Drafter
Clerk 04/06/2023
Title
AN ORDINANCE providing for the submission to the qualified electors of King County at a special election to be held in King County on August 1, 2023, a proposition authorizing a property tax levy in excess of the levy limitations contained in chapter 84.55 RCW for a consecutive six-year period at a rate of not more than ten cents per one thousand dollars of assessed valuation in the first year, and limiting annual levy increases to three and one-half percent in the five succeeding years, all for the purpose of supporting veterans and military servicemembers and their respective families; seniors and their caregivers; and resilient communities in King County by funding regional health and human services and capital facilities to promote housing stability, healthy living, financial stability, social engagement and health and human services system improvements and system access; providing for a resident advisory board; and directing proposal of an implementation plan for the veterans, seniors and human services levy, contingent upon voter approval of the levy.
Body
STATEMENT OF FACTS:
1. After approving the first six-year veterans and human services levy in 2005, King County voters have since voted twice to maintain levy-supported services for veterans and human services in King County, including adding seniors and their caregivers as a population explicitly served by the levy in 2017. Ordinance 15279, which created the initial levy for 2006 through 2011 and placed the levy on the ballot for King County voter consideration, was approved by fifty-eight percent of voters. Ordinance 17072, which placed the second levy on the ballot for King County voters, was approved by sixty-nine percent of voters, renewed the levy for 2012 through 2017. Ordinance 18555, which placed the third levy on the ballot for King County voters, was approved by sixty-eight percent of voters, renewed and expanded the levy for 2018 through 2023. This ordinance is the fourth time King County will ask voters to consider the veterans, seniors and human services levy.
2. Since its inception as the veterans and human services levy in 2006 and through its renewals in 2011 and 2017, the veterans, seniors and human services levy has served hundreds of thousands of veterans, military servicemembers and their families, as well as seniors, individuals, and families in need. The 2018-2023 veterans, seniors and human services levy has served more than one hundred and eighty-five thousand people, including more than twenty-seven thousand veterans, servicemembers or their families, and more than one hundred thousand seniors.
3. The 2018-2023 veterans, seniors and human services levy has supported more than three hundred programs led by more than one hundred fifty community-based organizations, of which more than a third are small organizations. More than seventy-five percent of levy-supported programs offer services countywide, with physical service sites available throughout the county and some programs specifically provide mobile services.
4. The 2018-2023 veterans, seniors and human services levy supports programs that contribute to outcomes in the following five result areas: housing stability, healthy living, financial stability, social engagement, and service system access and improvement.
5. The 2018-2023 veterans, seniors and human service levy contributed to the creation of more than one thousand two hundred units of affordable housing and one hundred ninety-eight new shelter beds for individuals and families experiencing homelessness in King County through its housing stability strategies to help prevent and reduce homelessness and to address the shortage of affordable housing.
6. In 2021, King County partnered with the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs and King County Housing Authority to increase the use of federal housing vouchers to help house low-income veterans in King County experiencing homelessness. The partnership is a first in the nation pilot program using King County veterans program social services staff to support veterans finding and maintaining housing using federal housing vouchers. From its launch in April 2021 through September 30, 2022, the levy-supported collaborative case management program helped one hundred sixty-four veteran households obtain vouchers, with one hundred households moving into permanent housing.
7. King County tracks the number of veteran households experiencing homelessness through the Homeless Management Information System. On March 31, 2017, one thousand two hundred fifty-two veteran households were active in the homeless system. As of November 30, 2022, the system showed an estimated seven hundred forty-four veteran households actively experiencing homelessness in King County, a reduction of more than forty percent since the peak in March 2017.
8. King County is home to one in five veterans living in Washington state according to estimates from the U.S. Census Bureau. More than two-thirds of the veterans residing in King County are fifty-five or older.
9. King County veterans program uses levy proceeds to create veteran service hubs that connect more than two thousand veterans and their families each year to the services supported through the levy's financial stability strategies that support King County residents in gaining and maintaining self-sufficiency. These service hubs coordinate with other veteran service providers to provide access and connection to an array of services at the King County veterans program sites.
10. In 2019, veterans accounted for six thousand two hundred sixty-one suicides in the United States, or more than thirteen percent of the total number of people dying by suicide nationwide, according to a 2021 report on veteran suicide by the United States Department of Veterans Affairs. Veteran suicide-related deaths are increasing at a greater rate than that of the general United States population. According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, suicide risk factors include mental health conditions and substance use disorders, as well as economic insecurity, housing insecurity, isolation and stress.
