A month after a 3–4 vote against asking for a draft ordinance by January 19, council voted 7–0 Wednesday to study a Kirkland minimum wage on Kirkland numbers: data and outreach in the first quarter of 2027, a check-in by March 31, options for a draft ordinance by June 30. Council didn't discuss a wage level. Earlier, a council member asked whether the way groups ask the City for money is "inside baseball," and the City Manager allowed that "maybe people who know access do use it more than people who don't." The services residents rate important but grade low still get 2.9% of the spending the City maps. The station area is now the Forge District.
Wednesday, November 4, 2026, the day after Election Day. Study session 5:30 PM, regular meeting 7:30 PM, City Hall. All seven council members were present. Timestamps are hours:minutes into the video on the City's meeting page.
The Short Version
Two minutes here, about thirteen for the full recap. One vote that mattered; the rest was direction.
APPROVED 7–0
Minimum wage: Kirkland data first, options for a draft ordinance by June 30, 2027. Data and targeted outreach in the first quarter, a check-in by March 31, a regional convening, and a place on the City Work Program. (Item 9.B)
DIRECTION GIVEN
About $869,000 is uncommitted, and the way groups ask for it got questioned. Park cameras or gates, a quarterly Kirklander and mammograms at the health fair are in line for the money. Councilmember Pascal questioned it, Councilmember Tymczyszyn asked for a public, formal process, and the City Manager allowed that "maybe people who know access do use it more than people who don't." (Item 3.A)
STILL LOW
Services residents rate important but grade low get 2.9% of the spending the City maps. Staff explained how the numbers are counted, but the color is in residents' written comments. The City posted those in 2024 and hasn't this year. (Item 3.A)
JANUARY OR FEBRUARY
Neighborhood Safety Program review. The program runs unchanged in 2027; any new structure starts in 2028. (Item 3.A)
APPROVED 7–0
The station area is the Forge District. A motion for the Rise failed first. (Item 9.A)
DIRECTION GIVEN
Paid parking at Juanita Beach's gravel lot stays in the budget. Six of seven council members were fine charging it, $2 an hour in summer like the paved beach lots. (Item 3.A)
NO VOTE
The Pursuit church park-and-ride. A majority asked staff to explore allowing private commuter lots. Councilmember Prem recused. (Item 10.B.1)
If you only have time for one thing: staff scope the minimum wage work in November and December, and it goes onto the City Work Program in January. That's when the questions get set: what's measured, who is asked, and who does the asking. CityCouncil@KirklandWA.gov
Where Your Email Counts Next
Email CityCouncil@KirklandWA.gov; our guide to commenting in writing has the details.
November 17. The third budget hearing, with costs for the uncommitted money and the community requests. Also the Community Safety Initiative 2.0 study session and the preliminary property tax levy.
December 8. Budget and capital plan adoption. Any money for the wage work comes through the budget process, at adoption or later.
January or February 2027. The Neighborhood Safety Program review.
By March 31, 2027. Minimum wage check-in with council.
By June 30, 2027. Research and options for a draft ordinance.
9B — Minimum wage: Kirkland data first, draft ordinance options by June 30 (7–0)
2:56 to 4:05. Council asked for these options on October 6 (our recap). The City Manager opened by saying the night was "not about the merits" of a wage, only how to gather information.
Two ways to learn
Staff offered four options, but the real choice was between two. Option 2 is staff's standard 90-day engagement, built around the King County ordinance. Option 4 is a budgeted work program item that could include outside research on Kirkland businesses, with staff's date at the end of 2027.
The City Manager drew the line plainly. Option 2 shows "what the nonprofit who came to the meeting thinks," he said, but not what "all nonprofits might be impacted by." One "may be sufficient for the council to make a decision." The other "would just take a little more time and a little bit of outside resource." When Mayor Curtis asked whether Option 4 could be pulled in to the first two quarters, he said "I think so," with some additional resources.
What public comment asked for
Five of the nine speakers at Items from the Audience (1:37 to 2:02) spoke on the wage. Four backed Option 2 or its quick timeline, among them a grocery worker and union steward and speakers active in Democratic organizations. Most wanted outreach now and a draft ordinance by January or February. One said the consultant's figures put the bottom quarter of Kirkland's workers at $25 or less, which he put at about 12,000 people.
The executive director of the Kirkland Chamber of Commerce asked for Option 4. "The reality is we don't know how many minimum wage workers there are, and we don't know how many businesses employ those workers," she said. She asked that an outside organization do the business outreach, confidentially, because owners "don't want to be put at odds with their customers or with their employees."
