Wednesday, September 22, 2010

El Centro de la Raza co-founder Robert Maestas died of cancer today



Roberto Maestas, the long time leader and co-founder of El Centro de la Raza, a center for Seattle's Latino community, died of cancer Wednesday, September 22, 2010, morning. He was 72.
Maestas's most recent public work was helping to choose Seattle's new police chief. He was loved and respected.
"This is a man who believed in people, in all people," said John Hayes with the Seattle Police Dept. "He believed that everyone had rights, that everyone needed to be together, work together."
But his role in community spans decades. He founded El Centro de la Raza and led a movement for Latino rights in the 1970s. He organized the takeover of the Seattle City Council in 1972, along with now King County Councilman Larry Gossett.
"It was an effort to make America what it could be," said Gossett.
That year, he and Gossett and others occupied a Beacon Hill school, which the city later turned over the civil rights movement. It became El Centro de la Raza, the Center for the People.
"More fully integrating low income people into mainstream America, and we were willing to do any means necessary to do that," said Gossett.
On Wednesday at El Centro, a meeting was called to tell of Maestas' death. There were tears for their leader.
"Right now I feel sad," said Graciela Gonzalez. "Because we lost a great man. You know, but because of his legacy, we are going to continue because he taught us never to give up."
"It's very painful but in a way it's a reminder of the work that we still have to do," said Enrique Gonzalez.
According to the University of Washington Seattle Civil Rights and Labor History Project page, Maestas was born in New Mexico in a small farming community and worked his way north through the migrant stream, first to Colorado and eventually to Seattle, permanently settling in the city in the 1950s.
Maestas was educated as a teacher and taught at Franklin High School before leaving secondary teaching and pursuing a graduate degree at the University of Washington in 1968.  At the University, he became involved with the Chicano student activism, the black freedom struggle, and farm worker organizing in the Yakima valley.
Maestas helped form a program at South Seattle Community for Adult Basic Education and English as a Second Language (ESL) to cater to the city's growing Latino community in the early 1970s.
In addition to providing a range of social services, El Centro played a prominent role in local solidarity campaigns with Central America during the 1970s and 1980s. Maestas also co-founded the Minority Executive Directors's Coalition in the 1980s with fellow "Gang of Four" colleages Bernie Whitebear, Larry Gossett and Bob Santos. 
Maestas died at University Hospital with his wife, daughters and grandchildren at his side.

Mayor Mike McGinn ordered flags be lowered to half staff in honor of Maestas.

An Alert to neighborhood activists and inner-city "tree huggers"


Seattle Displacement Coalition Comments on the Land Use White Paper from the September 14th “Achieving Carbon Neutrality” Forum before Mike O’Brien’s Public Utilities and Neighborhoods Committee which can be found here:

An Alert to neighborhood activists and inner-city "tree huggers":  The Land Use "White Paper" presented by an advisory group at last week's Carbon Neutrality Forum is essentially a manifesto for the destruction of single-family neighborhoods and the cramming of still more growth into all of Seattle. It calls for an array of changes to the zoning code and new financing tools to achieve these goals, and especially for adding densities around rail and major bus stops, in so-called Transit-Oriented Development (TOD) areas.  The authors, described as representative of “community groups” also want to dramatically expand the definition and size of those TOD areas.  Also, their strategy leans heavily on use of Tax Increment Financing (twice struck down by the courts), a tool that robs cities of huge chunks of their tax base to pay for targeted special interest redevelopment schemes.

Be sure to read Appendix A on page 7, which lists members of the Advisory Committee that produced the “white paper”. With only a couple of exceptions, the 30 member group is dominated by pro-density-at-all-cost advocates who either work for developers or with organizations receiving funds from them.