11. More than two hundred thirty veterans and thirty military family members receive counseling each year supported through the levy’s healthy living strategies to help them manage the effects of trauma in healthy ways. Those counseling services add relief to an already stressed mental health care system by providing an additional thirty-two licensed mental health counselors who focus on the impact of military service.
12. Overall, more adults report feeling anxious or depressed since the start of the COVID-19 pandemic according to public health - Seattle & King County data. According to a 2020 Washington state Department of Health community recovery-oriented needs assessment survey for King County, twenty-five percent of respondents reported that they had experienced poor mental health on at least fourteen days in the previous month. A Kaiser Family Foundation study on older adults in August 2020 showed rates of depression and anxiety are higher among adults ages sixty-five and older relative to rates in 2018. A Kaiser Family Foundation report on the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender people reveals a disproportionate impact on their mental health.
13. Since the start of the COVID-19 pandemic, thirteen percent of Americans report having started or increased substance use as a way of coping with stress or emotions related to COVID-19, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. In King County, overdose deaths across all substance types reached an all-time high during and after the pandemic, with data from the King County medical examiner's office showing a 137 percent increase in overdose fatalities between 2019 and 2022 and a 551 percent increase in overdose fatalities caused by fentanyl.
14. The Washington state Office of Financial Management estimates twenty-five percent of King County residents were aged fifty-five or older in 2020 and estimates that proportion to increase to thirty percent by 2040. As the population of older adults increases statewide, so does the population of older adults from racially and ethnically diverse communities or backgrounds.
15. The responsibility to care for vulnerable seniors impacts all generations according to a research report conducted in 2020 by the American Association of Retired Persons. According to the United States Department of Health and Human Services, adults ages sixty-five and older have a seventy percent chance of needing some type of long-term care service. That work will in many cases require assistance from unpaid caregivers, including spouses, adult children and acquaintances.
16. Eighty-five percent of persons sixty-five or older nationwide have one or more chronic health conditions, such as diabetes, cardiovascular disease, chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, asthma, cancer or arthritis, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention behavioral risk factor surveillance system. Racial, ethnic and place-based disproportionalities unevenly distribute these conditions and risk factors across King County.
17. Actual and perceived social isolation are both associated with increased risk for premature death, according to the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering and Medicine study on social isolation and loneliness in older adults. The influence of social isolation on the risk of death is comparable with risk factors for mortality such as smoking. Older adults who are immigrants or a part of the lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, questioning, queer, intersex and asexual plus community may be at higher risk for social isolation and loneliness due to factors like discrimination and barriers to care. Social isolation is also associated with a fifty percent increased risk of dementia. Poor social relationships are associated with a twenty-nine percent increased risk of heart disease, and a thirty-two percent increased risk of stroke.
18. The 2018-2023 veterans, seniors and human services levy supports thirty-nine senior centers to form twenty-two senior hubs as part of the levy's social engagement strategies to improve King County’s senior residents’ feelings of engagement in community. More than twenty-eight thousand seniors each year receive nutritious meals and connections to critical services to combat social isolation since the senior hubs program launched in 2020.
19. The 2018-2023 veterans, seniors and human services levy also supports the geriatric regional assessment team to deliver home-visiting behavioral health and human services intervention to more than three hundred fifty seniors total since the levy supported the assessment team's relaunch in 2020.
20. Ordinance 18555 and the veterans, seniors and human services levy implementation plan adopted by Ordinance 18768 dedicate support for vulnerable populations through the 2018-2023 veterans, seniors and human services levy. The department of community and human services reframed the population served by that levy's proceeds as resilient communities to emphasize community strength in the midst of vulnerability.
21. Of the twenty-one million people trafficked worldwide, approximately eighty percent are labor trafficking survivors and victims of forced labor, bonded labor and domestic servitude.
22. More than eighteen percent of King County adults have one or more physical, intellectual or developmental disabilities. According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the United Nations Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities, persons living with one or more disabilities may have reduced social participation, experience difficulties in mobility, lack of assistive technology and face barriers in access to care to include communication, policy and programmatic barriers, all of which contribute to poor health and decreased quality of life.