The packet carried two outside documents. A Chamber letter asked for a Kirkland-specific analysis. A King County Democratic Central Committee resolution, adopted October 27, cites rising costs of living and asks King County cities to adopt local minimum wages above the state's. It says the party will make "substantive action toward a higher local minimum wage a point of inquiry and emphasis" when it endorses candidates for mayor and city council.
Where council landed
Nobody picked a single option. The City Manager said he was "the one who wrote end of 2027" for Option 4, only because the City adopts two-year work programs, and "there was no magic to picking 2027." Councilmember Falcone reported that the Chamber, in an email, also supports Option 2 "as long as Kirkland specific data are collected and analyzed." Mayor Curtis summed up the room: take 1, 2 and 3, put them in 4, and compress the timeline.
They agreed on a lot. Member after member asked for Kirkland-specific data, several wanted the work on the City Work Program so it gets staff and money, and no one defended the end-of-2027 date. Pascal asked for the number of workers, their industries and the size of their employers. Things "have changed since" the county ordinance was crafted, he said, naming energy, health care and utility costs. Deputy Mayor Black noted that Kirkland's largest employer is Evergreen Hospital, and Curtis that nonprofits run on very low margins.
The split was over who collects the data. Tymczyszyn and Falcone leaned toward staff working with the Chamber; Tymczyszyn worried an outside firm could take months and return "mediocre" work. Pascal wasn't sure what the Chamber can provide ("I'm hearing different things"). The Mayor said the Chamber doesn't "represent every business that's in our community," so "we still need to capture the businesses that aren't part of the chamber."
The motion
3:50. Councilmember Arnold moved and Councilmember Tymczyszyn seconded: gather data and do targeted outreach in the first quarter of 2027, bring back options for a draft ordinance in the second quarter, organize a regional convening, and add the work to the City Work Program, with any added money through the budget. Tymczyszyn's amendment, seconded by Falcone, set a check-in no later than March 31 and the draft ordinance options no later than June 30, "so we can hold ourselves accountable." Both passed 7–0, the final vote at 4:04.
Deputy City Manager Jim Lopez asked council to treat the outreach feedback and the impact data as "two bodies of work." The City Manager isn't opposed to the dates but "might ask them to be extended" once staff get into the work. On the Chamber's request for outside, confidential outreach, he said the motion "creates the possibility of that." Falcone asked that any confidentiality cover workers and other stakeholders too, "if appropriate."
The motion leaves open who gathers the data, whether outreach is confidential, what the March 31 check-in must include, and when the regional talks happen.
OUR VIEW. Whatever you want the wage to be, Kirkland should set it on Kirkland numbers. The City Manager put the choice honestly. Ask the people who come forward and you learn what they think, which may be enough. Count everyone affected and you learn how they'd fare, for a little more time and some outside help. Put that way, the choice is about evidence, and it can be made without anyone declaring a side.
Kirkland is its own economic microclimate, with a hospital as its largest employer, as the Deputy Mayor noted, and many nonprofits and small service businesses. Rising costs cut both ways. The Democratic resolution cites them as the reason workers need more, and Councilmember Pascal asked that the work account for them. The same count helps both sides make their case. Council's test is whether it knows enough to decide well. The consultant's white paper calls itself "not a minimum wage impact model," so that knowledge is still ahead. We'd like a neutral outside analyst, scoped small, held to March 31, with the count reported apart from the outreach feedback, so workers and owners alike can trust the number before anyone argues over it.
Why weigh in now → Staff scope the work in November and December and recommend who does the counting. Any added money comes back through the budget process, at adoption December 8 or after the January work program talk.
3A — Budget and capital plan: direction, no votes
0:00 to 1:28. Study session, so no motions. The preliminary budget is $1.15 billion, and its only new general tax is the optional 1% property tax increase (our October 29 recap has the full picture).
The uncommitted money
About $869,000 in the budget isn't spoken for, up from $616,000 after a state grant took over the jail navigator position. It assumes the gravel lot charges; without that it's about $746,000. Council decides how to use it at adoption December 8. Staff also said the net cost of a transportation engineer position council let go forward, about $265,000 in 2027 and $269,000 in 2028, would likely come from the same general fund balance. Staff priced what council has asked about, all over two years:
Park security: gates about $227,000, cameras about $130,000. Either helps, staff said; gates are harder to power.
