will continue to make that decision the same way on other uses of biometrics. That’s the point here.

**[3:51:10] [Commissioner] —** But we could make those decisions with greater control if we harness this at this point.

**[3:51:18] President Steinbrueck —** Okay. Let’s move on to item number 9B, North Satellite modernization budget increase briefing.

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**[3:51:42] Executive Director Metruck —** Commissioners, this briefing will go into detail on how and why the current North Satellite modernization project cost estimate at completion is forecasted greater than the budget authorized by the commission. Scope changes, additional soft costs, unforeseen conditions, and remediation are just a few of those cost drivers. This briefing lays out the intention of the project team to return soon for commission authorization. The presenters are Ken Warren and Rad Milosavljevic.

**[3:52:18] Ken Warren —** Good afternoon, Commissioners and Executive Director Metruck. We’re here to provide a briefing on the North Satellite modernization project. The budget was authorized for construction in August of 2017. As you recall in our past briefings, we’ve been evaluating our estimated completion. We now know more about the project and what lies ahead, and are projecting a need for additional funds.

*[technical difficulty]*

**[3:53:03] Ken Warren —** Thank you, sorry. Our forecast today indicates a 5.9 percent increase, equating to $40 million. We’ve broken this request into categories. This represents changes in the process of negotiation, changes necessary to complete the project, added scope, support costs, and differing site conditions — they have all been contributors.

So what does that mean to you, Commissioners? It means there have been many small incremental changes impacting our forecast, with the exception of contaminated and unsuitable soils, which is about $8 million. We’re also planning a $5 million management reserve controlled by Executive Director Metruck. To further break out what the funds represent, I’d like to highlight just a few. Completing the design development allowance — we’ve been reporting for some time that was higher than expected. Higher-than-anticipated market conditions since 2017, when the project was authorized. The phasing complexity and complications with the passenger circulation path during construction — that’s the central core, the escalators, where we have people going through the project while we’re constructing it. Cost impacts to the budget are both capital and expense related. And again, we continue to discover and exceed our predictions for the soils.

Moving forward, we continue to work on risks, and our team expects phasing resources, construction gates and availability of gates, and temporary system removal at the end of the project — all to be mitigated. We have included these risks in our request. Phase one taught us how to be successful. Reflecting on our experience and striving for continuous improvement is our team’s nature. We continue to capture our lessons, achieve better results, and communicate them out to our fellow teams and stakeholders for implementation portwide. I’d like to now allow Rad to talk about small business.

**[3:55:51] Rad Milosavljevic —** The next couple of slides deal with small business participation and apprenticeship participation. First off, I’d like to tell you the good news that all of those are actually meeting or projected to meet goals and requirements. This is going to look a little different than what you’re used to seeing now with Diversity in Contracting. This was established in 2017, prior to Diversity in Contracting. So what happened is the contractor already on board planning the project sat down with construction management, CPO, and the Office of Social Responsibility, looked through the work at hand, and tried to come up with work packages that could be bid to small businesses without affecting the overall efficiency of the project.

Right now we’re looking at the SCS participation requirement. SCS stands for small contractors and suppliers — a list of contractors certified within King County. I can’t read the numbers from here very well, but we have a goal, our requirement, on the left-hand side in yellow, and right now we believe we’re going to exceed that, which is the middle bar — how much commitment we have to date. Not all of those subcontractors have been fully contracted yet, but we believe that’s where we’re going to get at the end of the job. The blue chart on the right-hand side is what we’ve paid to date. The project is probably about 64, 65 percent complete, which tells you some of these are definitely well on their way to meet or exceed the goals. Next slide, please. Similar with the apprenticeship participation — the left-hand bars are goals and the right-hand bars are current utilization, and as you can see, we meet and exceed all of those as well.

