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HomeMy WebLinkAboutCity Council Meeting - Council Workshop - Agenda - 03/21/2000 ` CITY OF F INVICTA Jim White, Mayor COUNCIL WORKSHOP AGENDA The Council Workshop will meet in Chambers East in Kent City Hall at 5:30 PM on Tuesday, March 21, 2000. Council Members: President Leona Orr, Sandy Amodt, Tom Brotherton, Tim Clark, Connie Epperly, Judy Woods, Rico Yingling Speaker Time Jacki 2. Payroll/Finance/HR System Acquisition Marty Mulholland/Sue Lester 30 minutes 3. Intergovernmental Update Dena Laurent 10 minutes The Council Workshop meets each month on the first Tuesday at 5:OOPM and the third Tuesday at 5:30 PM in Chambers East unless otherwise noted. For agenda information please call Jackie Bicknell at(253) 856- 5712. ANY PERSON REQUIRING A DISABILITY ACCOMMODATION SHOULD CONTACT THE CITY CLERK'S OFFICE AT (253) 856-5725 IN ADVANCE. FOR TDD RELAY SERVICE, CALL THE WASHINGTON TELECOMMUNICATIONS RELAY SERVICE AT 1-800-833-6388. 220 4th AVE.SO., /KENT,WASHINGTON 98032-5895/TELEPHONE (253)856-5200 City of Kent Information Services Department F1nan yr�oll System Sielection Fig Prepared for City Council Workshop March 21 , 2000 By Marty Mulholland, Director of Information Services, and Sue Lester, ERP Project Manager We are looking forward to the opportunity to meet with you to give you an update on this very important project. Please note that the purpose of this presentation is to provide you with background information on the project. We are not yet prepared to make an official purchase recommendation, but anticipate doing so within the next few months. Please note: In the industry Finance/HR/Payroll systems are often referred to as "ERP Systems" for Enterprise Resource Planning systems. The term implies that these systems touch every aspect of our agency, which will certainly be true for the City. This system will include purchasing, timekeeping, and benefits management modules, along with many other sub-systems that will be key tools for moving forward in the new century! In January Council President Orr asked Council member Tom Brotherton to serve as a Council Liaison for this project. We have provided Tom with extensive materials from this project and have met with him a few times. We appreciate his interest in participating in this project and providing a Council perspective. Thanks Introduction In April 1998 the Kent City Council accepted the City's Technology Plan. At the time of the Plan Presentation to Council, we identified a number of systems to be replaced. We were particularly concerned about the City's Finance/Payroll/HR Systems for a number of reasons: a. The Finance/Payroll software vendor declared their software to not be Year 2000 compliant, refused to provide the City with a system support contract,and b. The City's Finance/Payroll system was considerably dated, had never been extended to offer any amount of much-needed Human Resources functionality, and c. The City's Flexible Benefits System,written by a third party,was also removed from a system support contract and its Year 2000 status was uncertain. For those reasons, the City's Technology Plan included funding to replace the existing Finance/Payroll system and Flexible Benefits system. The lack of support mechanisms and Year 2000 compliance was of great concern, especially since a solid system selection and implementation project typically takes 2 — 3 years. We did not want to select and implement such a key set of systems on an"emergency'basis. As it turned out,we took on several efforts to resolve the status of these systems: a. We successfully negotiated an interim support contract with a state agency called the Center for Information Services (CIS) for the Finance/Payroll systems. The contract hinged upon the City's agreement to test for Y2K. The agreement will only remain in effect as long as the CIS is supporting other agencies running the same software. b. We successfully tested the Finance/Payroll system for Year 2000. This was a long and arduous process. We experienced many glitches and identified a few Year 2000 bugs,which were repaired by CIS prior to the Millennium Rollover weekend. c. We also tested the Flexible Benefits system for Year 2000, and its interface to our Payroll system. This too was an arduous process, and in the end we hired a contract programmer to work on this project for several months. d. We launched the Finance/HR/Payroll system selection project. Desired System Functions: The ideal system for the City of Kent would support the following functions: Finance • General Ledger • Accounts Payable • Budget • Accounts Receivable* • Purchasing* • Projects and Grants* • Fixed Assets* • Revenue