October 6, 2026 — City Council: What Happened

Council Meeting

Oct 8

All seven councilmembers said they want Kirkland to look at a local minimum wage. They split 3–4 on how fast. Council also approved the Arete affordable housing deal, agreed to rent out the church it just bought, and set an October 20 hearing on two statewide ballot measures. Four other items, including 15 families losing their rent vouchers, were pushed to dates nobody named.

Tuesday, October 6, 2026 · Kirkland City Hall, 123 Fifth Avenue · Study Session 5:30 PM, Regular Meeting 7:30 PM · All seven present, Councilmember Arnold by video · Watch the meeting video (timestamps below are hours:minutes into the video)

The Short Version below takes one minute. The full recap takes about thirteen. Pick your depth.

The Short Version

The thread through the whole night was time. Council agreed on more than it argued about, and the calendar decided more than any vote did. The full story is in The Night the Calendar Won below.

OPTIONS DUE NOVEMBER 4 · 7–0
Minimum wage: Kirkland keeps going, but not on a 30-day clock. A motion by Councilmembers Falcone and Tymczyszyn to bring back a draft ordinance modeled on King County's failed 3–4. What passed 7–0: the City Manager returns November 4 with engagement and targeted study options. (Item 9.b)
HEARING OCTOBER 20 · 7–0
Statewide ballot measures: a hearing on October 20, with opposition resolutions only. A motion to drop the topic failed 3–4, with Councilmembers Arnold and Pascal and Deputy Mayor Black voting to drop it. (Ballot measures)
APPROVED 7–0
Arete: 224 units kept affordable for up to 60 years. A $500,000 interest-free City loan. Council's August push added two two-bedroom apartments. (Item 9.e)
APPROVED 5–2
The former church on NE 132nd: the City becomes a landlord for about two years. Councilmembers Tymczyszyn and Pascal said this isn't what they voted to buy. (Item 9.g)
NO VOTE · DIRECTION GIVEN
Short-term rentals and speed limits. Two rentals per host and no guest cap. Budget options to get 20 mph signs up faster than eight years. (Item 3.c)(Item 3.a)
POSTPONED · NO DATE
Not reached: the federal voucher report, the Council rules rewrite that sets the packet clock, the station area name, and both Holmes Point memos. (The Night the Calendar Won)

If you only have time for one thing: email Council before the October 20 hearing on the two ballot measures. Ballots mail October 14, and the only resolutions in the packet will oppose the measures. If you think the City shouldn't take a side on statewide initiatives at all, that's the night to say so. CityCouncil@KirklandWA.gov

Where Your Email Counts Next

October 20, ballot measures hearing. No six-speaker cap at a public hearing, though Council may limit each side's total time. Written comment counts too.
November 4, minimum wage options. Owners and hourly workers: say what you pay or earn, and what each King County rate would mean for you.
The packet clock. The rule that sets it was pushed, so it's still open. See Items from the Audience.
The church lease. The resolution comes back on a future consent calendar, where items pass without discussion. Write before then.
October 22 and 29, the budget. The faster 20 mph sign swap and a new county sales tax choice are decided there.

The Night the Calendar Won

The minimum wage item ran almost two hours, from 2:39 to 4:27 on the video. Then the Mayor cut the agenda. Pushed: the station area name, with the branding consultant waiting online since 10 PM; the Federal Impacts update, on 15 Kirkland households losing their rent vouchers around December 31; the Council policies rewrite; and the Holmes Point memos, postponed "yet again." No new dates were given.

About half an hour earlier the Mayor had said "there is nothing on our council calendar that we can push off" into 2027–28. Council has four meetings left this year. Will the Federal Impacts report get one of them before December 31? Nobody said.

9B — Minimum wage: options on November 4 (7–0)

Who this touches: anyone who works an hourly job in Kirkland, anyone who signs those paychecks, and everyone who shops, eats or gets care here.

Every councilmember said they want to keep going. They disagreed about how. Councilmember Pascal wanted a targeted Kirkland study alongside outreach. Deputy Mayor Black wanted answers before picking a structure, from phase-in and enforcement to what it does to grocery stores and how many low-wage workers lose hours. Councilmember Prem said businesses must be heard first. The Mayor summed it up as engagement first, with King County's ordinance as a reference point, and asked that the work go on the 2027–28 work program in January rather than into budget season. She also named the City's own payroll and the agencies it funds. One provider had told her, "I'm all in... but I don't know how I'm going to pay for it."