**[3:58:01] Ken Warren —** Our project schedule continues to track based on our 2017 authorization. Our partner Alaska Airlines is collaborating with us to continue our focus on the schedule; we expect to deliver on time. Our contractor is to be commended for their dedication and work. I believe our contracting methodology, coupled with Hensel Phelps, Hermanson, Aecom, and our other subcontractors, exceed our expectations.

On to the show-and-tell portion. Here’s an exterior shot of phase one — the expansion to the north of the 1973 terminal that we opened on January 23, 2019. Here’s a great 1973 photo showing the means of construction nearly 48 years ago. Here we track the facility just prior to construction in the upper left, where we are today — that picture was taken last week on Friday — and where we’re headed in the bottom right corner. The concourse is being constructed, and we plan on enclosing the building envelope soon. I’d like to share our magnificent marketplace, really beginning to take shape, showing the great views to the west — really what this project is about. Our baggage expansion is complete, upper left. The grand elevator, lower left, is beginning to take shape. The airfield shot from the west shows construction progress. In addition, the Concourse C train station and escalator replacement opened in January, completing our Concourse C program work. The art piece is also installed, upper right. Our preserved plant wall has been determined, the black leaf sculpture in the center has been procured, and the John Grade boundary has been constructed — you can see the actual construction of the art piece, now waiting to be installed in the marketplace, in storage at his facility.

We also would like to recognize our partners, Alaska Airlines. You can see here how the original satellite was prepped for the final jet bridge installation four months prior to the opening in July 1973. I’d like to go back to the Alaska Lounge photographs and talk about the support Alaska Airlines has given — verbally and in support of our request. They notified me today of that. Here’s a great picture of the 1973 facility about three or four months before the project started, almost 48 years ago.

Again, we know it’s challenging to report the financial news, but it is important that we be transparent, that we improve our delivery, and continue to improve on completing the program’s scope, schedule, and budget. We invite any questions you may have at this time.

**[4:01:58] Commissioner Bowman —** It’s not necessarily a question, but maybe — the factors driving the increase. I would ask, more for Steve and Lance, because you did a really excellent job on phase one, but many of these are things we’ve been experiencing for other projects over the years. I call out the market condition, the contractor availability, phasing complexity — when I think about the IAF in particular — scope additions, and especially the contaminated and unsuitable soils. I would ask that the team really think about how, as we’re planning these projects, it feels like we’re surprised by these things, but there are common themes we seem to be having with our large capital projects at the airport. So I would ask — I don’t know what the plan is — but bring us some recommendations about how we’re not continually saying there’s not enough labor, the soil is bad. We know the soil is bad. So as we’re moving forward with SAMP and other projects, that we’re anticipating that in advance.

**[4:03:01] Ken Warren —** That takes us back to our estimations of how we do those and bringing forward. In developing this program, we did do a lot of preliminary work. We actually potholed in 100 different locations around the existing project before we started. We estimated our contaminated soils based on those findings. Everywhere we’ve dug since then has found contaminated or unsuitable soils. So it was a bit of bad luck in our plan — not to say we didn’t do our due diligence back in 2015, 2016.

**[4:03:41] Commissioner Bowman —** Perhaps in the future — you want to hear a suggestion? Maybe we double the number that we’re planning on, way back when.

**[4:03:48] Ken Warren —** Right, that’s where I was looking, because we had the same issue with the IAF, that the first soils didn’t seem bad.

**[4:03:48] Commissioner Bowman —** So perhaps we shouldn’t trust all of our own information when we’re developing those programs early on, and that might be a good lesson learned to reflect back on as we move forward.

**[4:03:57] Executive Director Metruck —** It goes back to some of our other lessons learned from other projects, which includes two independent estimators and things like that that will build into that, as we come back to you to say what process improvements we’re doing overall to our capital delivery system.

**[4:04:13] [Commissioner Felleman] —** So when you say potholing, is that a core sample?

**[4:04:20] Ken Warren —** Absolutely. I’d like to defer to Rad.

**[4:04:20] [Commissioner Felleman] —** How deep do we go?

**[4:04:28] Rad Milosavljevic —** It depends on the area. It’s basically decided by the engineers at the time it’s being done, based on some data we have on the materials out there. They go anywhere between — maybe at 10 feet down. It also is controlled probably by how deep you’re going to go with your excavation. We’re not required to chase it — we just have to deal with the stuff we find.