Receipting* Employee Services • Employee Master • Benefits • Applicant Tracking* • Position Control* • Performance Evaluations* • C►assification/Compensation* • Training* • Risk Management* • Employee Relations* Payroll • General • Leave Management • Time Entry • Earnings • Deductions • Processing/Calculations • Payroll History • Reporting *functions not currently automated at the City Background of the ERP Systems Market The software market for ERP software systems is large and complex. It is helpful to be aware of this market when going through a project of this nature. �r The software industry refers to the major ERP system players as `Tier 1"vendors. These software vendors support multi-national companies for Finance, Payroll, and HR. Some of the vendors in this category include Oracle, Peoplesoft, and SAP. Top tier vendors typically have the following characteristics: • Substantial product offering/More complex systems setup • Newer technology/Larger research and development teams • Relatively less experience with public sector • Often software is purchased from the software vendor, but the system is implemented with the assistance of an Implementation vendor. Selection of this vendor can be as important as the selection of the software. Other software vendors are categorized as "Tier 2" or sometimes `Tier 3" players depending on their size and role in the market. Some of the vendors in this category include Bi-tech, Eden, HTE, Ross, and SCT. Characteristics of vendors in the Tier 2/3 category are as follows: • More experience with public sector accounting • Smaller research and development teams / Less sophisticated technology and/or longer migration to new technology • System is purchased from and implemented by the software vendor �. Product offering may be lacking some components 2 Please keep in mind that all of the above staternents are general in nature; there is substantial variation from one vendor to the next. Kent's Strategy, Key Objectives Often agencies decide ahead of time that they are going to select either Tier 1 or Tier 2 vendors. We decided that our strategy would be an open one. We encouraged all vendors to participate in our systems project. We indicated that we were aware of the different market segments, were aware of the differences among the players, and would be willing to select a Tier 1 vendor if that was the best option for the City of Kent. Key Project Objectives 1. Vendor will have a proven track record for both software use and implementation services for public sector organizations similar in size and complexity to the City of Kent. 2. Vendor will be dedicated to ongoing development of and support for the proposed solution(s). 3. Vendor will provide a solution for retirement reporting as defined by the Washington State Department of Retirement Systems, as well as other Washington State financial accounting and reporting requirements. 4. Proposed software will support government fund accounting, including the ability to distribute costs directly to fund and sub-fund through payroll, accounts payable, purchasing and journal entries. 5. Proposed software solution will be compatible with the City's technical environment. 6. Proposed software solution will have strong query, data extraction, drilldown and reporting features. 7. Proposed software solution will allow distribution of functions out to the users including, but not limited to, timekeeping, budget development, purchasing and accounts receivable. 8. Proposed software solution will support a complex benefits model, with self- enrollment features for employees. 9. Proposed software solution will provide a single point of entry for Human Resources and Payroll data. 10. Proposed software solution is integrated to minimize interface requirements. 11. Proposed software solution will have the ability to deliver rich functionality and usability. Summary of Project Activities 1. Developed city requirements by interviewing staff. 2. Documented current business processes. 3. Performed research on products available. 4. Wrote a comprehensive Request for Proposals (RFP). 5. The RFP was released to vendors on July 30, 1999. 6. The City received 15 responses to the RFP. 7. The RFP responses were scored by city staff and references were checked. 8. Top four vendors were announced on September 16, 1999. They were • J.D. Edwards, • SAP, • Bi-Tech, and _ 0 Ross. 9. Each vendor spent four days demonstrating their product to city staff using detailed demonstration scripts prepared by the project team. Over 35 city staff participated in the demonstrations from October 12, 1999 through November 5, 1999 and provided feedback to the project team. 10. On November 10, 1999 the project steering committee removed Ross from consideration. 