There is one good suggestion contained in their white paper --the call for use of inclusionary zoning to ensure that developers share in the cost of providing some existing low-income housing in redeveloping (or gentrifying) areas.  But with the density increases they are calling for in communities like Southeast Seattle that are predominantly lower density, multi-racial, and lower income, no set of inclusionary zoning, one-for-one replacement, or other preservation strategies would be enough to offset housing losses set in motion by their pro-density policies.

Their land use white paper also makes no mention of the need to be responsive to concerns or wishes of affected inner-city communities.  Quite the opposite, it calls for reorganization of how permitting decisions are made so as to more effectively circumvent participation from these affected neighborhoods.  Also, no caution is expressed over the potential negative impacts associated with runaway growth on the quality of life in our city or even in the communities that are directly affected – as if the inner-city was a tabla rasa.

In the Carbon Neutrality Land Use Advisory Committee vision:
- They call for creation of an overarching centralized city-planning agency (a Department of Planning and Development on steroids) with power to override decisions and recommendations made at the grassroots.  The minimal formal land use authority now in the hands of the Neighborhood District Councils and Community Groups would be further eroded if not eliminated.
- Any and all parking minimums for new construction would be eliminated and maximums would also be set as low as possible in denser areas.
- They suggest upzoning outright all single-family areas within five to ten minute walk of a transit station.  Large swaths of Southeast Seattle where low income and minority families now live would be seriously affected if such a policy is actually played out.
- For all of our city’s single-family zoned areas, they call for nothing short of wholesale  “duplexing” of these communities and allowing attached, detached, and cottage housing without restriction.  No rationale is given for such sweeping changes other than their mantra “density, density, density”.  (Parenthetically, how does such a policy fit with their goal of concentrating growth around rail stations and in “urban villages” as opposed to dispersing it into these single family areas? If they are assuming this will lead to more affordable housing, they are sorely mistaken. Twenty-five percent of our city’s rental stock is located in single family housing.  It is largely what remains of our lower income rental supply of larger units for low income and working families (indeed data shows that most families with kids in Seattle now are renters, not homeowners).  Single-family rentals also sometimes serve up to eight unrelated lower income individuals. How does the “commercialization” of these single-family areas affect this critical element of our affordable rental stock? How much of our rental housing for families would be lost due to such policies? For that matter how would such a loss affect inner-city school enrollment?)
- Master Planning processes would be created and given jurisdiction over entire neighborhoods, with area-wide Environmental Impact Statements or one big EIS for all TOD areas, and “more streamlining of permitting.”
No matter that we have reached 60% of our 20-year GMA growth targets in just 5 years.  We must give up our inner-city open space and tree canopy, and existing lower density communities and affordable housing stock for still more density.  We must also cede our democratic participation in land use planning itself—all for the sake of curbing carbon emissions.

But when it comes to the evidence that these sacrifices would in fact reduce greenhouse gases, this advisory committee and indeed this wing (or should it be called a 'sect') of the environmental movement - view it as an article of faith.  Their proposals are legitimized on the basis of one thesis--the more density we accept in Seattle's communities, the fewer cars we'll have on our streets, and hence, less CO2 emissions.

No other benchmark shall be used for evaluating the merit of public policy. And there seems to be no attempt to analyze or weigh the thesis in the context of current patterns of growth here in Seattle and the Puget Sound region. There’s no attempt to analyze how at various levels of densities in Seattle, it may practically affect Seattle and the region.  It doesn't seem to matter.

What’s scary about this of course is the implication that no increased level of density is adequate. More is always better. This may explain why there is an increasing overlap of interests between this group and inner-city development interests.  “Give us more” upzones, expedited permitting, fewer environmental rules, more of our tax dollars, more more more.  That’s always been the refrain of developers. Now it comes shrink-wrapped in a veneer of green.

