Friends and Neighbors, I hope this final newsletter for 2020 finds you and your loved ones safe and healthy during the winter holidays — and hanging on — as we finally see the light at the end of the long tunnel with the COVID pandemic.  It’s hard to believe we’ve already finished my first year […]

[NOTE: More on the Budget: The blog post below discusses the final results of the Fall 2020 budget process (for 2021). For the separate blog post that details the beginning and middle of the process, CLICK HERE. Public Safety: While public safety is a key component of our city budget and is discussed below, you […]

Friends and Neighbors, October has been bursting with work on Seattle’s $6.5 billion budget for 2021. I’ve spent the last few weeks working with the Durkan Administration, my Council colleagues, and constituents to consider how best to finalize a budget that works for all of us in the face of the economic and public health […]

Friends and Neighbors, I hope this newsletter finds you looking forward to the season of Fall — here at City Hall that means budget season. Despite sometimes expressing policy perspectives different from several of my City Council colleagues, I have enjoyed crafting important measures to benefit our district and our city–and then working with those […]

Friends and Neighbors, While City Hall refers to the past two weeks without City Council meetings as a “recess,” your District 4 office continued to work for you—having more conversations about the role of policing in our community, preparing for the bigger budget process this Fall, and responding to constituent requests. After Labor Day we […]

Friends and Neighbors, Due to the COVID pandemic, revenues to our City’s treasury have dropped substantially, creating massive budget deficits (an estimated $325 million this year and $325 million next year). Last week your City Council took action to re-balance our 2020 budget and made initial changes to our police budget. While calling for more collaboration […]

Newsletter: Special Edition on Taxes As the Councilmember representing our District 4, I typically enjoy organizing topics into groups of 4 to explore. But this group of 4 is more daunting. As we are painfully aware, our city is facing 4 epic challenges: COVID: The pandemic continues to take lives even though we moved into […]

Monthly Newsletter: Protests and Public Safety, Budget Deficits, COVID Updates, Bridges, and More Photo by Xena Goldman [Note: please also see other posts, including: https://pedersen.seattle.gov/injustice-anywhere-is-a-threat-to-justice-everywhere/ ] Friends and Neighbors, While this month’s newsletter discusses the COVID-19 public health crisis, the resulting economic downturn, our sudden $300 million budget deficit, and the need to fix the West […]

City Hall and Coronavirus Updates Friends and Neighbors, The month of May has brought a glimmer of hope. Governor Inslee announced a multi-phase plan for reopening Washington state. While King County has been in Phase 1 since May 5, the Governor this week approved 10 other counties to move to Phase 2. Thanks to our […]

City Hall and Coronavirus Updates Friends and Neighbors, It’s been a busy two weeks since our last update. In addition to plenty of activity at City Hall and in District 4, Governor Inslee announced today he is extending Washington’s “Stay Home, Stay Healthy” order to May 31st and outlined a four-phase plan for reopening the economy.  For more information, […]