A quarterly Kirklander: about $90,000 more than the roughly $70,000 the twice-a-year newsletter costs now.
Mammograms for uninsured residents at the Health and Wellness Fair: about $7,200 a year, though Evergreen says screening needs follow-up care with it.
Mayor Curtis said there was "strong support" for a quarterly Kirklander, though staff said it might end up three times a year, and Councilmember Arnold suggested setting money aside for the health fair without spelling out its use yet.
A neighbor's view. More Kirklander is good for anyone who doesn't follow council closely, and Councilmember Tymczyszyn was right on October 29 that it helps fill the local news gap. But a City newsletter is the City describing its own work, and some of what residents need to know is what the City doesn't publish.
Community funding requests
Some of that money is being asked for already, and there's no application for City money outside the regular grant programs. A group asks a council member, emails council, or speaks at a meeting, and the request is weighed with the budget. This year staff started a list. It has one item, $50,000 for the Kirkland Woman's Club to renovate its historic clubhouse kitchen windows, which staff said could come from an existing facilities grant program. Councilmember Falcone added a request from Leadership Eastside.
Councilmember Pascal asked whether this is "inside baseball," and said he wants to make sure the City isn't rewarding those with access to the current council. Councilmember Tymczyszyn went further: "we need a very transparent and formalized process as how people would get access to this money." The City Manager said the City doesn't solicit requests, and allowed that "maybe people who know access do use it more than people who don't." Councilmember Arnold described others that came in the same way: Little League groups proposed the turf fields now in the preliminary budget, and climate advocates brought Energy Smart Eastside, which the City Manager's budget funds, and low-income heat pumps, which weren't recommended.
It isn't the only route outside the grant programs. Council also keeps a $250,000 Special Projects Reserve. City policy says it is "primarily intended" for council or staff initiatives "and not to fund outside organization requests," except emergencies case by case. It has funded outside groups before, among them Leadership Eastside and the Parks and Community Foundation. In July, after Mayor Curtis asked for it in June, council voted 6–0 to give $100,000 from it toward repaving Lake Washington United Methodist Church's lot, home to its Safe Parking program, on condition the program runs at least three more years. Staff bring the full request list, including last budget's, on November 17.
Our read. Pascal and Tymczyszyn asked the right question, and even the City Manager's hedged answer makes the case for fixing it. Whatever the merits of any one request, the groups left out are the ones that don't know the door exists. A posted application, open dates, and a public list of who asked and what they got would put every group on the same footing. The November 17 list is the place to start.
The Kirkland Quad: 2.9% for what residents grade lowest
Every two years the City asks residents what matters most and how well it delivers, then plots the answers on a chart it calls the Kirkland Quad. The top-left box holds the Imperatives, services residents rate important but grade low: traffic flow, planning and growth, attracting and keeping businesses, and neighborhoods. On October 29 they got $11.2 million, 2.9% of the spending the chart maps, down from 3.6% last time.
Wednesday staff showed the arithmetic. The dollars come from specific budget codes, such as traffic control, signs and signals for traffic flow and current planning for growth. Part of the drop is one-time 2025-26 money, including $300,000 for station area activation and $70,000 for festivals. Staff called the sorting "a difficult kind of process to do well." No council member asked a follow-up.
OUR VIEW. The Quad is the closest thing Kirkland has to a test of whether the budget follows residents. They say what matters, and the City built the Quad to make sure it "provides the services that matter most to the community." Traffic flow and growth have sat in the Imperatives box since at least 2021, and surveys back to 2008 found much the same. The share of residents who say the City does a good job focusing on priorities is 47% in this year's main survey, down from 55% in 2024 and the same as in 2016. The codes explain how 2.9% was counted. They don't explain why a question asked every two years, answered much the same way in every survey we've found since 2008, gets a smaller share of the budget. That's a choice, and it belongs to the City and council. There's a real risk in measuring something you aren't prepared to work on. Each survey asks residents to believe their answers shape the budget, and the same result survey after survey makes that harder to believe.
Residents' own words would explain why the grades are low. In 2020 and 2022 the City published the full written answers to its online survey in a council packet, and in 2024 it posted the written answers to its main survey, including "what, if anything, concerns you?" This year it hasn't. Those comments should be public before council adopts the budget December 8.