23. According to data from the National Domestic Violence Hotline, there was a thirteen percent increase in domestic violence calls between January 2020 and July 2021 in King County. Homicides resulting from domestic violence in King County increased by nearly four times during 2021 compared to 2019, according to the King County prosecuting attorney's office. A statewide survey commissioned by the Washington state Supreme Court in 2015 found that low-income survivors of domestic violence experience the highest number of civil legal needs per capita relative to any other group surveyed.
24. The 2018-2023 veterans, seniors and human services levy supported mobile advocacy services through the levy's service system access and improvement strategy for more than one thousand two hundred survivors of gender-based violence from January 2020 to September 2022. Eighty-four percent of these survivors were connected to an advocate within one day of reaching out for assistance.
25. The 2018-2023 veterans, seniors and human services levy supported a service system access and improvement strategy to streamline how domestic violence survivors access services, designed to meet their individual needs. The resulting creation of a twenty-four-hour, multilingual and multimodal domestic violence hotline is now a single-line access to domestic violence services available in King County. Since the hotline's launch in July 2021 through the end of September 2022, it received more than sixteen thousand calls or texts to assist those in crisis and referred nearly seven thousand of those contacts to additional support.
26. The 2018-2023 veterans, seniors and human services levy introduced new investments for gender-based violence, legal aid and senior center services, nearly tripling the County's annual investment in these areas.
27. In 2021, the veterans, seniors and human services levy supported a contract with 501 Commons to survey more than two hundred thirty nonprofits based in and serving King County, employing more than twenty thousand people, to better understand the array of influences that contribute to employee recruitment, retention, and satisfaction in the nonprofit sector. Survey findings show that many nonprofit employees delivering critical human services earn wages at levels that make it difficult to live in the communities they serve, doing community-based work in King County.
28. According to the 2021 King County nonprofit employee engagement survey conducted by 501 Commons, sixty percent of surveyed staff would consider leaving the nonprofit sector to get better pay and fifty-four percent would consider leaving the nonprofit sector because of burnout or other fatigue. Nationally, turnover in nonprofits is nineteen percent, compared to twelve percent for all industries.
29. In Motion 16129, the King County council requested the executive to produce an assessment report providing information, analysis, and recommendations to inform deliberations about a possible renewal of the voter-approved veterans, seniors, and human services levy. The assessment report drew upon program performance measurement data, feedback from levy providers and community input from fifty-two community engagement meetings. The executive transmitted the report to the King County council on September 6, 2022.
30. In addition to describing the impact to veterans, seniors and resilient communities served by the levy, the assessment report recommended continuing the 2018-2023 levy's five result areas and commitment to the three service populations, increasing levy resources to better address the scale of community needs and creating a regional impact initiatives fund within the levy to address regional human services priorities whose effects span the levy's priority populations.
31. In 2010, Ordinance 16897 established the King County Strategic Plan. In 2015, the King County council passed Motion 14317 updating and revising King County's vision, mission, guiding principles and goals. Included within the county's goals are improving the health and well-being of all people in King County, increasing access to quality housing that is affordable to all, implementing alternatives to divert people from the criminal justice system and ensuring that county government operates efficiently and effectively and is accountable to the public. The guiding principles set out by the county's strategic plan provide a framework to guide the county's actions: "address the root causes of inequities to provide equal access for all; engage with partners, community and public and private organizations to achieve goals; align support, policy and operational goals of King County government; and provide effective, efficient local governance and services to unincorporated areas."
32. In 2010, the county adopted Ordinance 16948 establishing definitions and implementation steps for the county's work related to equity and social justice to achieve the "fair and just" principle. King County applies the principles of equity and social justice to eliminate racially and ethnically disparate health and human services outcomes in King County. The 2018-2023 veterans, seniors and human services levy supports community-led and community-informed organizations that are reflective of and embedded in the communities they serve, advances equitable access to levy resources for community providers and communities, and ensures that investments are focused on communities that have been impacted by historic and ongoing inequity, discrimination, isolation and lack of resources. Equity and social justice shall continue to guide the council and the executive in the process of designing, administering, and evaluating the policies and programs related to the renewed veterans, seniors and human services levy, if it is approved by voters.
33. It is the intent of the county that over the course of the six-year levy the majority of levy proceeds expended to build capital facilities under authority of this ordinance shall be for low-income households. Specific low-income threshold levels are defined by the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development or its successor agency and vary according to household size.
34. It is the intent of the county to continue to strengthen the human services network to ensure that services supported by a renewed veterans, seniors and human services levy are integrated and working together as a complete system that is responsive to communities seeking access or support in navigating resources.