We share and strongly support the goal of curbing global warming.  But more density is not necessarily going to achieve this goal.  To take just one example, if we follow the policy recommended in the white paper, we would see an increase in auto use into and out of the downtown core.  Consider that we've recently upzoned downtown for the equivalent of 12 more Columbia Towers.  When all this space is built out, we’d add some 55,000 more office workers to the core.  If all those workers sought to live in the city, they would drive up the price of housing, outbidding low-income renters and homeowners who would be forced to live further away and commute to their jobs—unless those with lower incomes were already driven out as their lower-cost housing is torn down to make way for bigger buildings, always with higher rents.

But the majority of those 55,000 new office workers, no matter what we do to beg, cajole, or reward them, are going to continue to seek housing in the suburbs.  Why do we say this?  The 2000 census shows that 49 percent of Seattle workers actually lived in the city. But a check of 2008 data made available through the U.S Census "LED" Local Employment Dynamics partnership (and accessed here: http://lehdmap4.did.census.gov/themap4/) indicates that in 2008, that number was only at 38.2 percent. Even though this latter figure is an estimate, it suggests that the trend is downward.  As growth accelerated in this decade in Seattle, a greater share of the downtown workforce chose the suburbs.

Even with a doubling or tripling of mass transit ridership into and out of Seattle from the suburbs, a significant percent of those additional 55,000 office job holders are going to commute by car, spilling more noise, air pollution, traffic and congestion into our neighborhood and generating more CO2 emissions than an entire city of green roofs and "woonerf's" (A woonerf (Dutch plural: woonerven) in the Netherlands and Flanders is a street where pedestrians and cyclists have legal priority over motorists, see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Woonerf.. could ever offset.

One of the greatest costs to a regional transportation system whether by rail, bus or car, whether measured in terms of dollars, energy consumed or CO2 emissions, is the cost of moving ever increasing numbers of commuters longer and longer distances to and from their place of work.  This is not a sustainable or environmentally sound growth model.

As our lower density neighborhoods become too crowded, and rents and housing prices skyrocket, we hit a level of growth--an economy of scale if you will--that drives people out of Seattle.  By contrast, more modest densities here in Seattle (that we're already achieving under our existing code) coupled with encouragement of modest increases in density in the other "activity or urban centers" scattered around the region--a poly-centered regional growth model--is a better way to go.  Relocating jobs closer to where a large and increasing portion of the workforce is choosing to live anyway is a more sustainable and environmentally responsible way to reduce carbon emissions from transportation.

Nowhere is the Carbon Neutrality Advisory Committee’s disregard for Seattle's communities more on display than in its call for implementation of a county or region wide system of Transfer of Development Rights (TDR).  Their plan would allow developers building in "receiving areas" (meaning Seattle's neighborhoods) to build denser, bigger, taller, bulkier projects if in return they contribute cash to acquiring and saving a piece of green space or air rights above that green space somewhere else in the county.  We must trade away trees and open space here to preserve them somewhere else.  It's a false, crude and unacceptable trade-off.

I have a better idea.  Let's promote rational environmentally sound land use and transportation policies that preserve and enhance open space, tree canopy, urban agriculture, our shores and streams (and our affordable housing) both out in the county and right here in the City. You don't trade away those values one for the other.

It's nothing short of weird to me to watch a bunch of self-professed enviro's jettison their credentials and become our city's most rabid pro-development interest group just because they cross the city line. I could go on but I recommend you read the white paper for yourselves. It should be circulated broadly to the neighborhoods and serve as a clear warning of what we are up against and must continue to fight.

- John Fox for the Seattle Displacement Coalition  206-632-0668

P.S. We will provide a report soon on the results of Councilmember Licata's recent forum held earlier this week:  "Can we achieve Social Equity while Pursuing Smart Growth Principles?"

Saturday, September 18, 2010

important forum Monday at City Hall - 5:30 - 7:30 p.m.

Reminder:  This is an important forum Monday at City Hall that we hope will produce new strategies to preserve low income housing in our communities in the face of increased development pressure, pending upzones, and other pro-density policies.  But we need your presence and input.  We hope you can join us.  Also, please circulate thru your lists if you can.

