SODA, SOAP, and SODO

[00:00:10] Hello and welcome to the latest Snow Day edition of Seattle Nice. I'm David Hyde here with Erica C. Barnett of Publicola, who I assume has been out, I don't know, sledding earlier today? Yeah, romping around. Romping in the snow, yeah. Also with us, Sandeep Kaushik, who, if you look on his Facebook page, he takes the time to make a snowman every snow day. It's so cute. I love that you do that.

[00:00:36] I just finished a snowball fight with the little kids on my block. Who won is the question. On today's show, we're going to be talking about some of Seattle's favorite acronyms, SOAP, SODA, and SODO. So we're talking about drugs, prostitution, affordable housing. We're going to start with SODA, Seattle's Stay Out of Drug Areas Ordinance. The Seattle Times reports that the city passed this ordinance last year. This was the city council big initiative.

[00:01:03] We talked about it. Regular listeners will know because we talked about it, I would say, ad nauseum. But it's not being used, which was one of the things that some folks like Erica C. Barnett predicted. Yeah, I mean, it's not being used for a lot of different reasons. I think cops are not making arrests as much under the new law as proponents had hoped. And, you know, and I think that, I mean, there's a whole series of things that has to happen for this law to be enforced.

[00:01:30] One of which is, you know, the city attorney needs to prosecute and seek these orders and judges need to give them. And that's just not happening. I mean, I think part of it is that this was a really performative effort in some ways. I mean, much like the new drug laws themselves to appear tough on crime and to appear tough on drug use.

[00:01:48] But I mean, anybody who goes to the two hot spots that everybody's obsessed about, you know, roughly third in Pine and roughly 12th in Jackson, although it moves around, can see that, you know, the problems there have not been solved. We're not providing more resources for people who, you know, want to get out of their cycle of addiction. And we're also not arresting people.

[00:02:10] I mean, one of the things in the story that Seattle Times reported is that the city is also not using all the jail beds that it, you know, huffed and puffed performatively about last year. And so it's not like, you know, there's not enough jail beds for people. It's not like they couldn't be prosecuting these things. It's that they're not.

[00:02:30] And I think that's, you know, I think that's very interesting because when you if you were to actually prosecute these cases and if judges were to grant these orders and ban people from these areas, I mean, I think we would see pressure to actually do something meaningful about the underlying problems. And city's not funding any of that stuff. So I think this was entirely predictable. And maybe Sandeep will disagree and think that there's some greater master plan going on.

[00:02:56] But I think that this is just, you know, there was a lot of performative flailing last year. And we're seeing that the result is, you know, not very impressive. Sandeep, before you answer, I just have to point out the hilarity of the fact that both Tammy Morales last year and now Erica are using your own word against you. Performative. Performative, performative, performative. She used that to say this was a terrible, right? Isn't that what she said? She called it smoke and mirrors and performative. And now Erica's saying, yeah, it turns out she's right.

[00:03:26] What do you think? Well, first of all, the law hasn't been used much. It looks like there's only one case yet, right? We're only three months in to this law going into effect. And I think there's an argument to be made that, you know, it's going to take some time, as Erica's saying, to kind of set up the mechanisms to sort of put this law into effect.

[00:03:48] In fact, there's going to be a, you know, if it's done correctly, there's going to be a kind of, you know, kind of protocol set up at SVD, training of officers, decisions about where and how to deploy this. And then, you know, coordination with the city. But Sandeep, I thought it was so urgent. Well, if you let me finish, I'll get to that point. Anyway, all of that, you know, all of that needs to be set up.

[00:04:13] And the other big impediment to this, which obviously is going to take some time to resolve, that the city is saying, is that, you know, they just don't have the manpower at SVD right now to really, you know, put this stuff into effect. They've still only got about 900 deployable officers when, you know, they're supposed, which is down about 30 percent from where they want to be, 1,300 deployable officers. So that's a big impediment to their ability to do that stuff. But I'm going to agree with Erica here.

[00:04:41] If the city wanted to do it, right, they could make it a priority and give this thing some urgency. And that has not happened. I don't think that this law is necessarily performative. But I do wonder why on the SVD and the executive side, it sort of feels like this is all just business as usual. We're kind of doing the same thing we're always doing.

[00:05:08] We're not sort of putting this law into effect in a more intensive way, given the constraints that are real. But we're not even making much of an effort to do that. And I think that's a criticism we're hearing from some members of the council who said we passed this law to create this tool. And now it gets handed over to the other side of city government to make use of it. And they haven't done so yet. That's a question for them.