35. It is the intent of the county to continue, without interruption, critical regional health and human services to veterans, military servicemembers and their families, seniors and other persons in King County from the 2018-2023 levy; to provide substantial investments in housing stability; and to engage in planning activities until the new implementation plan is adopted in accordance with section 7 of this ordinance.
36. The 2018-2023 veterans, seniors and human services levy will expire at the end of 2023.
BE IT ORDAINED BY THE COUNCIL OF KING COUNTY:
SECTION 1. Definitions. The definitions in this section apply throughout this ordinance unless the context clearly requires otherwise.
A. "Caregiver" means a person who cares for or supervises another person who requires care or supervision due to disability, chronic illness or a need for support in activities of daily living. "Caregiver" includes individuals providing care for a family member or someone with whom they have an ongoing personal relationship independent of their caregiver roles.
B. "Levy" means the levy of regular property taxes for the specific purposes and term provided in this ordinance and authorized by the electorate in accordance with state law.
C. "Levy proceeds" means the principal amount of moneys raised by the levy and any interest earnings on the moneys and the proceeds of any interim or other financing following authorization of the levy.
D. "Limit factor" for purposes of calculating the levy limitations in RCW 84.55.010, means one hundred three and one-half percent.
E. "Military servicemember" means a person who is serving as either an active duty, national guard member or a reservist member of the United States armed forces.
F. "Priority populations" means veterans and military servicemembers and their respective families, seniors and their caregivers, and resilient communities.
G. "Regional health and human services" means a wide range of those services, programs, operations and capital facilities that promote outcomes relating to healthy living, housing stability, financial stability, social engagement, service system improvement and service system access to meet basic human needs and promote healthy living and healthy communities including, but not limited to:
1. Those services, programs, operations and capital facilities that promote housing stability or that contribute to making homelessness rare, brief and one-time by creating housing, preserving or modifying existing housing, or supporting persons in gaining or maintaining housing, including an assistance program to support persons who qualify to apply for a property tax exemption under RCW 84.36.381;
2. Those health care and health promotion services, programs and operations that encourage healthy lifestyles and wellness, support food security, promote healthy aging, support recovery, reduce unintentional injury, support survivors of gender-based violence, promote suicide prevention efforts, and improve physical and behavioral health for individuals and families including, but not limited to, substance use disorder initiatives such as public awareness campaigns, substance use disorder professional workforce resilience, or peer navigators and upstream mental health care such as counseling and other therapeutic services;
3. Those services, programs and operations that address and support efforts to address firearm violence intervention and injury prevention to promote safe and thriving communities;
4. Those services, programs, operations and capital facilities that promote social engagement and community building, such as senior centers for individuals and groups in culturally, geographically, economically or linguistically isolated communities, and for others, such as seniors experiencing or at risk of social isolation and its health-harming effects;
5. Those services and programs that promote financial stability or financial mobility, including access to, preparation for, and assistance in, gaining or maintaining employment, income, education and financial literacy, including an assistance program to support persons who qualify to apply for a property tax exemption under RCW 84.36.381;
6. Those services, programs, operations and capital facilities that promote and support diversion away from the criminal legal system and its impacts, and services and programs that assist individuals recovering from the effects of their involvement with the criminal legal system, including services that promote restorative justice or returning to community after incarceration or detention, such as services aimed at supporting criminal legal system-involved individuals to attain or retain housing;
7. Those services, programs, operations and capital facilities that improve or expand the delivery of health and human services, improve health and human services system access and navigability, reduce or prevent the disparate or traumatic effects of systems upon resilient communities, build the capacity of communities to partner with King County and build the capacity and support the operations of health and human services providers to serve their clients and communities, including strategies to promote retention, recruitment and pay of high quality service providers;
8. Those services, programs, operations and capital facilities that improve or expand the delivery of civil legal aid to veterans, seniors and resilient communities;
9. Those services and programs that promote, encourage and support employment opportunities for veterans and military servicemembers, including employment opportunities in King County government such as the veterans internship program, a version of which has also been known as the Vets 4 HIRE program established by Ordinance 17450;
10. Those services and programs for veterans and military servicemembers involved with the criminal legal system, including assessment and referral to behavioral health services, housing resources, and other social service supports;
11. Those services, programs, operations and capital facilities that further a goal of allowing seniors to age in place and enjoy a high quality of life in their own homes or where they reside;
12. Those services, programs, operations and capital facilities that provide education and workforce development and training for resilient communities; and
13. Those services, programs, operations and capital facilities that mitigate and offset the impacts of gentrification, including geographic displacement, on resilient communities.