Then came the motion. Councilmembers Falcone and Tymczyszyn presented it as a joint motion they'd drafted in advance. It asked staff to take King County's ordinance to stakeholders and return with "a draft Kirkland ordinance." Councilmember Tymczyszyn moved the date to November 17, and Councilmember Arnold moved it again to January 19, 2027, which passed 6–1 with Councilmember Tymczyszyn the only no. The main motion, now dated January 19, failed 3–4. Councilmembers Tymczyszyn, Arnold and Falcone voted for it; Councilmembers Prem and Pascal, Deputy Mayor Black and Mayor Curtis voted against. Black objected that it asked for an ordinance when "we haven't had a chance to even talk about some of the options." Pascal said rushing would divide the community. The City Manager then offered the language that passed 7–0: he'll bring "community engagement and targeted study options" to the November 4 meeting.

Two councilmembers pushed hardest for speed, though Councilmember Prem also asked to shorten the timeline where possible.

Councilmember Falcone said she saw no need for "an extensive academic or economic study," because she'd heard no reason Kirkland differs from the existing research: "I don't think it's a good use of taxpayer dollars to conduct another study." She backed engagement instead, with the Chamber, small and large businesses, nonprofits, labor and low-wage workers, plus a look at the City's own budget. Later she called raising Kirkland's wage "simply just the right thing to do," and said Kirkland doesn't "rush into things."

Councilmember Tymczyszyn said he wasn't opposed to a study, but only on the City's timeline. He called the four months the first study took not "a sustainable pace" and wanted "significant steps forward in 2026." He also said small businesses need care, and that the draft ordinance was meant as "a point of discussion." He cast the only vote against moving the date to January, and while voting for the final motion said, "I just don't want to waste three months."

OUR VIEW: Council made the right call. A draft ordinance by November would have arrived with King County's wage as the starting point, before anyone had counted how many Kirkland workers it reaches or what it costs the City, its grantees, or a 14-employee restaurant. The consultant's own paper says it is "not a minimum wage impact model." Twenty minutes earlier, responding to the consultant's list of possible next steps, Councilmember Falcone asked that any future study look at the costs Kirkland's code puts on builders, costs she said "can really kill projects," depending on "who is bearing the burden." She's right, and the same question belongs to a small restaurant owner facing a higher wage. Engagement will hear from those owners. A study would count what it costs them. Councilmember Tymczyszyn kept asking for speed in a season when Council is about to receive a two-year budget it hasn't seen. Wanting a higher wage and wanting to know what it costs aren't opposites, and the 7–0 vote that followed keeps room for both.

What the Preview asked, and what we heard. The City's own payroll came up as a question, not a number. Nobody asked to rerun the study's sample 14-employee restaurant with a local wage, and while grocery stores came up, nobody mentioned the grocers and hotels the City is courting for the station area.

Why weigh in now → the November 4 options set the scope. Ask that they include a count of affected Kirkland workers, the City's own seasonal payroll and grant costs, and the sample restaurant run with a wage. CityCouncil@KirklandWA.gov

Ballot measures — Hearing October 20, opposition resolutions only (7–0)

Who this touches: every Kirkland voter, and anyone who cares whether City Hall takes sides on a statewide ballot.

Near 11 PM the City Manager reported four draft resolutions, for and against each measure, for an October 20 hearing. The measures are IL26-638, on girls' sports, and IL26-001, on parents' rights. Councilmember Pascal questioned the hour it would take: "It has nothing to do about the initiatives," only "how best to schedule our valuable time." Councilmember Falcone moved to prepare only opposing resolutions. It died without a second.

Councilmember Arnold then moved to take the topic off the agenda. He called it "optional for us," said a Council statement wouldn't be "dispositive," and said he'd take his own position as an individual. Councilmember Pascal seconded. It failed 3–4: Arnold, Pascal and Black for; Tymczyszyn, Prem, Falcone and the Mayor against. Once the hearing was going ahead, Councilmember Arnold moved what Councilmember Falcone had proposed, Councilmember Tymczyszyn seconded, and it passed 7–0. The packet will hold two resolutions instead of four; the hearing runs the same length.

OUR VIEW: Thank you to Councilmember Arnold, Councilmember Pascal and Deputy Mayor Black for voting to take this off the agenda. To be fair to them, none argued the measures' merits, and Councilmember Arnold said a statement in opposition had real value. Their case was that this is optional and the City's own work is behind. We'd go a step further. In 2024 Deputy Mayor Black said Council positions on ballot measures "should be rare," with "a high threshold." In every statewide case we found, Kirkland's resolution pointed to City money, City plans or City authority. The Mayor's reasons Tuesday, the Youth Bill of Rights and the values behind it, are sincere. But if shared values are enough, nearly any statewide measure clears the bar. That's worth telling Council before October 20.