[00:05:33] Well, I think, Sandy, if you're forgetting that this law did not come from the mayor's office, it came from the city attorney, Ann Davison's office. Our Republican city attorney is up for election this year. And, you know, I mean, you have a lot of inside sources at the mayor's office that I don't have. But I have not seen, you know, a massive amount of enthusiasm from Bruce Harrell for enforcing these things. But, you know, leaving that aside, I mean, there is also the fact that these have failed every time they've been tried in the past.

[00:06:02] And so, I mean, I think that our, you know, consistent record of failure in this city to solve problems by banishing people from, you know, geographic areas, you know, perhaps it's instructive for, you know, why they're having a hard time enforcing these now or there's not a lot of enthusiasm for enforcing them now. And I don't agree with you at all that the problem is that we only have, you know, 900 something deployable officers.

[00:06:29] I mean, we have seen that the city is more than capable of doing hotspot policing in these two particular hotspots that, again, everybody is talking about as targets for these stay out of drug areas. There's I mean, the zone is flooded with cops frequently. And they've been doing that over and over again for as long as those areas have been hotspots. And yet this particular tool of banishing people from downtown has not been used. And I think that, you know, I don't think there is a way to use it effectively.

[00:06:59] I mean, I think that we have seen it doesn't work. So, you know, if they want to try it again and demonstrate once again that it's a failure and that it doesn't work to help people with addiction or to improve, you know, the perception of public safety. I mean, they certainly can. But I'm, you know, kind of glad that they haven't yet because I think that it's just, you know, again, going to be a performative effort that impacts people's lives in a negative way. So I want you to respond to Erica.

[00:07:28] But can you also pick up that thread that you mentioned or hinted at, which is there appears to be kind of a rift here between some of the moderates on the council and this moderate mayor over an issue like this one, that the one Seattle mantra might be put to the test, given that we've got some major municipal elections coming up in 2025. Right. I mean, we have two branches of government, right? The legislature, in this case, the city council passes laws, right?

[00:07:57] But then they have to be implemented on the executive side, right? And so I think I have definitely heard some questions coming from the council side of this. And I think, you know, Sarah Nelson, the council president, had a tweet about this after the Seattle Times story about the kind of lack of deployment of these laws came out last week, kind of pointing that out, like saying, hey, we passed the laws, but we need the executive side to implement them, you know,

[00:08:25] and we have a sense of urgency about this. Where's the urgency on the executive side to kind of make use of some of these tools? So, yeah, I think there's a, you know, I think there, you know, Erica was saying this too, like it's not 100% clear to me where the mayor's office and the executive side is on this tool. It's not like he came out against it while it was coming through, but I haven't seen them say they were for it.

[00:08:54] Coming back to what Erica was saying before, my understanding in the run-up to the creation of this law was that an assessment was done at the city, right? It was originally proposed by Ann Davis and the city attorney. The idea of bringing this back originates with her. And their assessment was that they could pull together the resources to do two soda zones, right?

[00:09:18] To actually execute on two soda zones with the existing manpower at SPD and the available resources, right? And Erica, I think, scores a real point when she pointed out as this was happening, that immediately it got proposed. And as it went through the council process, it got expanded to six different soda zones, which nobody at the city believes they have the ability to actually execute urgency, sense of urgency or not, right? But the feeling was that we could,

[00:09:49] if the commitment was there, work on two of these. And I will say, again, not to complicate matters too much, but the mayor was already, and SPD were already pushing through a initiative that's paid some real dividends at 3rd and Pine and 3rd and Pike, right? There's been a really significant effort and policing presence and all of that that's already been happening there.

[00:10:15] But 12th and Jackson is still kind of hanging out there as a real problem area where there doesn't seem to be a lot of effort. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, you're describing efforts as police presence. Those efforts don't actually solve a problem if they aren't leading people into options that help them not be using drugs in public, you know, in the city of Seattle. It just pushes it around. And everybody knows that. I mean, that's not seriously in question from anybody except politicians.

[00:10:45] I will say, I mean, the idea of cops standing around, you know, sort of surrounding two small soda zones in the downtown area sounds like an absolutely ridiculous waste of police power to sort of, you know, if anybody steps their foot inside those little areas, they can arrest them and haul them to jail. I mean, what an absolutely silly idea that is. And just what a profound waste of resources.

[00:11:13] And so, you know, I think that we have to like go back to what are these actual zones? They're areas downtown where if you get caught using drugs or possessing drugs in public, you can be banned. And if you step foot inside them, you can be tossed in jail. And so if the executive, and again, we don't know except by the actions of the police, if the executive is saying this is not a good use of resources, then, you know, I think

[00:11:40] it's kind of funny because it's the council getting a taste of their own medicine. You know, this is the separation of powers under Jenny Durkin and under the last council. You know, the council passed a lot of stuff that the mayor's office just kind of ignored. And it was often progressive priorities. So, Sandeep, you didn't mind. But, you know, it's happening now with these kind of, you know, money-wasting right-wing priorities.

