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Yesterday King County Executive Dow Constantine and I submitted King County's application to the Washington State Department of Health to move to Phase 2 of the Safe Start COVID-19 recovery plan. The state is expected to process the application this week, and King County could move to Phase 2 by Friday.
Since last week, King County has operated under a modified Phase 1 variance that allowed partially re-opening business and other activities. Phase 2 allows for businesses to operate at twice the indoor capacity permitted in the modified Phase 1, provided they meet all re-opening requirements set out by the state’s guidance. Read more about what’s open in each Phase of Safe Start here.
Many of you have written asking for allowances for more business and recreational activity, while others remain very concerned that we are not ready to open up further without risking a deadly resurgence of COVID-19. Within King County, we are struggling to strike the right balance between people’s health, financial well being and other needs. Based on where we are at this time, I agree with our public health professionals that we can move forward cautiously, but we must all commit to take steps to continue to contain the spread of COVID-19. In particular, I will be closely monitoring our health care system readiness, which measures our County’s ability to respond in the case of a sudden resurgence of the disease.
During the time that we gradually and cautiously reopen our economy, it’s more important than ever to wash our hands, wear masks and maintain physical distancing. These indispensable health practices will ensure we limit the spread and make our journey to recover a one-way trip.
Legislative update on work to fight systemic racism
In my last update I reported that the King County Council will be considering a number of important proposals in the coming weeks to address systemic racism. Today, at the King County Council Committee of the Whole we started this work by recommending changes to the County Charter (our constitution) to increase law enforcement oversight in a number of ways. We voted to recommend giving the County's Office of Law Enforcement Oversight (OLEO) subpoena powers for its investigations and to expand and better define our inquest process, which provides a public review of any deaths of people in King County custody. Our recommendations included providing legal counsel to families of victims in all inquest proceedings. Both civilian oversight investigations by OLEO and the inquest process are essential to a system of accountability for law enforcement provided by King County. These measures will now go to the Council for a final vote on July 7th. If approved by the County Council, the recommended Charter amendments would be placed on the November 2020 ballot for public vote.
As your representative on the King County Council, I am co-sponsoring and have voted for both measures. I will report out to you as we make progress on specific actions and I ask that you please contact me to share your experiences and ideas.
Stay home and spread the word!
Remember right now, physical distancing is the most important thing we can do to fight the COVID-19 pandemic. Please forward this email widely and invite others to sign-up to my email updates to receive important and timely information for District 6 constituents.
Sincerely,
 Claudia Balducci
King County Council
Council Chair
District 6
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