**[4:04:56] Ken Warren —** We’re primarily working around the satellite in the top six feet for the most part, excavating and then recompacting to provide that new ramp concrete area — that thick concrete, so we have that infrastructure there for the satellite of the future. So obviously you don’t go shallower than that.

**[4:05:12] [Commissioner Felleman] —** Although it sounds like — because we find PCBs? What are we finding?

**[4:05:21] Rad Milosavljevic —** It’s a lot of fuel and a lot of glycol, primarily. Not exactly surprising.

**[4:05:29] [Commissioner Felleman] —** Not surprising things.

**[4:05:29] Rad Milosavljevic —** For the most part the glycol isn’t a big deal, but when it gets to such a concentration, when our contractor tries to compact it and it has to meet the FAA requirements, it tends to be more like sand. The soil conditions out at the North Satellite are very sandy — it used to be a lake bed area over there. So when you combine the natural conditions with that glycol, it tends to be more like putty than a hard compaction soil we’re really desiring for that good base course for the ramp concrete.

**[4:05:53] [Commissioner Felleman] —** So do you have to actually go deeper with your foundations, or is it just a bigger cleanup?

**[4:06:01] Rad Milosavljevic —** There are a number of different remedies we use. It’s not just a cleanup.

**[4:06:01] [Commissioner Felleman] —** I’m just thinking — there are actually dogs right now that can detect PCBs. They can walk a dog through a parking lot and detect PCBs — that’s what King County does. It seems like some of the stuff we could almost guarantee. This is primarily fuel and glycol, which would be even easier to detect.

**[4:06:24] Rad Milosavljevic —** Many times we’ve removed the material and bring in other material to replace it so we can get that compression. We are trying to deliver this project and move quickly, and a lot of decisions we make have to be quick. So if we start having a lot of trouble in the middle of a rainstorm with compaction, it might be easier to remove it and get it done and move forward with our concrete — which then has additional cost. But on the overall schedule, we have 18 months to go, and we are working very diligently in delivering this project.

**[4:07:05] President Steinbrueck —** Speaking of which — this project is still on time for the expected completion date? You said it was 18 months from now?

**[4:07:13] Ken Warren —** About.

**[4:07:13] President Steinbrueck —** And what is the percent completion?

**[4:07:13] Ken Warren —** About 65.

**[4:07:21] President Steinbrueck —** And what is the expectation at this point — that this is going to get the job done, the additional authorization?

**[4:07:29] Ken Warren —** I wouldn’t be here before you if I wasn’t good.

**[4:07:36] President Steinbrueck —** Okay.

**[4:07:36] Ken Warren —** I’m confident that we’ve projected what we know today. As of today, we met this afternoon to discover where our forecast is. We have continued to forecast since we set our number in early November, and I’m pleased to report our number hasn’t changed. We do continue to work in the ground since November, so we are discovering things — we have forecasted additional mitigation within that request. So far, things are aligned.

**[4:08:00] President Steinbrueck —** Well, I appreciate the clarity of your presentation and your directness with us regarding the explanations. I’d also comment that the original budget was $672 million — this is a 5.9 percent increase, which is not a huge amount in that context. Nonetheless, we need to look at lessons learned, unexpected and unforeseen. What was the delivery method of this — is it GCCM, general contractor/construction manager?

**[4:08:33] Ken Warren —** Right.

**[4:08:33] President Steinbrueck —** We leverage that methodology every day. That’s important to note as well — that can have a big impact on the success.

**[4:08:50] President Steinbrueck —** So what are the “changes in process”?

**[4:08:58] Ken Warren —** Those are changes in process of completing — changes that are underway, not the change in the process. Changes that are in process under negotiation. Sometimes it’s work in place, sometimes it’s work we’re yet to install.