[00:12:06] And, you know, and they're not, the executive is choosing not to, I mean, at least so far, not to spend resources and police power enforcing them. So that is the separation of powers right there in the city of Seattle. First of all, I don't think you should assume that the executive, the mayor in this case, like thinks this law is ineffective and agrees with you that it's- I'm not assuming. I'm not assuming. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Again, like I said, I'm just looking at actions. Right. Well, again, we're three months in, right?

[00:12:34] When the, you know, public drug use law, which was the big sort of public safety battle of 2023 went into effect, it's been, it's been, they were slow to kind of build up the protocol, start utilizing it, but it has been used more as time went on. Right. So something similar could end up happening. Well, I think it's had some effect. I think it, I think it is one tool in the, in the public safety toolbox that is being utilized

[00:13:02] at places like Third and Pine right now, you know, to try to make a difference in, you know. You know that people get out of jail immediately, right? It's not, it's not like, you know, you're sort of, spend some time in the pokey learning, like thinking about what you did wrong. That's not happening. Again, you seem to be against any kind of police or punitive intervention whatsoever in every instance, you know, related to the kind of street disorder and problems that we're seeing on the street. Okay. Okay.

[00:13:31] That's completely inaccurate. You're talking about, we're talking about misdemeanor level drug possession. Have you ever possessed drugs? Yeah. He has. You know I have. You know I went to jail for it. I mean, right, but that's a felony. It's a complaint. I mean, these are like. I mean, I didn't go to jail, but I spent a day in jail. Let's turn to Isaac. Just to tie the bow. I mean, this is, this is performative. And yes, Cindy, if you are correct, I don't think that we should be going in people's pockets and seeing if they possess drugs because they're in public. People use drugs at home all the time.

[00:14:00] And we don't have a problem with that because it isn't visible. And I think that is hypocritical to obsess over visible drug use as opposed to felony level, you know, drug dealing, drug trafficking, those things that should be criminalized, you know, to obsess with like, you know, a guy who's addicted on the street and throw him in jail for a night instead of offering any alternatives or solution. Yeah. I do think that's a huge waste of money. All right. Let's turn to SOAP, Seattle's stay out of area prostitution order.

[00:14:30] So we were talking about soda. Now we're talking about soap because we love our fucking acronyms here in Seattle. And Erica, you've been tracking this one, a big city announcement earlier this week. Yeah, there was an announcement from SPD, a triumphant announcement that they had done a prostitution sting on Aurora and arrested nine guys. And I just kind of want to want to leave it with a thud a little bit.

[00:14:58] But but I will say I have looked into it a little more. There were nine arrests from, you know, your standard issue. You know, cop goes out, dresses like a sex worker, entices dudes, arrests them. Three of those were under the new prostitution loitering law. So it's not actually the soap law, but it's you know, they're they're contained within the same legislation. And so they all went to jail for a night, I think, with one exception. And we're out the next day.

[00:15:27] And now the city attorney's office is going to prosecute them. So as usual, they'll be dragged into court. We'll probably end up pleading and paying a fine. And don't we all feel safer? And you're against this. You're against any kind of enforcement on the I mean, I guess I just I think that prosecuting Johns is a waste of time and resources. And, you know, and I also think I mean, as I've reported and I'm going to do some more reporting on this.

[00:15:56] But the fact that so many, you know, overwhelmingly, these are not white men. They are Latino immigrants and African immigrants, for the most part, who are being arrested. And I mean, this is just this is true across time. Defense attorneys have told me this, who represent the guys in these cases. And in the Trump administration, ICE is going to go through those jail records, whether or

[00:16:22] not the city of Seattle wants to resist Trump and whether or not SPD refuses to hand over immigration information. It doesn't matter because ICE goes through jail records and they will check those records. I guarantee you against people's immigration status. And so this is, you know, whether you think that somebody should be deported for soliciting a sex worker or not.

[00:16:48] I you know, I think that that should be troubling that ICE is doing that in the first place. And we shouldn't be giving them more opportunities to do that. Hey, Seattle nice listeners. Seattle politics got you low. We'll get high with Uncle Ikes. Pissed at the mayor? Relax with a dollar joint. Pop a tire in a pothole?

[00:17:18] Eat a $2 gummy and chill. Whether you need something to pump you up for Saturday's protest or a mellow strain for your next sit-in, Ikes is your best friend. Now is the time to roll up Seattle. Download the Ikes app today or head on over to Ikes.com. That's Ikes.com. So a couple of thoughts here.