Why weigh in now → the hearing is October 20 and ballots mail October 14. Write before, or sign up to speak. CityCouncil@KirklandWA.gov

9E — Arete Apartments: approved 7–0

Who this touches: renters at 450 Central Way, and anyone following how the City spends its housing dollars.

Moved by Councilmember Falcone, seconded by Deputy Mayor Black. Resolution R-5747 lets the City Manager finish the agreement: a $500,000 interest-free loan for 20 years, renewable twice to 60. For as long as the loan runs, 219 EcoFlats are held at 60% of area median income and five larger units at 80%: one studio, two one-bedrooms and two two-bedrooms. Rent increases on every unit, market-rate included, are capped at the state formula of 7% plus inflation or 10%, whichever is less. Earlier repayment was declined; the owner says the public loan is what qualifies the building for a state property tax exemption for nonprofit-owned affordable housing. That's a different program from the City's multifamily tax exemption, or MFTE. Councilmember Tymczyszyn said the family-sized units "moved the needle."

The two-bedrooms are a real gain, and they came because Council pushed for them in August. They and the rent cap, which covers market-rate units too, are the parts of the deal that add something the building didn't already offer.

The rest deserves a closer look. By the owner's count, only 26 of the 228 EcoFlats rent above the 60% level today, so roughly 200 of the 219 guaranteed units are already priced there (our arithmetic). The staff memo also says most current tenants earn more than 60% of median income and won't have to move, so income-qualified renters will fill those units only as people move out. The one physically new unit is a studio made by converting a shared kitchen. Would a new owner really have added kitchens and raised rents? Councilmember Prem thought the downtown location made it a real risk. Staff wrote that it "does not have definitive data," and that small units across the Eastside are plentiful enough to keep rents flat for now, though it expects demand to grow along with the city.

One fair ask for the final agreement, due this fall: a yearly report to Council on how many units are rented to income-qualified households. It's easy to add before signing, and it's how anyone will know the deal worked.

9G — The former church: City as landlord, approved 5–2

Who this touches: Kingsgate neighbors promised a community center, and the groups hoping to rent the space.

Moved by Deputy Mayor Black, seconded by Councilmember Prem; Councilmembers Tymczyszyn and Pascal voted no. The sale closed that day. Parks can't run the building while it opens the Kraken Iceplex community center in 2028, so the City will lease it for about two years to tenants who fit park zoning, pay rent, and can leave on time.

Councilmember Tymczyszyn said he voted to buy a "generational" property for parks and possibly a pool, and that tenants used to low rent will be hard to move: "this is not why I voted to acquire this property." Councilmember Pascal said the community was promised a Kingsgate community center, and had he known it would sit, he might have questioned the purchase. The majority called leasing the fiscally responsible choice, and the Mayor put the building's long-term plan on her 2027–28 work program list.

The record is a little more complicated than the dissent. Leasing was in the April 21 memo, listed among "concepts" for a building staff already said Parks couldn't program "in the next few years." The City Manager made the same point at the end of the item, and the October memo spells out the plan: leasing through 2028, then using it for North Kirkland Community Center programs in 2029 and 2030 while that center is renovated. It doesn't say when Kingsgate gets a community center of its own.

The price matters too. The church listed at $7.31 million. The listing drew ten offers, several above $10 million, and the City paid $10 million, under its own $11 million appraisal. To pay for it, the City drew $7.3 million from a bond first meant to repay the Houghton Village loan and about $1 million from a 124th Avenue street project, among other sources, and it gave up a planned $5 million gym partnership at Kamiakin Middle School.

Fair questions before the lease resolution. What rent does the City expect, and does it cover the building's costs? Is the end of 2028 a firm end date, and what happens if a tenant can't leave? And when, on the City's own calendar, does Kingsgate get the community center this purchase was for? The rent question, asked in the Preview, went unanswered. Staff did make a tenant's ability to leave on time a condition of any lease.

3C — Short-term rentals: direction, no vote

Council's direction: two rentals per host, on the same logic as two ADUs per lot; whether a renter may host is the landlord's call, not the City's; operators stay Kirkland residents for now; and no appetite for a cap on guests. Left open: whether an off-site investment property can be a rental, and Councilmember Arnold's question about a yearly cap on rental nights. One connection went unmentioned. Staff wrote that after September's parking cuts, occupancy limits "may become one of the few operational tools available" for neighbor concerns, and Council set that tool aside.