Neighborhood Safety Program
Mayor Curtis asked when council would discuss revamping the program, which has drawn "enthusiastic emails." The City Manager said "January-ish, February-ish," with any new structure starting in 2028; 2027 runs as is. Council could give narrow direction in January, such as making the $75,000 project cap firm. Councilmember Arnold asked what it would cost to set money aside now for the "quadrant by quadrant" option, which would widen who proposes projects beyond neighborhood associations. Staff haven't worked that out.
OUR VIEW. As we wrote on October 29, judge any change by whether it brings more people in through their neighborhood association. Setting money aside for a quadrant model now would get ahead of a decision council hasn't made.
Parking and the rest
Juanita Beach's gravel lot drew the longest debate. The Houghton and Juanita beach lots would charge $2 an hour from Memorial Day to Labor Day, about $985,000 over two years. Councilmember Tymczyszyn called budgeting it before a vote premature and raised Little League families. Falcone, Black and Pascal said the City should be consistent once it charges at all; Arnold, Prem and Curtis were fine with it ("it's about circulation," the Mayor said).
No one objected to the City adopting the children-and-family sales tax so Kirkland, not King County, spends it (about $245,000 in 2027). Of 14 school sites, staff ranked four highest for the state-required study that comes before any new school-zone camera.
Why weigh in now → November 17 is the third budget hearing; the budget is adopted December 8.
Also Wednesday
9A — The Forge District (7–0)
2:39 to 2:55. A motion for the Rise failed on a voice vote. Council then named the station area the Forge District, 7–0, and asked staff to look into honoring the Kellett family, the Heritage Society's pick, some other way.
10B1 — The Pursuit church park-and-ride
4:39 to 4:51. No vote. The park-and-ride serves Amazon employees and isn't allowed in any zone today; staff also have active code cases at the church on trees, signs and a helicopter landing area. Five council members said they'd like to see an amendment with conditions. Councilmember Prem, who works for Amazon and uses its park-and-ride, recused herself "to avoid the appearance of a conflict."
Public comment on the tool library request for proposals
1:45 to 1:48. A resident asked council to order an independent review of how the City ran its tool library request for proposals before any contract comes back. Citing City emails released through public records requests, she said one group helped write the staff memo that launched the request, received the draft memo before council saw it with a note to "please keep internal and do not share," and was offered a tour of the old fire station, scheduled for June 3, that other bidders weren't told about. She said the City's facilities manager had written that a tour for one bidder meant opening it to all and publishing an addendum. Minutes later, she said, another staff member wrote that the City Manager's "comfort level is to offer a tour to anyone who asked," but no addendum about the tour was published, so other bidders had no way of knowing to ask. "Each time the decision traces back to the city manager," she said, and the City received one proposal. Separately, she said the Mayor had emailed Public Works staff directly in June, suggesting they meet with the group and "provide some input," and she said council's code of conduct says members will not "give or imply direction to staff." Her second ask was a written rule: "Whatever one bidder gets, every bidder gets. By addendum." Council doesn't respond during public comment, and no one did. On August 5, council voted 5–2 to negotiate with that proposer and come back with a contract or a check-in (our August 5 recap).
The rest of the night
No one spoke at the budget or property tax hearings (2:02 to 2:16); the levy rate rises because assessed values fell about 5%, and the preliminary levy is back November 17 (our property tax guide). On council rules (4:05 to 4:38), a motion to rotate members into agenda-setting meetings failed 2–5, and a proposed 11 PM end to meetings went to a retreat, 7–0. The consent calendar passed 7–0 with nothing pulled, including Kirkland's NORCOM 911 and Regional Crisis Response shares. Insurance Commissioner Patty Kuderer briefed council on wildfire risk and home insurance. In public comment on other topics, one speaker backed the Kellett name and one thanked Kirkland Police's corrections team for its jail policies for transgender and intersex people. Councilmember Arnold is council's delegate to the National League of Cities conference, which falls during the November 17 meeting; he'll join remotely.
What To Watch Next
The uncommitted money and community requests on November 17. The minimum wage scope before January. The Neighborhood Safety Program in January or February. Whether a tool library contract comes back to council, and whether council takes up a resident's call for an independent review of how the request for proposals was run.
Prepared by a Kirkland neighbor from the meeting video on the City's meeting page and the November 4, 2026 agenda packet. Timestamps are hours:minutes into the video. Quotes are as heard on the video, with filler words removed; names and numbers can be hard to catch, so check the official minutes before quoting anyone. We describe public speakers by role or topic rather than by name.
Sources & city records
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