[00:17:48] One, while I agree with you, Erica, that if, you know, in a perfect world, if I could wave a magic wand, sex work would be legal and regulated and above board and, you know, to the, you know, best human extent possible. We could take out the exploitation and degradation and all of that stuff. But we don't live in a perfect world. We live in Seattle circa 2025, a far from perfect world. Right.

[00:18:17] And what we actually have is a sex market on Aurora that is rife with exploitation, degradation and violence. Right. And that there is there's been a huge spike in violence in that area over the last couple of years related to controlling the prostitution trade and on Aurora.

[00:18:39] And so in the face of that reality, I think it makes perfect sense for us to be taking actions to try to disrupt that market and to get at the, you know, criminal behaviors that are leading to the exploitation of women. And whether arrested, you know, doing stings and focusing on johns is the right approach there. You know, I don't know. Right. There may be other techniques.

[00:19:06] But absolutely, I think there needs to be action up there to try to disrupt what had become a really problematic, dangerous, exploitative market where women were being abused and crime and violence was was was becoming endemic. I mean, Sandy is and no one is saying it's a perfect world. And, you know, I'm not I'm not naively over here saying that there's no no degradation and all the things you said, violence, et cetera.

[00:19:35] So just so listeners know, the way that Sandeep characterized what I was saying is not correct. But we often hear this, you know, this the same refrain with any sort of problem that that we witness in Seattle, we just need to disrupt it. And this isn't maybe the perfect solution, but we got to do something. I mean, that's, you know, homelessness to sweeps aren't the perfect solution. We got to do something about all these tents. We never get to a solution that actually would be effective and we never fund those solutions

[00:20:05] because we're not really focused on helping the people with, you know, with quote unquote solutions like sweeps, like arresting people for having drugs in their pocket and like cracking down, you know, first on sex workers. And then the legislation was changed after, you know, a lot of outrage to directed at Kathy Moore now on Johns. I mean, if we are concerned about, as we should be, exploitation, sex trafficking, pimps and

[00:20:35] violence related to sex trafficking, then we should go after that. And we aren't in any meaningful way when we focus again on these performative stings. I mean, beyond and beyond enforcement, though, sex work, sex workers on Aurora need help. They need they need intervention. That's what I'm saying. Yeah, no. And so what about that piece of it? You know, it seems like it's always the missing piece everywhere. Why just the enforcement without the help?

[00:21:01] Well, Kathy, Kathy Moore, when she passed, you know, she was on the city council was the prime driver of the soap law. And she did say at the time the law was passing that she was going to come back in the budget process. And I believe she did, if I remember correctly, you know, get more resources devoted to David, exactly the kind of outreach work. Now, now, still receiving. Sorry, just to just to interrupt. Two million dollars for a quote unquote receiving center for people who want to exit the sex trade. That's what that's what she got in the budget. OK.

[00:21:31] Yeah. Yeah. So, you know, but but obviously not adequate to the scale of the problem. All of those things are true. But there's definitely some effort on Kathy's which she understands that there needs to be more outreach on that part. And there's definitely some effort was was put into kind of appropriating some resources to try to help make that happen. But again, let me just bring back to just some cold, hard realities here about Aurora. Right. I think it's between 2023 and 2024. But nevertheless, it was year over year.

[00:21:59] There was a 200 percent increase in shots fired between 85th and 145th on Aurora. Like a Matt, you know, there was. And what was the two over the total numbers in those? Because when I hear 200 percent increase, I wonder if it was from 10 to 20. And I don't know. No, no, no, no, no, no. No, it's a it's a shitload of shots. I mean, there was just one incident recently that was like there was video footage on, you know, TV news of two what looked like very likely to, you know, kind of pimps getting

[00:22:28] in a gun battle on Aurora where there was probably there were at least I mean, just in the footage, it looked like there were dozens of shots fired, shots fired in this one incident. So we're talking about hundreds of shots. And there's been a noticeable spike in homicides along that that. Right. How does Sting John John's affect that? I mean, Seattle puts I mean, it's it's a it's a lot of training that you have to do to become, you know, to participate in a sting. A lot of police resources. How does that address that? Right. A big.

[00:22:58] So a big piece of the of the soap law that got passed. Right. As we talked about at the time, it was getting passed was that they crew was they were creating a trespassing rule to allow them to more easily get at pimps who are there. Now, I think we need to go back. We're not talking about pimps. We're talking about John. So I know. Let's let's be clear. Also. But what Erica says, it's not people who are reading The Seattle Times. Yes.

[00:23:24] I'm saying this is not a real problem that like that this is not the real problem that we need to address. And you're saying you're saying that, you know, that these soap orders, you know, banning men from areas who have solicited sex and these stings where, you know, you know, a police officer dresses up like they think a sex worker dresses and, you know, and goes out on Aurora that this is a good use of resources to get at pimps. And I just I don't see the connection and you haven't drawn it.

