BDC February 2021 Meeting | Ballard District Council

Date/Time
Date(s) - 02/10/2021
7:00 pm - 8:30 pm

Categories

Regular Meeting

State, County & City Legislative Panel Discussion: Homelessness & Mental/Behavioral Health Coordination Issues in Ballard

For our February 10 meeting (which will be broadcast on the BDC YouTube channel), we are pleased to welcome legislators from three different levels of local government:

Washington State Senator Reuven Carlyle (Chair of the Senate Environment, Energy & Technology (EET) Committee and serves on the Senate Ways & Means and Rules committees)
King County Councilmember Jeanne Kohl-Welles (Chair of the County Council’s Budget Committee and Vice Chair of the Community, Health & Human Services Committee)
Seattle City Councilmember Andrew Lewis (Chair of the Select Committee on Homelessness Strategies & Investments)

Join Us Live on YouTube or Zoom

This month, for the first time, we will include a wider group of attendees “live and on the call” with us. We’ll admit the first 30 people to log in to the Zoom link between 6:45-7pm. During the Community Q&A portion of the meeting, we’ll field questions from attendees. Everyone else is welcome to tune in live via our YouTube channel, where the video will also be archived afterward.

AGENDA

7-7:05 Welcoming remarks (Brent Lackey, President, BDC)
7:05-7:25 Opening remarks from legislators
7:25-7:50 Panel discussion — questions from BDC Executive Board
7:50-8:25 Community Q&A
8:25-8:30 Closing remarks

To kick off, we’ll hear a brief general update from Senator Carlyle re: state legislative activity and then a key focus of the meeting will be a panel discussion of how State, County and City government are working together on issues of homelessness, drug addiction and untreated mental illness — these intertwined crises are the most common issues Ballardites ask us about. We hope this will be a valuable continuation of information and discussions from our December meeting (re: supportive housing/shelter and homelessness services in Ballard).

We’ve asked the panel of elected leaders to talk about how local government is working to provide more effective and immediate relief for:

people living unsheltered
people with untreated mental illness and severe addiction
health/safety/environmental impacts in local parks and public spaces
crime and other impacts to businesses and residents

What bills or other legislative actions should the Ballard community be aware of, to provide constructive feedback and support, in these areas?

More than 5 years after Seattle/King County declared an emergency around homelessness, increasing numbers of people are openly suffering and the City/County regional authority efforts seem delayed or faltering. We would like to provide opportunity for legislators to provide context and suggested actions for Ballardites.

Please send suggested questions for the panelists in advance! Email to info@ballarddistrict.org.

Spread the Word

Help invite other community members by sharing the event link.

Note: We also extended invitations to State Representatives Noel Frame and Liz Berry but they are unable to join us on this date. We will look for another opportunity to host them at Ballard District Council.