Thursday's budget session: 66 Council proposals for police, human services and CARE. Who filed what, and what it adds

The Seattle City Council's Select Budget Committee meets at 9:30 a.m. Thursday for its third and final day of councilmember proposals on Mayor Katie Wilson's 2027-2028 budget. On the agenda: the Human Services Department, the Police Department, the CARE department, the City Budget Office, the Legislative Department and the Mayor's Office.

These are the departments behind the budget's biggest public arguments, from police staffing to shelter and crisis response. Central Staff's proposal packets for all six went up before the meeting, so residents can see the full list before members speak to them. No votes are taken Thursday.

This follows our counts of Tuesday's 36 proposals, Wednesday's 58 and our two-day running tally.

What our records add: the count

Central Staff's summary list has 62 numbered items, and the Legislative Department packet adds four draft ordinances, for 66 in all:

• Human Services: 32 (packet)
• Police: 15 (packet)
• CARE: 6 (packet)
• City Budget Office: 6 (packet)
• Legislative Department: 4 ordinances
• Mayor's Office: 3 (packet)

Prime sponsors, counting all 66:

• Dan Strauss (District 6, budget chair): 10
• Eddie Lin (District 2): 10
• Maritza Rivera (District 4): 10
• Joy Hollingsworth (District 3, Council president): 8
• Dionne Foster (Position 9): 8, including three of the ordinances
• Robert Kettle (District 7): 8, including one ordinance
• Rob Saka (District 1): 5
• Alexis Mercedes Rinck (Position 8): 5
• Debora Juarez (District 5): 2

Five of Kettle's eight items are Police Department proposals. Rivera's spread across police, CARE, Human Services and the Mayor's Office. Hollingsworth filed seven Human Services items, several of them for programs in the Central District.

The money. We added up the General Fund cost in each packet's financial summary. For 2027, the items that spend money total about $32.6 million:

• Human Services: about $25.6 million
• CARE: about $2.6 million
• Police: about $2.7 million
• City Budget Office: about $1.3 million
• Mayor's Office: $418,000

Many items cost nothing in the General Fund because they are reports, called Statements of Legislative Intent, or "provisos" that fence off money already in the budget for one use.

Two Human Services items make up almost two-thirds of Thursday's 2027 total: Rinck's $8 million a year for domestic and sexual violence services, which we covered when she announced it, and Lin's $8 million for a 3 percent pay increase in city-funded human services contracts. Strauss's $3.5 million for a new RV safe lot is next.

Watch 2028. The single largest police item is small in 2027 and large later. Kettle's proposal to keep hiring 12 recruits a month costs $792,000 in 2027 and $11.6 million in 2028, and the department estimates $22 million more in 2029, according to the police packet. We have more on that proposal.

Putting the three days together. Our earlier counts put Tuesday's and Wednesday's 2027 General Fund asks at roughly $49 million. Adding Thursday brings the three-day total to roughly $82 million for 2027 alone. PubliCola reported that the money identified so far to pay for additions is about $26 million. Our totals use each packet's own figures and count only the larger of competing versions where two members filed different fixes for the same cut.

Items to watch

• Layoffs: Strauss's CBO-005-A would spend about $1.2 million one-time to keep 13 employees who would otherwise be laid off on the payroll for six more months, in the construction and inspections department, Neighborhoods, Economic Development, IT, Arts and the Police Department, according to the budget office packet.
• A fire district study: Strauss also proposes $150,000 to study a fire protection district and a report on a "fire benefit charge." See our explainer.
• Two versions of one ordinance: Foster and Kettle each filed a "Financial Sustainability" ordinance requiring the mayor's budgets to come with balanced six-year financial plans for the General Fund and the JumpStart payroll tax fund, per the LEG packet. Foster's co-sponsors are Lin and Rinck; Kettle's are Strauss and Rivera. We covered Foster's version when she announced it.
• Police overpayment fund: Foster's fourth ordinance would create a fund to hold any money recovered from the $13.1 million in police wages paid in error, which we covered in our story on the overpayment.

What's next

According to Central Staff's process overview:

• Wednesday, Nov. 4: Strauss's balancing package, showing which proposals survive.
• Thursday, Nov. 5: public hearing on the budget (meeting page).
• Monday, Nov. 9: deadline for members' self-balanced amendments to the chair's package.