[00:23:53] So the the sex worker that is performing the sex act right, you know, on on Aurora right now is almost certainly addicted to to, you know, drugs and and, you know, significantly controlled by some male pimp figure. Right. That's just the reality of what's going on in Aurora right now.

[00:24:18] And those markets went in the in the absence of any enforcement grew enormously and became incredibly lucrative. And it became a big, big money making place for, you know, and the level of problems grew commensurately as that as the as there was a kind of complete free for all. We're all in agreement about that. But the question is, are they tackling it? Disrupting the market itself starts to first of all, it sends a signal. Well, it's going to it's a huge.

[00:24:48] I mean, we've been doing checks for decades. Right. I mean, none of this will none of this will end the market, but it but it will certainly make some people think twice about going down there. Right. It does have a deterrent effect. And there is a disruption of the market when there's when it seems like there's some risk involved in actually engaging in these. Sunday, why do you think it's never worked before that? And what's different this time? Well, it did work.

[00:25:15] It's not going to end those markets, but the market was smaller before there was less violence, you know, because there was some enforcement going on. Right. So these things are all relative. And and the explosion in in in the level of activity and the negative social effects happened hand in glove with the with the city kind of completely standing down and just, you know, letting it be fair about it. I don't think that the city was less fair about it. I don't think you have evidence for that. And I don't think they were for a while.

[00:25:45] They stopped enforcement for a while. Are you talking about during COVID? For a while. Yeah. I mean, they didn't they didn't. I mean, there's a lot of stuff that went on during COVID. Sandy. Well, the city passed the council. Previous council, as you know, passed a law in 2020 that basically took away the penalties for doing text work on Aurora. Right. Or in the city. You know, SPD stood down in the prostitution loitering ordinance. It didn't take away the penalties.

[00:26:15] I mean, you're you're you're conflating a lot of things, Sandy. Like it it was still whatever that it was still a policy of the city to go after John. They went down and they went down and I can finish my point. They went down an abolitionist road and said the better way to do this is to sort of take away the punitive piece of this and and we'll focus on, you know, root causes and long term solutions and blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. And none of that stuff ever got funded. Right.

[00:26:41] And what happened was a much bigger problem and a much, much bigger and much worse problem on Aurora. That was the bottom line of what happened. And then. Right. So the question is what they're doing now. We had an experiment. The question is, is what they're doing now going to work? Is it going to do it differently? The two of you disagree. I think we can end it there. Right. Yeah. Yes. Yes. We disagree. Actually, just just to just to clarify, though, never mind.

[00:27:10] I mean, if you're wrong about you're wrong about the the decriminal. I mean, your definition of decriminalization is not focusing on sex workers. Kathy Moore wanted to arrest sex workers. She got a lot of pushback. And so she took them out. And so now the the law only applies to sex buyers, which is how it's always been. That's what Pete Holmes instituted. So I guess not always. But since the era of previous city attorney Pete Holmes, it is focused on buyers and it

[00:27:37] has been ineffective in solving the problems that you have identified. Hello, I'm Katie Sewell. You might recognize my voice from KUW Public Radio, but I want you to know it in a different way and have something to look forward to in 2025. Come to Rome, Italy with me this October for a week long adventure exploring the secret side of the world's eternal city.

[00:28:04] This is the Rome most tourists never get to see. You can find more information by listening to my weekly podcast, The Bittersweet Life, or by visiting the bittersweetlife.net. Let's turn to our let's turn to our final acronym. Number three, which is SOTO.

[00:28:33] People are a lot more familiar with this one, so I don't have to explain it. A new bill from city council president Sarah Nelson that could lead to apartments south of T-Mobile Park. Port of Seattle is against it. Sandeep is for it. Eric is probably for it, too. But this is really an interesting one to me because it sort of pits good things. Housing and affordable housing on one side. On the other side, according to critics, you know, blue collar jobs and port related businesses. Right.

[00:29:02] So, Sandeep, what's the latest? So, just to preface this, I'm at this is I'm direct. I should disclosure here. I am directly involved. Right. Because I consult for the two public stadium. We tried to get somebody who wasn't a flack on, but that's not deep side of the podcast. Yeah. I'm not a flack, but I am a consultant. I guess I'm playing flack on this podcast today since we're talking about it. But so I've been consulting for the two public stadium authorities for years. Right.

[00:29:30] And so just to preface this issue for people, because there's a long history to this for years now, dating back to more than a decade. But really, the recent history is that Jenny Durkin, when she was mayor, created an industrial lands task force of stakeholders to revisit the zoning and laws around protecting industrial lands in the city of Seattle.

