Key to the city

Rose Ehl, Dave Ehl and Karla Kolibab, founders of the Federal Way Farmers Market, were celebrated with a Key to the City by Mayor Jim Ferrell. The Federal Way Farmers Market just celebrated its 20 year anniversary and is active through the end of October each year.

The mayor lauded the market as “one of the pillars of our city,” telling the recipients that “your family unites Federal Way.”

Rose Ehl highlighted the work of many collaborators and supporters of the market over the years: “It’s not just a place to buy produce,” Ehl said. “It’s where friendships are made and memories are created.”

The market is holding some special festivities for its last event of the year on Oct. 28, including a costume contest and other seasonal fun. The market runs 9 a.m. to 3 p.m. Saturdays at the Commons mall.

Police promotions

Police Chief Andy Hwang shared that “promotions are one of the most critical decisions chiefs make for their agency,” adding that “one of the key ingredients of our success has been to promote the right individuals.”

The mayor then administered the oath of office for the promotions of several officers.

• Officer RB Blackshear was promoted to lieutenant. He joined the FWPD in 2013 and has been the Acting Lieutenant assigned to the Specialty Assignments Unit, overseeing the School Resource Officers. He also served in the Army National Guard.

• Officer Jeff VanderVeer was promoted to lieutenant. He has over 31 years of law enforcement experience, transferring to FWPD 16 years ago. He served on the Valley Independent Investigation team and is certified to conduct independent investigations into officer-involved shootings. He currently coordinates departmentwide training, does background investigations and is involved in recruiting and hiring.

• Corporal Nic Peterson was promoted to lieutenant. In his 18 years of law enforcement, he has worked as part of the Special Operations Unit, a technician for the Bomb Disposal Unit and a member of the Civil Disturbance Unit. He has also lead projects to deal with shoplifting in the downtown business area, restructured the mountain bike program and coordinated a monthly outreach program for the homeless community.

• Officer Travis Tilford was appointed to the position of corporal. He has 16 years of law enforcement experience and is a Field Training Officer that positively contributes to the development of new officers.

• Officer Andrew Sederburg was appointed to the position of corporal. He has been a generalist K-9 handler since 2018 and has over 13 years of law enforcement experience.

Performing Arts and Event Center contract

The PAEC venue management contract is up for renewal. After much discussion, the council moved forward to approve one of the three options they were presented, voting to engage in a five year contract with Spectra to continue their management of the venue. The contract includes a $200,000 capital investment from the city and includes a renewal of another five years unless there are serious qualitative or quantitative concerns about the group’s management of the venue, according to the city.

The new plan will also include revised performance metrics, as requested by the council.

“It’s your facility, we are transparent with everything,” General Manager Brian Hoffman said.

Day Center

Community Development Director Keith Niven shared an update about the Day Center after a meeting on Oct. 4 between city leaders and Catholic Community Services representatives.

“We had a really good conversation,” Niven said “At least what I’ve observed since that meeting is that things are dramatically different.”

The mayor added that it has been “very positive” and that “we want to make sure we are creating an environment where we can help people or where people can get help.”

Two commentors stated that the Day Center is a negative influence on our community, because it does not provide enough resources for long-term success and also because it attracts people from outside the society.

In a recent assessment this year, 90% of the Day Center’s most consistent users are from Federal Way. They also provide access to case managers to support connection to housing services, mental health support and a wide variety of other services that align with their stated goal to “connect people to resources that will enable them to meet their full potential.”

Domestic violence

The city council and mayor read a proclamation for October 2023 as “Domestic Violence Awareness Month.” In the proclamation, they “urge our citizens to recognize this critical problem facing our entire community, work to prevent domestic violence, increase services to domestic violence victims and their children, and continue efforts to eliminate this crime which affects all of us in this community, our state, and our nation.”

The proclamation also shared that there are over 2,100 domestic violence calls in Federal Way each year and that studies show this number does not include the 70% of domestic violence incidents that goes unreported. They also stated that domestic violence is the leading cause of injury to women ages 15 to 44 in the United States.