11. Additional reference checking was performed. 12. Project team members visited reference sites during December 1999 and at the end of February 2000: • City of Phoenix,AZ; City of Victoria, TX and King County for SAP • City of Culver City, CA and the City of Fort Collins, CO for JD Edwards. 13. The project steering committee made a decision on December 27, 1999 to move ahead focusing on JD Edwards as the top vendor but not removing SAP or Bi-Tech from official consideration. 14. Project planning and preparation continues. We met with representatives from JD Edwards and from AMX, the proposed implementation vendor, on February 3rd and 4`�', 2000 to create project scope documents which will be used to determine final costs. These documents will also be key exhibits in the final contract. JD Edwards JD Edwards has been referred to as a"Tier 1 '/2"player in the industry. Their new product is called OneWorld, and their prior product line was called World. The World product was extensive and was highly regarded in the industry, but it was not competitive across all computing platforms. OneWorld is truly a multi-platform product, and it is our belief that JD Edwards is now being seen as a Tier 1 player. Washington State Public Sector Implementations of JD Edwards • Kitsap County • Puget Sound Transit • King County Library System Other Public Sector Implementations of JD Edwards • Fort Collins, CO • Culver City, CA • Huntington Beach, CA • Santa Monica, CA • Oceanside, CA • Moreno Valley, CA • Douglas County, CO • Orlando, FL • Danbury, CT • Washtenaw County, MI • Sheboygan County,WI • Outagamie County, WI • Utah Transit Authority Report on JD Edwards prepared for Fort Collins, CO N- The source of the following is a 1997 report from an independent consulting firm called TMG to the City of Fort Collins, Colorado as Fort Collins was evaluating vendors and products for their Finance/HR/Payroll systems. TMG used a variety of industry expert sources to prepare their report. • Founded in 1977 J.D. Edwards is a privately held corporation that has been in business for 20 years. As a privately held company it maintains a low-profile while successfully developing and implementing its Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) product suite. Industry analysts note that while the company is ahead of its competitors in many areas it does not adequately market or sell itself and its accomplishments. As a result, in spite of its numerous strengths it has recognized a slower growth rate than its competitors. • Historically the high-end market serving very large enterprises has been dominated by SAP,and PeopleSoft and to a lessor extent Oracle and Baan. The middle market has many players with J.D. Edwards identified as a middle market leader. • Within the middle market J.D. Edwards net revenues in 1996 totaled $478 million which were greater than two of its high-end market competitors including PeopleSoft at$450 million. In fact J.D. Edwards is the third largest enterprise application vendor behind SAP and Oracle. • J.D. Edwards provides a multi-tiered architecture with a data base server, an applications server, a web server,and the desktop client.The architecture has received excellent architectural and performance reviews. • The J.D. Edwards solution is totally web-enabled allowing the deployment of Java based applications across the Internet. • The J.D. Edwards product suite utilizes a fully integrated and complete technology infrastructure from the application,to the middleware, to the utilities. This means that the City will receive a total upgrade of all solution components with every new release of the product. • The J.D. Edwards product is fully integrated across all subsystems from the Financials to HR/Payroll. This is visible in drill downs, and the seamless navigation across subsystems. • The J.D. Edwards software features cross-validation rules within its subsystems. This means that entries created in AP or AR,for example,will always be valid before posting is made to the General Ledger. • From a technology perspective the J.D. Edwards solution wins hands down. The use of a multi-tiered architecture, an object oriented design,fully web-enabled, and a fully integrated product design place this solution at the top of the list. Industry material was very positive across the board with J.D. Edwards. • J.D. Edwards provides world class administrative and financial systems with the majority of their installations across their complete suite of products, including HR/ Payroll. • J.D. Edwards provides best practices for specific industries including the public sector and has embedded them into the product. • Almost 90%of