[00:29:54] And there was a two year stakeholder process that came up with a package of recommendations. You know, it's a very, very intensive deep dive into what's happening in terms of industrial activity in the city of Seattle and came up with a package of recommendations that included saying strengthening industrial lands protections in most parts of the industrial maritime areas of the city, but saying there are some areas where, you know, things have really changed

[00:30:21] on the ground and we ought to and there are better uses and we ought to look to those, including creating some housing in some of those areas. Right. So following that, that industrial lands task force recommendations, the city went through a very extensive EIS, environmental impact study process that produced an 800 page report, right, looking at how to how to take those recommendations and implement them. And part of the EIS was the recommendation that in that northern part of Soto, in the immediate

[00:30:49] vicinity of the stadiums where no industrial activity remains anymore, it makes much more sense to create a transitional maker zone of small kind of light manufacturing breweries, distilleries, Filson kind of business, clothing manufacturers with maybe a little bit of, you know, in front of store retail as, you know, to sell the products that are remade in the back of the room, kind of business, you know, bike bag making businesses or electric bikes, that kind of stuff. Right.

[00:31:17] A maker zone of these sort of smaller businesses, along with a threshold level of affordable housing, both because it's good to build affordable housing and also because a maker zone really doesn't pencil economically for developers without the housing piece of it. So that was the recommendation of years and years of city study. But when the industrial lands package went to the council in 2023, at the 11th hour, the housing in the stadium district was stripped out because of lobbying by the Port of Seattle in the long term.

[00:31:46] So, you know, I complained about it at the time that this was a NIMBY move by the city, that it was, you know, that all of the city studies and recommendations said this housing made sense and that it was compatible with the maritime industrial areas of the city and that this was bad policy done for political reasons. And it was a total NIMBY play. And so what's happened now is that Council President Nelson has brought back legislation to restore

[00:32:14] the original recommendations of the city and to allow that housing and that maker zone to go forward. And I think it's just self-evidently the right thing to do, right, from a policy perspective. It's been studied to fucking death. And all the studies say this is what we're supposed to do. And, but of course, the Port and the Longshore Union and some of their allied maritime interests are fighting at tooth and nail. So that's what's going on. I mean, I think, Sandy, you've laid it out well. I do.

[00:32:45] Well, first of all, I want to say, very importantly, SOTO is not an acronym. And I'm going to be old Seattle here and say it actually stands for south of the dome. That was before my time. But, but now it basically stands for south of downtown. OK, the dome being kingdom. OK, so, you know, this, this legislation, I mean, it's funny because I have been hearing these arguments about industrial lands broadly, you know, for as long as I've been here from the port.

[00:33:14] And the argument always seems to be, you know, our industrial, it always is. Our industrial lands are precious and sacred. Once you take them away, they'll never come back. The land values are going to go up too much and we can never turn this back into industrial land, which is sort of premised on the idea that we're going to in the future at some point, you know, it's we're going to revert back to a heavy industrial manufacturing and cargo

[00:33:42] heavy ports that, you know, we haven't had for many years and because it has been becoming less so and less so, you know, year over year. But at some point in the future, it's going to change and we're going to need all that industrial land again. And the area that we're talking about is and you can probably tell, I mean, yes, I think we should allow 990 units of housing or up to 990 units of housing in this area immediately next to the stadiums where hotels are already allowed. This area is not office. And offices.

[00:34:12] Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And this area is not an industrial use currently. It is, you know, by and large, I mean, you have some uses along First Avenue. The Showbox Soto is down there. There's some strip clubs, I think, weed businesses. But like for the most part in that general area, it's not industrial use. There's a lot of boarded up buildings. There's a lot of, you know, crumbling warehouses that, you know, the port is saying we need to preserve in case they ever need to be used for industrial again.

[00:34:42] Time to say, you know, let's try something different. And as Sadeep said, I mean, the recommendation was to allow some housing in this area. It did get stripped out at the last minute. And the longshoremen, I think, are sort of pushing the, you know, very green council members and, you know, making the same old argument about industrial lands. But the fact is that land is too valuable now to be used for industrial purposes because it's next to stadiums, because there's hotels there, because, you know, there's just

[00:35:09] it's just developing in a different way than was probably conceived of, you know, 50 or 100 years ago. And I just, the objections to this seem pretty specious to me, and they're also incredibly familiar. Now, one objection I have heard that, you know, I understand is why are we putting housing in this area that's dirty and polluted? And isn't this just a conspiracy by Sarah Nelson to avoid having density anywhere else in the city? You know, I don't buy that.

