The Seattle City Council budget balancing proposal include the next maneuvers in the back and forth tug of war over attempts to loosen the strings on the JumpStart payroll tax revenue intended to fund important social programs and affordable housing.

The council is in the midst of finalizing the city’s budget for 2024 with an important meeting this week and a public hearing to finalize the package in mid-November.

Meanwhile, there are signs that the city’s economic recovery from the pandemic may be on more solid ground as the latest revenue forecast shows a predicted jump in funding from previous more-dire expectations.

“We must meet historic challenges with historic investments in our most critical needs. This package meets that challenge by rejecting austerity and keeping the promises we made to our community when we passed JumpStart,” council budget chair Teresa Mosqueda said as her office released the balancing proposal last week. “As we begin to see the tangible results from our prior investments, it’s time to make good on our commitments and build on their success. This shows the power of progressive revenue to deliver real results for the people of our city.”

CHS reported here on Mayor Bruce Harrell’s 2024 budget plan and spending concerns for the next 2025/2026 budget as the administration emphasized affordable housing and a boost for treatment and diversion to join a crackdown on public drug use while also including spending for the city’s existing first responders at Seattle Police and the Seattle Fire Department to be maintained at status quo levels.

Now, the council is ready for the public debate over reshaping Harrell’s plan. The JumpStart payroll tax on the city’s biggest employers was passed during the pandemic to fund affordable housing and important services. It has been an important driver of new revenue with more than $231 million generated in its first year.

Seattle’s mayors have had a hard time with the temptation to redirect some of that spending away from the initial JumpStart priorities. The council’s 2024 rebalancing plan will start there, moving $20 million of JumpStart funding back to services line items and affordable housing priorities.

The resulting proposal “would invest $340 million in affordable housing in 2024, which is an increase of $5 million from the budget adjustments proposed in September and brings the total investments in across the biennium to nearly $600 million,” a council brief reads. “This is largely possible because of JumpStart Seattle, the progressive revenue source Councilmember Mosqueda sponsored in 2020.”

But the council will also need to plan for the challenges included in the Harrell administration’s proposal including new labor contracts for city employees, a new police contract, and predicted budget shortfalls.

Those shortfalls might be lessened. The council’s rebalancing process starts as the city’s has released updated projections for 2023 and 2024 revenues including an expected $9.8 million boost to the general fund and $14.2 million increase from the JumpStart payroll tax. Transportation ane real estate excise tax revenues, meanwhile, are predicted to come in lower than expected.

“The revenue improvements in this forecast are good news and an encouraging sign for our recovering economy as we continue to focus our budget on strengthening public safety, addressing homelessness and affordability, revitalizing Downtown, and supporting workers and small businesses,” Harrell said about the forecast changes.

But the city is also plagued by some nearly ridiculous budget holes. Most recently, 100,000 automatic traffic tickets issued to drivers in school zones and at red lights were not reviewed by the Seattle Police Department and expired without fines, costing the city about $4.3 million in school safety funding, the Seattle Times reports.

In the statement on the improved revenue, the mayor called on Mosqueda and the council to plan for spending to resolve open labor contracts with city employees, and pay down “the looming deficit in 2025.”

The mayor also made a more specific suggestion of restoring “investments in school safety through automated traffic enforcement cameras.”

For that, the city is being reminded you sometimes need to spend money to make money.

The Seattle City Council budget committee will meet to discuss spending proposals this week, Friday, October 27th with a final public hearing slated for November 13th.

UPDATE: Here’s what the council has to say about Friday’s expected marathon session:

This first round of Councilmembers’ budget amendments will be discussed during this Friday’s meeting of the Select Budget Committee. It’s going to be a long one, starting at 10 AM and will last the rest of the day, as Councilmembers give an overview of their amendments, discussing them one at a time. Here’s an important change to the process: this year, any changes proposed by councilmembers must be “self-balancing.” That means when an amendment proposes new spending, it will have to explain how it will be funded – either by identifying new revenue or by taking money from somewhere else.

You can follow changes to the 2024 spending plan on the Seattle City Council Budget Dashboard. The Council’s 2024 Budget Amendments will be posted here.

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