companies using J.D. Edwards would recommend their software package,this compares to an industry average of 69%. They appear to be a well managed company with excellent products and a loyal and happy customer base. • Industry analysts recommend considering J.D. Edwards if you are: ➢ A medium sized organization; ➢ Looking for a complete integrated product suite(the industry term is ERP, Enterprise Resource Planning); Wanting to move to client/server; > In one of their primary target markets which includes public sector. Budget The budget for the Finance/HR/Payroll (ERP System) project will come from many areas of the Technology Plan. My plan is to create a special project budget line item after the purchase takes place. The special project budget will draw from a variety of areas of the Technology Plan, including Business Systems(software). Following is some information related to the proposals we received. We received 15 responses to our RFP and proposal costs varied substantially: Initial costs for the 15 proposing vendors, including software purchase, installation, and first year service costs ranged from$994,504 to$5,268,901. When we added in operating costs for years two through five, the five year project costs (exclusive of hardware and database licensing)ranged from$1,148,723 to$6,093,245. Initial costs for the top 4 vendors ranged from $994,504 to $2,391,864. Five year project costs for these vendors ranged from $1,423,991 to$2,938,518. Please regard these figures as preliminary indicator of project costs in terms of software and implementation costs. We are heavily engaged in contract negotiation and cost review at this time. My estimate for FULL project costs, including hardware, database, software and implementation is in the range of $3,200,000. This will include the initial project costs but not the ongoing support costs for beyond the implementation phase. Our overall Technology Plan budget was $12.8 million. Our balance as of May 14, 2000 was$6.01 million. This project has always been expected to be the single most expensive project for the 1998—2000 Technology Plan. Summary After a comprehensive system requirements and selection process,JD Edwards has emerged as the vendor of choice for the City of Kent's Finance/HR/Payroll system. We look forward to providing you with other details of this project along with more details as to why JD Edwards is the vendor of choice, and a discussion of the project status at the moment. s Update : Finance/HR/Payroll System Selection Presentation to Council March 21, 2000 Marty Mulholland, Director of Information Services Sue Lester, ERP Project Manager Today's Messages • Key decision for the city • Rigorous selection process • Up-to-the-minute project status i Finance/HR/Payroll Today Annual Finance Annual HR Statistics Annual Payroll Statistics - -750 regular employees Statistics - -$100 million operating - -310 temporary - 24 pay period budget employees - -850 paychecks/time - -$130 million projects budget - 10 bargaining units/ sheets per pay period - -300 capital projects employee groups _ -1300 W-2s - -190 grants - -6,000 job applications - -210 different - -8,000 vendors - -80 recruitments deductions - Over 4,500 fixed assets - -100 new hires - -80 different types of - Over 36,000 vendor invoices earnings - Over 15,000 purchase orders Finance Functions HR Functions Payroll Functions - General Ledger - Employee Master - Employee Payroll - Accounts Payable - Benefits Data - Budget - Applicant Tracking - Leave Management g - Position Control - Time Entry - Accounts Receivable _ Performance Evaluations - Earnings - Purchasing - Classification/Compensation - Deductions - Projects and Grants - Training - Processing I - Fixed Assets - Risk Management Calculations Employee Relations - Payroll History - Revenue Receipting - Reporting Note: Functions in yellow and italics are currently not automated Selection Process RFP RFP i Short Top Preparation Process List r ] - Extensive - Sent to 51 - Bi-Tech,JD Edwards, -JD Edwards is the market research organizations Ross,SAP top vendor - Meetings with - Encouraged tier 1 - 4 days of scripted - Conducted vendors and tier 2 vendors to demonstrations for extensive,in-depth - 74 city staff bid each vendor research interviewed,all - 27 vendors at pre- - Over 35 city staff - Visited vendor departments proposal conference participated in headquarters - Current - 15 RFP responses demonstrations,scored - Conducted two day business received representing vendors and provided planning session processes defined 10 software feedback - Began contract -Defined key packages' - Ross removed from discussions objectives - 24 city staff consideration after - SAP and Bi-Tech - 182 page