[00:35:39] There is housing, you know, in the sort of immediate vicinity. This is just south of Pioneer Square, which is, you know, also in an earthquake area, also in a liquefaction zone, and which are some of the other objections. So I don't think the world is going to end if we allow a thousand apartments in this area. And I actually think it'll be very beneficial and will improve the neighborhood. I work in Pioneer Square. I would love to have, you know, more stuff to do in the area.

[00:36:07] And the more people are in an area, the better it is and the safer it is. Symbolic, symbolic capitalists agree. Screw blue collar workers. Let's have some more apartments. That's the ports argument. I haven't heard it. I mean, come on, like, let's just make it harder and harder for these hardworking folks to actually move their trucks around and that sort of thing, because that's what this is going to do. Right.

[00:36:32] More traffic means harder to to ship your stuff from the port of Seattle to wherever it's got to go. It's just, you know, we've already pushed blue collar out of Seattle. We just let's just put the final nail in the coffin. In fact, you know what I think we should do, Erica, these maritime jobs, what we should do is create like big plexiglass walls around them. So as we're biking past, we can look in and see those hard workers at work as a part of our sort of ambiance in the city. Real like jobs.

[00:37:02] No, who cares about that shit? These jobs are not going away, David. I mean, the idea that, you know, allowing this is they're just slowly being forced as they've been forced out of Ballard. They're being slowly forced out of Soto. That's what's happening. We're becoming San Francisco. You know it, Sandeep. You know it, Erica. And you support it. You symbolic capitalists. It's terrible. Terrible. Right. Right. That this thing has been studied to death. Again, the freight mobility routes, you know, don't run down first avenue where this would be happening.

[00:37:31] That's been looked at. The city studies show that this would be done correctly, compatible with the maritime and industrial uses. In fact, we're talking about creating a transitional area that is essentially, you know, focused on manufacturing and light industry first. And then the housing is the sort of icing on the cake of that. Right. So it is a transitional area between the fully maritime and industrial parts of the city where we've strengthened the protections for those areas.

[00:38:00] And the neighborhoods, the CID and Pioneer Square, both neighborhoods actually strongly support this plan. To Erica's point, they want to see this happen. The affordable housing developers in the city want to see this happen. The building trades union want to see this happen. And SEIU wants to see UFCW is on board. There's a very large coalition of folks that are saying this makes sense. The city studied it and said this absolutely makes sense.

[00:38:25] And and it's not going to be detrimental to, you know, the longshoremen or the truckers or the port or anybody else. And so I get that there's a vibes thing from some of these folks that they feel like, you know, the sun is setting on their world. Look at today compared to 20 years ago. And tell me that all of those maritime businesses, there's a ton of them gone out of business. That's what's happened. David, by your logic, we should tear down the stadiums and we should take, you know, those

[00:38:53] derelict warehouses and boarded up buildings and, you know, erect a monument to them. Maybe put those in plexiglass so people can come by and just, you know, and look at it in awe. The plexiglass was a joke. I would tear down the stadiums. That's a good idea. I'd rather live in blue collar Seattle. I like that idea. Let's tear them down. I want a maritime zoo. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Let's reverse 50 years of time. I mean, like we live in, you guys were talking about the Seattle of 2025 and the reality we actually live in. This is the reality we live in.

[00:39:20] I mean, David, you can, you can, you know, imagine that, you know, protecting Ballard, which is a lot better today for people and, you know, for the people that live there, it's a place people actually want to go. Yeah. Yeah. But, you know, I mean, I guess they could have preserved it. Let me finish, David. Come on. I guess they could have preserved it in Amber and, you know, and it would have been the same like sleepy little boring area that I lived in when I moved out here in 2021.

[00:39:50] But, you know, first of all, is that what you want? I think you may patronize some of those businesses in the area, David. Only choices. And I highly recommend the lock spot. Still, still kind of a dive bar in Seattle, but there's not many left. And, you know, yeah, those aren't the choices. And I would also just point out that just because we are on the left and progressive on this podcast doesn't mean that every change is always for the good or for the better. You know, the environment's gotten worse. But we're talking about this.

[00:40:18] We're talking about this specific change on two blocks of land. I will also point out. I will also point out that Democrats. Public safety. This would help address. Democrats lost a lot of blue collar working class voters in this last election. And the way that we talk about issues like this, I think, reflects that this. I'm not joking. Like this is symbolic capitalist ideas about the future. And there's a lot of people who who. I don't know what capitalist is, David, and I'm not interested in a discussion of what it

[00:40:47] means because there's a lot of people. My bachelor's degree. A lot of people value a lot of people who, you know, value those jobs that and they're not nostalgic to do so. David, I would say that you are performatively valuing those jobs. How many people do you know who work in blue collar jobs? How much do you really know about the poor? I mean, that's an ad non minimum attack. Who cares? Who cares? It's the point of the argument. It's not. OK, either I'm right or I'm wrong.