H. "Regional impact initiatives" means those regional health and human services that provide or support responses to issues that affect all three of this levy's priority populations and which regional health and human services can help address such as, but not limited to, nonprofit health and human services workforce stability, language access, responding to the regional homelessness crisis or addressing community safety.
I. "Resilient communities" means persons or communities susceptible to reduced health, housing, financial or social stability outcomes due to systemic and historical exposure to trauma, violence, poverty, isolation, bias, racism, stigma, discrimination, disability or chronic illness. Examples of resilient communities include, but are not limited to: communities of color; immigrant and refugee communities; persons with disabilities; survivors of domestic violence and other gender-based violence; persons who identify as lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, queer, questioning, intersex or asexual; and survivors of human trafficking.
J. "Senior" means a person who is at least fifty-five years old.
K. "Substance use disorder initiative" means those regional health and human services that provide or support responses to issues relating to substance use disorders and recovery from substance use disorders.
L. "Technical assistance and capacity building" means assistance for providers of regional health and human services responding to requests for proposals or assistance to implement, improve, or expand their delivery of regional health and human services in King County.
M. "Veteran" means a person who has served as either an active duty, national guard member or a reservist member of the United States armed forces.
SECTION 2. Levy submittal. To provide necessary moneys to fund, finance or refinance the purposes identified in section 4 of this ordinance, the King County council shall submit to the qualified electors of the county a proposition authorizing a regular property tax levy in excess of the levy limitation contained in chapter 84.55 RCW for six consecutive years, with collection commencing in 2024, at a rate not to exceed $0.10 per one thousand dollars of assessed value in the first year of the levy period. The dollar amount of the levy in the first year shall be the base upon which the maximum allowable levy amounts in years two through six (2025 - 2029) shall be calculated. In accordance with RCW 84.55.050, the levy shall be a regular property tax levy subject to the limit factor as defined in section 1 of this ordinance.
SECTION 3. Deposit of levy proceeds. The levy proceeds shall be deposited into a dedicated subfund of the veterans, seniors and human services levy fund, or its successor.
SECTION 4. Eligible expenditures.
A. If approved by the qualified electors of the county, the sums from the first year's levy proceeds as are necessary may be used to provide for the costs and charges incurred by the county that are attributable to the election.
B. After the amount authorized in subsection A. of this section, the remaining levy proceeds shall be divided in the following proportions and used for the following purposes:
1. Thirty percent of levy proceeds shall be used to plan, provide, administer and evaluate regional health and human services for veterans and military servicemembers and their respective families;
2. Thirty percent of levy proceeds shall be used to plan, provide, administer and evaluate regional health and human services for seniors and their caregivers and to promote healthy aging in King County;
3. Thirty percent of levy proceeds shall be used to plan, provide, administer and evaluate regional health and human services for resilient communities;
4. Ten percent of levy proceeds shall be used to plan, provide, administer and evaluate regional impact initiatives and technical assistance and capacity building, of which at least ten percent of the levy proceeds identified in this subsection B.4. shall be used to support technical assistance and capacity building;
5. At least twenty-five percent of the levy proceeds described in this subsection B., including a portion from the thirty percent of levy proceeds to support each of the three priority populations identified in subsection B.1. through 3. of this section and a portion from the ten percent of levy proceeds to support regional impact initiatives identified in subsection B.4. of this section, shall be used to support those regional health and human services that promote housing stability; and
6. Levy proceeds may be used to mitigate the levy's impact on metropolitan park districts, fire districts or public hospital districts in King County to the extent their levies may be prorationed, as mandated by RCW 84.52.010 and to the extent the levy was a demonstrable cause of the prorationing and only if the county council has authorized the expenditure by ordinance. Metropolitan park districts, fire districts or public hospital districts receiving levy proceeds shall use the proceeds for the purposes stated in subsection B.1. through 4. of this section.