RFP involved in scoring demos still options written -Top 4 vendors - extensive reference selected based on checks scores - 5 site visits to public sector customers 'Software packages bid: Agresso,Bi-Tech,Eden,JD Edwards, Lawson Software,Oracle,PeopleSoft,Ross,SAP,SCT Why JD Edwards? Top 7 Reasons 7 - Lower training costs compared to other products 6 - Improve decision making 5 - Improve flexibility 4 - Improve efficiency 3 - Improve responsiveness 2 - Improve accountability 1 - A good long term investment Technology Plan millions Budget Review $12.8 Remaining Objectives($2.8) $10.0 Finance/HR/Payroll Systems($3.2) $6.8 Year 2000.Trainine,Fiber Optics.Other Business Systems Planning,Consulting,Staffing Minicomputers&Servers PCs,Software,E-mail Telephone Systems Network Expenditures to Date Estimated Estimated Project Activities After �Now�� Contracts Implementation Implementation - Contract - Software - Project team training _ Operations mode negotiations - Software - Software p - Project budget - On-going support 1 9 maintenance configuration and of users - Training - Implementation testing - Project staffin - New software 1 9 services - Conversion of data releases - Infrastructure - Hardware - Report and interface _ Re ulato requirements development g ry - Chart of Accounts -Presented to - Redesign business changes to software - Reporting needs council for processes - On-going training - Interface - Implement approval - Design training additional features requirements program - Test scripts - City staff training - Data conversions - "Go live" Summary • The City needs new finance/HR/payroll systems • These systems are very important to the city • We have conducted a thorough, comprehensive selection process • We have funding to support the project • We will be coming back to council when contract negotiations are complete • city of NDUM MEMORA February 29,2000 TO: Kent City Councilmembers FROM: Dena Laurent Government Affairs Manager SUBJECT: Target Issues on Regional Governance and Leadership il Retreat, fied Regional Governance and Leadership as a At you 1999 Counc you identi moderate priority target issue. As part of that discussion e prepared an issue paper , w outlining potential work items around addressing this issue. The purpose of this memo is to outline actions we've taken on those items and how we're working to address regional issues. We have also attached two packets of information (Attachments C and D) prepared by Suburban Cities Association staff that do an excellent job of summarizing the regional bodies and issues. We hope this information will provide a backdrop for further rkshop. During that discussion, we are interested discussion at your March 7 Council Wo in soliciting your feedback and further direction regarding this approach. Target Issue Report Action Items--Grouped �— 1. Intergovernmental Bodies ✓ Conduct an inventory of local, regional, county, state and national bodies with opportunities for local government representatives to ZD give input on issues affecting Kent. Inventory City staff and elected official participation in these bodies. Local bodies: City Boards and Commissions, School District and Chamber committees, citizen committees and local service clubs. The Mayor, all Councilmembers and many staff serve as liaisons and members of many of these groups. Regional and County bodies: These are best inventoried along with current membership in an SCA chart (Attachment A). Mayor White and Councilmembers Epperly, Clark and Brotherton serve on regional/county bodies. Several staff also serve on regional/county bodies including Chief Ed Crawford, Gary Gill (Public Works) and Lt. Curt Lutz (Corrections). Many staff also attend and/or are members of numerous regional, county and sub-county groups around their staff function (i.e., police chiefs, planning, human services) and/or specific regional issues (i.e. the Endangered Species Act, regional watersheds). State and National bodies: Bodies at this level include the Association of Washington Cities and the National League of Cities. The City is a member of each of these bodies and City elected officials periodically attend meetings. Councilmembers can run for election to the AWC Board of Directors which meets several times a year. They can also request appointment to Boards and Committees of the National League of Cities. Staff are also members of national organizations related to their profession(i.e. International Association of Chiefs of Police, International City/County Management Association). 