[00:41:15] It's not me saying that saying that, you know, that the way I talk about, you know, things is like Trump did well with working class voters. Trump did well with working class voters. That's all I'm going to say that people making two hundred fifty thousand dollars a year are not working class by traditional standards. But, you know, if we're talking about the longshoremen and I agree, I mean, the hard hard job should be should be well compensated. But you're talking about, you know, some like schmo in a diner in Ohio and like and I'm

[00:41:45] talking about people here in Seattle right now making land use decisions about two blocks of land that are next to a neighborhood, next to stadiums, next to hotels. And you're acting as if like as if this is going to be the downfall of Seattle and it's just going to be an Amazon tech bubble. Another nail in the coffin. That's what I. Yeah. One other point I wanted to make before we close this conversation, because I think this this debate over the the housing and Soto has become an interesting, larger political

[00:42:13] kind of rush litmus test for, you know, the state of movement urbanism in the city of Seattle. Right. I mean, what's so interesting to me, we've talked about this over the years. Why hasn't urbanism been a more effective political force, given how strong the support is for the basic principles of, you know, and this is obviously an urbanist play. Let's build affordable housing. Let's take over this dead area and turn it into something much more vibrant and alive

[00:42:42] and and help to solve some of the some of the problems we're facing for small businesses and for affordable housing and what have you. Right. But there's a number of people and organizations in this city that sort of very much sort of self-proclaim as urbanist organizations. And I'm not going to name names here, but. But are totally willing to throw these urbanist principles under the bus if it gets in the

[00:43:11] way of other, you know, either either because there's opposition from other allied left leading organizations or there are other, you know, kind of left focused, you know, ideological interests or whatever that say, you know, they will privilege those other things over the urbanist piece of explicit. Can I make that explicit? I mean, I sort of agree and I sort of disagree. I think people are, you know, people in the I mean, frankly, like it's all through all of

[00:43:41] us sitting here are middle class people. We don't have blue collar jobs. Um, and, you know, and I would say, you know, David, to make another ad hominem, I mean, you know, uh, complaining about the loss of dive bars in Seattle is a favored pastime of, you know, of, of middle-class people of a certain age and income. Symbolic capitalists. Yeah, sure. Whatever that means. Affordability is not a yuppie value. I mean, well, I mean, you can afford a $7 beer. So can I, whatever.

[00:44:11] I don't value it though. You know, but I, but I think that, I think that what is, um, what is happening with some in the kind of urbanist community, I mean, there's two things. There's one, you know, we don't, we hear working class, uh, you know, or people saying that they represent the working class, um, saying that this is bad for the working class and we don't know, but so we're going to believe that because we don't want to offend them. I think that that is a real thing that's going on. The other thing that I think is perhaps even more, um, more at play in this particular

[00:44:40] thing is that Sarah Nelson is behind this. Sarah Nelson, the, uh, city council president who is, you know, quite conservative on some issues by Seattle standards and is quite hated, um, I think by some in the sort of urbanist world. Um, and so allying with her in any way, it's just like anathema and, you know, and I don't think we should think that way. I don't think that way about my own political views and, you know, and I mean, it's just,

[00:45:08] it's just not very practical, but I think that's going on too. I think that people don't want to say Sarah Nelson is right about this. Yeah, I agree. I don't a hundred, I don't a hundred percent agree with the arguments I was making today, by the way, but, but for folks at home, somebody had, somebody had to, uh, you're being provocative. What's the guy's name who used to, or maybe he still does represents, um, the maritime industry and Ballard, Eugene, Eugene Wasserman. Yeah. Yeah. He wasn't on.

[00:45:36] So somebody had to, uh, try to do his best. You're channeling Eugene. But I don't completely, uh, disagree with that. Anyway, um, that's it for another edition. And I don't, and I don't entirely, well, anyway, I guess I don't get to say that. No, say it, say it, say it, say it. I don't entirely. I mean, I don't, yeah, no, I mean, I don't, I, I am also, you know, to some extent playing, uh, devil's advocate on, on some of the things, uh, that, that I said today. However, I will say, I do support this, uh, idea, um, have all along.

[00:46:05] And I do think that, um, you know, the fact that Sarah Nelson, um, you know, public enemy number one in some people's mind, um, is, uh, for the, should not be a deterrent if it's a good policy, which I think it is. You're, you're being a principled urbanist here and a lot of people aren't. Yeah. All right. That's it for another edition of Seattle Nice. She's Erica C. Barnett. He's Sandeep Kashuk. Our editor is Quinn Waller. And thanks everybody so much for listening.