**[4:09:14] Ken Warren —** We could talk about, like, the nursing suite, the restrooms. We worked really hard on the restrooms to complete the design in late 2018. We actually opened in January 2019, so we were going as fast as we could on those restrooms to incorporate everything all our stakeholders wanted, to have the best restrooms we could, on January 23rd.

**[4:09:29] President Steinbrueck —** There’s cost to listen there, right. I also wanted to ask regarding the goals for small business participation. These were not shown as percentage goals — they were dollar goals. How does the increase, even though relatively small, affect these goals? Do the goals change with the 40 million additional?

**[4:09:54] Rad Milosavljevic —** The goals shouldn’t change, because they don’t change with the changes. The change amounts are not added to them per contract. The goals are established on the original contract, and they keep getting tracked on the original contract.

**[4:10:10] President Steinbrueck —** And I want to offer praise for the accomplishments here — they’re fairly significant with regard to small business participation, small contractor participation. You’re showing meeting or significantly exceeding in some areas those original goals — that’s projecting out the total committed participation in the green — but just meeting or exceeding in all categories. And I think particularly noteworthy is the achievement of the apprenticeship participation. I think that points to an excellent working relationship with the prime contractor and their commitment as well. If they’re in the room here, I think they deserve praise for achieving that level of results. I just wanted to call that out.

**[4:11:08] Ken Warren —** Thank you, Commissioner. I’ll be sure to pass that on to our contractor.

**[4:11:15] [Commissioner Felleman] —** Changing the scope is one of those things that is not a fault — it’s a choice. So how much of that wedge is ours versus the airlines? How much do we own of that?

**[4:11:31] Ken Warren —** Good question. Probably more on the Port’s side than Alaska’s side. And you know what’s in the bathroom — those bathrooms, those things, sweet. It’s tough to really dig into this, because a lot of it is work in place. But we’d like to note that a lot of these items are not high-dollar in and of themselves, but when you have a multi-year project and a lot of requests, it’s a whole lot of issues. I’ve highlighted that we have $8 million in contaminated, unsuitable soils, a $5 million reserve, and the rest is a whole lot of little things — not one massive thing.

To highlight another issue: our building is not quite as level and plumb as we would have expected — the 48-year-old building. We did do some value engineering efforts back in the program, and we expected to do a simple overlay of the terrazzo. As we found out when we took the building apart over the last few months, if we were going to do that overlay, we would actually be into the sand bed on the south end of the facility. You can’t do terrazzo like that. So we unfortunately had to pull all of that terrazzo out, and we’re resetting the building so that it actually matches with the new expansion piece, so the floors work properly and we’re not going to have a building that’s leaning. So we’ve discovered some things.

**[4:12:59] [Commissioner Felleman] —** So that’s what would be considered a differing site condition?

**[4:12:59] Ken Warren —** But it’s also a change, in the fact that we didn’t expect that. In hindsight, we should have said, well, we don’t want to be on that edge, but we really thought we had a good building. That would have been considered a scope change rather than a condition that might be considered a differing site condition — but part of it might be scope change as well.

**[4:13:23] [Commissioner Felleman] —** I have a level you can borrow. And Ryan might know a good tile contractor.

**[4:13:37] President Steinbrueck —** More questions? All right, thank you. This will come back for authorization?

**[4:13:37] Ken Warren —** We plan on returning March 10th.

**[4:13:37] President Steinbrueck —** March 10th. Okay. Thank you very much for a very good presentation.

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**[4:13:46] President Steinbrueck —** We have one remaining item, which is any referrals to committees. Are there any, or any other commission member announcements or reports?

**[4:13:53] [Commissioner] —** LCFS — Bill Math pulled out of the committee today.

**[4:13:53] President Steinbrueck —** Well, good work. Good work.

**[4:14:03] President Steinbrueck —** The meeting is adjourned. Thank you all — have a good evening.

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