The proclamation was presented to a representative from Virginia Mason Franciscan Health, who spoke on her work: “Can you imagine if we eradicate domestic violence, how much better this world would be? I’m in healthy equity work and my goal is to make sure that people like me are not needed anymore, that my job is not needed anymore.”

Public comment

Allison Fine, Trenise Rogers, Saudia Abdullah and Tirzah Idahosa spoke about the importance of the city council modeling inclusive practices.

Concerns were also raised about a new practice of having the city attorney attend all Diversity Commission meetings. This is not a requirement for any other commission meeting, and members questioned the use of city resources and the city attorney’s time.

Another concern included the lack of a public apology to the Diversity Commission after they were accused of abusing and mishandling funds. An investigation found this to be an untrue allegation but Idahosa said nothing has been done to follow up and correct the record.

Comments made by Council President Linda Kochmar at a Parks Commission meeting about programming at the PAEC were also mentioned, where she requested a personal warning whenever the PAEC has similar programming to an annual event held by United Territories of Pacific Islanders Alliance Washington (UTOPIA Washington) in May. She called the event “controversial” and started by saying “you have to think of the community you’re in. We are not Seattle or Tacoma. We are a small suburban community,” then mentioned she used to say Federal Way “had a church on every corner.”

While Kochmar did not specify what she found to be controversial about the event held by the Pacific Islander-led organization that has been a community staple of South King County since 2009, she did refer incorrectly to pageant competitors as “the transgender person” when the Miss Island Goddess pageant focused on celebrating competitors in drag.

Several public commentors stated that calling a performer “controversial” based on their identity within the LGBTQ+ community is inherently transphobic. They thanked another unnamed council person who stood up against those comments in the moment, saying that the comments could be considered “discriminatory.”

Allison Fine added how disappointed she was that council members did not stop public commentors from making disparaging remarks against members of the LGBTQ+ community during a city council meeting in June. “I also sat in the back of the room and cried, because there were people from my community that decided to speak out negatively against the LGBTQ community that live here, calling us names like demons.”

Anna Patrick used her public comment time to call for unity, specifically referring to the comments made by Kochmar: “Our community is a meeting point with diverse identities and experiences. It’s crucial that we uphold civil rights guaranteed to all citizens in the United States. Both religious status and LGBTQ status are protected under these rights and finding common ground where these two intersect can be challenging. This calls for thoughtful dialogue.”

Councilmember Hoang Tran responded to an allegation that had been made during public comment by Ken Blevens. He had stated that the previous council was interested in defunding the police and was celebrating current council members.

Tran stated that he doesn’t “appreciate the false allegation,” and that “we did talk about police accountability, de-escalation tactics, we did talk about how to build better relationships between our police department and the community,” but that “at no point did our council members talk about defunding the police.”

More updates

• Senior planner Evan Lewis presented request for Authorization to Apply for a Department of Commerce Climate Planning Grant. This grant would provide funds to invest in emergency preparedness planning that would also open up the opportunity to be eligible for other grants in the future.

• Through the Mayor’s Day of Concern and partnership with Waste Management, the Federal Way community donated over seven tons of food to benefit Multi-Service Center food bank

• A delegation from Federal Way’s sister city of Yangsan in Korea visited on October 10. The Mayor shared that they had a “great conversation about what the next few years will look like,” when it comes to Federal Way’s involvement with South Korea. Representatives from Federal Way visited Yangsan earlier this year.

• The council voted to forward Bill #862 for a second reading that would allow Highline Water District to franchise a water distribution system within the city. Highline Water District already has approximately 263 connections in the city.

• Lydia Assefa-Dawson shared an update about a recent $50,000 investment into the Pacific Raceway that has seen a $100,000 value in returns and a reach of 1.1 million on social media. She shared that Federal Way hotels reported have increased usage during Raceway events.

• Paul McDaniel asked for an update about damaged lights at the Community Center. The lights are in the process of being fixed and then the Community Center will be assessed to see if additional lights are needed for safety and security after dark.