SECTION 5. Call for special election. In accordance with RCW 29A.04.321, the King County council hereby calls for a special election to be held in conjunction with the primary election on August 1, 2023, to consider a proposition authorizing a regular property tax levy for the purposes described in this ordinance. The King County director of elections shall cause notice to be given of this ordinance in accordance with the state constitution and general law and to submit to the qualified electors of the county, at the said special county election, the proposition hereinafter set forth. The clerk of the council shall certify that proposition to the director of elections in substantially the following form, with such additions, deletions or modifications as may be required by the prosecuting attorney:
PROPOSITION___: The King County Council passed Ordinance ______ concerning replacement of an expiring veterans, seniors and human services levy. If approved, this proposition would fund capital facilities and services for veterans, servicemembers, and their families; seniors and caregivers; and resilient communities susceptible to reduced health, housing, financial, or social stability outcomes. It would authorize an additional six-year property tax levy for collection beginning in 2024 at $0.10 per $1,000 of assessed valuation, with the 2024 levy amount being the base for calculating annual increases by 3.5% in 2025-2029; and exempt eligible seniors, veterans and disabled persons under RCW 84.36.381. Should this proposition be:
Approved? _____
Rejected? _____
SECTION 6. Governance.
A. If the levy is approved by the qualified electors of the county, the King County veterans, seniors and human services levy advisory board shall continue to serve in its capacity in accordance with K.C.C. 2A.300.540 now existing or hereafter amended.
B. Beginning in 2025, the executive shall provide an online annual report to the council and community which shall include, but not be limited to:
1. The levy's fiscal and performance management and accomplishments during the previous calendar year;
2. The expenditure of levy proceeds by result area by ZIP Code in King County; and
3. The number of individuals receiving levy-supported services by result area by ZIP Code in King County of where the individuals reside at the time of service.
SECTION 7. Implementation planning.
A. Contingent upon voter approval of the ballot proposition described in section 5 of this ordinance, and by no later than October 31, 2023, the executive shall transmit for council review and adoption by ordinance an implementation plan for the veterans, seniors and human services levy. The implementation plan shall:
1. Describe the forecasted expenditure of levy proceeds to achieve results related to the levy's five result areas of housing stability, healthy living, financial stability, social engagement, service system improvement and service system access for veterans and military servicemembers and their respective families, seniors and their caregivers, resilient communities, and regional impact initiatives, consistent with the eligible expenditures described in section 4 of this ordinance;
2. Describe the planned portion of levy proceeds for veterans and military servicemembers and their respective families, seniors and their caregivers, resilient communities and regional impact initiatives to fund those regional health and human services that promote housing stability as required in section 4.B.5. of this ordinance;
3. Identify and describe the levy strategies to stabilize the nonprofit regional health and human services workforce;
4. Identify and describe the levy strategies to expand access to counseling or other behavioral health services, including for veterans and military servicemembers and their respective families and seniors and their caregivers who are not otherwise sufficiently served through community behavioral health providers;
5. Identify and describe measurable results expected across each of the levy's five result areas for veterans and military servicemembers and their respective families, seniors and their caregivers, resilient communities and regional impact initiatives due to the expenditure of levy proceeds;
6. Identify and describe a regular performance monitoring framework that will be used to assess and report on how well the veterans, seniors and human services levy is achieving those results identified and described in section 7.A.5. of this ordinance, including how the results will be evaluated for geographic distribution;
7. Describe how the veterans, seniors and human services levy program-specific performance monitoring and reporting will be coordinated with performance monitoring and reporting on other dedicated human services funds such as the best starts for kids fund and the mental illness and drug dependency fund;
8. Make recommendations for any refinements to the levy's governance described in section 6.A. of this ordinance and transmit separately for council review and adoption any applicable ordinances that would accomplish the recommended changes upon the effective date of those ordinances; and
9. Describe how the executive shall make each online annual report described in section 6.B. of this ordinance digitally available to all councilmembers, to all members and alternate members of the regional policy committee, or its successor, and to the public.
B. Until the council adopts by ordinance the implementation plan referenced in subsection A. of this section, subject to appropriation, levy proceeds may only be expended to continue existing levy-supported services into 2024 and consistent with the veterans, seniors and human services levy implementation plan adopted by Ordinance 18768.
SECTION 8. Exemption. The additional regular property taxes authorized by this ordinance shall be included in any real property tax exemption authorized by RCW 84.36.381.
SECTION 9. Ratification and confirmation. Certification of the proposition by the clerk of the county council to the director of elections in accordance with law before the primary election on August 1, 2023, and any other act consistent with the authority and before the effective date of this ordinance are hereby ratified and confirmed.
SECTION 10. Severability. If any provision of this ordinance or its application to any person or circumstance is held invalid, the remainder of the
ordinance or the application of the provision to other persons or circumstances is not affected.