Join the Seattle City Council as we discuss:

Can We Achieve Social Equity
Using Smart Growth?

Monday, Sept. 20, 2010, 5:30 – 7:30 p.m.
Council Chambers, Second floor, City Hall
600 Fourth Ave, Seattle 98104

This interactive forum will include the success stories of proven policies and programs and a discussion of how to take practical steps to make our Seattle’s urban growth work for everyone, regardless of background or income level. PANEL SPEAKERS: 
1. Connie Galambos Malloy, Urban Habitat Director of Programs How does the living wage job/affordable housing mismatch in some regions undermine the carbon neutrality goals of sustainability advocates?
2  Professor Dennis Keating Why do new development and higher rents on one or two or three properties set off price increases on surrounding older properties?
3. Sarah Treuhaft, PolicyLink Senior Associate What is the Equitable Development Tool Kit? Why is it important to use and how do we use it?

There will be ample time given over the Q and A and comments following presentations in an effort to find consensus around some possible solutions. Please join us! 
SPONSORS INCLUDE: Councilmember Nick Licata, Councilmember Sally J. Clark, Housing Development Consortium,  The InterfaithTask Force on Homelessness, The Seattle Displacement Coalition,  Puget Sound Sage Seattle/King County Coalition on Homelessness,  Seattle Human Services Coalition, and the Washington Low Income Housing Alliance

Federation meets Thursday, September 23, 7:00 p.m.

SEATTLE COMMUNITY COUNCIL FEDERATION
Regular Meeting
NOAA (National Oceanic and Atmospheric Agency), Pacific Marine Center on Lake Union
Thursday, September 23, 2010

AGENDA


Will Tree Protection and Increasing the City’s Tree Canopy
ever become a Reality?
According to a City Auditor report in May 2009, the City should do much more to save and increase its urban tree canopy.  Is it really possible to increase the City’s tree canopy to 30 percent by 2037?  In an effort to move forward, the Department of Planning and Development (DPD) is proposing to revise Seattle’s regulations governing trees on private property.  One key element is implementing a tree credit requirement in single-family zones, rather than retaining existing “exceptional tree” protections.  Learn about the proposal from Brennon Staley of DPD.  For more information go to www.seattle.gov/trees/ or www.seattle.gov/dpd/planning/trees/.

Also on hand will be Steve Zemke, Chair of Save the Trees-Seattle.  A citywide coalition is drafting a Citizen's Alternative to DPD's proposal, which they see as deregulating tree protection in Seattle.  Save the Trees-Seattle's emphasis is to protect Seattle's urban forest  infrastructure from being destroyed, in part with incentives for protecting trees such as a rebate on utility bills, expanding Seattle's existing permit system beyond the current SDOT permits for trees in the parking strip, requiring posting of a notice before trees are cut , consolidation of urban forestry issues in one City Department, requiring licensing and training for arborists cutting trees in the city and requiring the City to follow the same rules as homeowners.

Time permitting, the September meeting will also include our monthly Round Robin of issues and projects in your neighborhood.  If you have informational materials you would like distributed at the meeting, please email electronic copies or links to Jeannie Hale at jeannieh@serv.net.

7:00                 Call to Order and Introductions
                        Administration
1.     Treasurer’s report
2.     President’s report
7:15                 Proposed Tree Regulations—Brennon Staley and Steve Zemke
8:30                 Round Robin
1.     MOHAI’s move to South Lake Union
2.     Exempting the UW from the increase in the commercial parking tax   
3.     Multi-family zoning appeal—update
4.     City’s carbon neutral “planning process”
5.     Other—Please bring priorities from your community group
9:00                 Adjourn
NOAA is a federal facility on high security alert, so attendees must enter by the security gate and may need to present photo ID. If you haven't attended a recent Federation meeting, please send your name, contact information, and address to rickbarrett@gmail.com  to be added to the entry list. No e-mail? Call 206-365-1267. The building is ADA compliant, with ample parking in front.