3A — Speed limits: 20 mph, faster than eight years

No vote. When the City Manager asked whether Council wanted budget options to speed up the switch to 20 mph signs, he said he could "see everyone nodding." The Preview put the cost of cutting eight years to four at about $30,000 a year. Three arterials drop to 30 first, in 2027. The Mayor asked that Lake Washington Boulevard be first in line for the next round, from personal experience: "I got flipped off for going 25 in a 30 the other day because there were so many people out." Nobody asked the Preview's question about Fire Department response times.

Items from the Audience

A week with the packet, and the slides in it

Our preview asked readers to request an earlier packet and the presentation slides, because the rule that sets the packet clock was on the agenda. A Rose Hill resident did exactly that, in three prepared minutes. Thank you. She did the hard part so the rest of us can do the easy one.

Her case was simple. The packet posts Friday for a Tuesday meeting, which leaves two business days to read almost 800 pages, talk to neighbors and write a comment. Councilmembers, she pointed out, are "on the same clock" as everyone else. Bellevue posts Thursday and Sammamish a full week ahead. She said Kirkland's code required Friday-at-5 posting until 2022 and now requires only the state's 24 hours, and that Tuesday's packet had changed that same day. "Posting is now a practice, not a commitment." She asked for a week's notice, every presentation slide in the packet, side-by-side changes when the packet is revised, and votes held when materials change late. The slides mattered most to her. "When residents see a slide for the first time on the screen, they cannot respond to it."

A caller seconded her, and the rest of the night made her argument for her. The Chamber's director said her board hadn't met on a wage study posted the Friday before. And at 10 PM Council recessed so a motion most of the dais hadn't seen could be typed onto a screen.

The rules rewrite was one of the items pushed, so the door she opened is still open. Council notices when the same short request arrives from several neighbors. If you've ever opened a 600-page packet on a Saturday, add your name to hers: post the packet a week ahead, and put the slides in it. CityCouncil@KirklandWA.gov, and copy CityClerk@KirklandWA.gov.

The minimum wage, and the rest

The six-speaker cap filled on the wage, so four people weren't heard. A grocery worker, a retail worker, a Head Start teacher and Eastside For All urged a higher wage. A downtown retail and hospitality operator and the Kirkland Chamber of Commerce asked for a Kirkland study first. The Chamber's director put it this way: "if we're the first ones that are going to do this on the east side, then we got to do it right." Also heard: the Kirkland Heritage Society proposed "Kellett Heights" as the station area name, and a Holmes Point homeowner asked for relief on trees that flood her house, the same night the Holmes Point tree memo was pushed.

Also Tuesday

Election safety (9.D), 7–0. Ordinance O-4949 lets Kirkland Police enforce the state's 25-foot zone around ballot drop boxes, and Council agreed to ask Olympia for a larger buffer.

Consent, 7–0. About $21.5 million in payroll and bills (our arithmetic), the emergency management framework, and contracts. EvergreenHealth's CEO announced a $100 million gift toward a new patient tower.

Coming back. The Mayor asked for a report on Pursuit Church in North Rose Hill: noise, the park-and-ride, open code cases. A new King County sales tax option would raise about $430,000 if Kirkland takes it instead of the County, and that choice comes to the October 29 budget meeting.

What To Watch Next

Dated items are in Where Your Email Counts Next above. Utility rates are adopted October 20. Still without a date: the voucher report (deadline December 31), the Council rules rewrite, the station area name, the Holmes Point memos, the church lease resolution, the Pursuit Church report, and the final Arete agreement.

Prepared by a Kirkland neighbor from the October 6, 2026 meeting video and the published agenda packet. Vote counts and movers are as called from the dais; check the official minutes before quoting anyone. Outside the October 6 packet: the church purchase history comes from the April 21, May 29 and June 2, 2026 Council packets, and Deputy Mayor Black's 2024 standard from Council's public record that year. The count of Arete units already affordable and the consent total are our arithmetic. Public commenters are described rather than named, and organizations are named where a speaker appeared on their behalf.

Sources & city records

Last updated: October 2026.

Want the preview before the next meeting? Members of our private Facebook community get every meeting preview days before the council meets — while there's still time to email council and shape the outcome, not just read about it. Join the Cherish Kirkland Facebook group — request to join, answer the membership questions, and an admin will approve you.

Heather Montpas