2. Issues before Intergovernmental Bodies ✓ Identify current and future issues to be considered by these bodies which may affect Kent. ✓ Prepare an intergovernmental briefing document on these bodies, issues and participants. ✓ Present the briefing document to the City Council. Receive Council input on issues and bodies of interest. Determine Council desire for future participation, information and briefings. Determine desired communication feedback from participants back to Council and staff and implement. Local Bodies: The issues before these groups vary. Issues before City Boards and Commissions often come to the City Council as policy items. The issues before citizen groups, committees and clubs also vary and are sometimes reported in the local media. Issues before these bodies include: school district bonds and levies, the performing arts center, workforce, trade, athletics, the arts, traffic safety, freight mobility, diversity, responsible government and community service. Regional/County Bodies: Issues before these bodies are well charted in an SCA graph (Attachment B) and are described in the SCA reports. State/National Bodies: We bring state issues to you through the annual legislative agenda and session updates. National issues are offered to you through national League of Cities publications and conferences. Some issues, such as pipeline safety are supported through correspondence from the Mayor's Office. 3. Staff Role ✓ Provide staff support for Council serving on regional, state and national bodies. ✓ Consider formation of staff level intergovernmental affairs cabinet with monthly meetings. Cabinet would assist in development of regional affairs report at Council workshops. 1 ✓ Continue on current schedule for development and adoption of state legislative agenda. Consider adoption of federal legislative agenda. Staffing for elected officials serving on regional, state and national bodies varies by body and issue. We always try to provide staff support on Council request. After much discussion, we have chosen to organize staff collaboration on regional affairs on an issue by issue basis. For example, we have an interdepartmental "fish team" that meets monthly to discuss ESA issues. We had an interdepartmental team that met weekly during the siting of Kent Sound Transit Station. Intergovernmental staff have been meeting with traffic staff to evaluate the impact of various Metro service cut proposals. Many issues are also discussed at the weekly Leadership Team meetings. We find that while this more "decentralized, ad hoc" approach is more efficient, bringing together the precise players needed for the time needed rather than requiring a meeting to share or request information. We advise continuing on the current schedule for adoption of the State Legislative Agenda. We have requested some advice regarding the timing, scope and effectiveness of adopting a federal legislative agenda. 4. Council Opportunities for Election/Appointment to Bodies ✓ Ensure Council workshop briefings include notification of upcoming opportunities for election, appointment or participation in bodies of interest. Much of this information is provided to Council via mail from the individual bodies. In general, SCA elections are in May/June and their appointments to regional/county committees is in December/January. AWC Board elections are in June with nominations accepted before that for the Board positions which are open. Nominations for NLC appointments made by AWC occur in the fall. We will ensure information we receive on these opportunities is provided to Council. 5. Council Involvement Required ✓ Receive intergovernmental briefing document and presentation ✓ Determine bodies and issues of interest, desired level and methods of communication ✓ Consider any policy issues raised by intergovernmental bodies ✓ For Councilmembers choosing/selected to serve on intergovernmental bodies: become knowledgeable on the issues, commit to regular meeting attendance, collaborate with support staff, communicate back to staff and Council on body's actions. The question here is whether this course of activity achieves the level of regional governance and leadership you had in mind when making this as a moderate priority target issue. We are committed to providing information on intergovernmental issues, especially those with policy implications. We do this by memo and in your committee meetings. We look forward to your feedback on this question. W IT E LY PU�> STATE� X LA E � - a , SPECIAL SESSION—The Legislature entered its first week of special session, prompted by the inability to agree on Supplemental Operating and Transportation budgets that will need to respond to Initiative 695 in some fashion. It was not a breakthrough week on the budget and very little business was done in week 1 —publicly(See below for House budget breakthrough). 695 COURT RULING—AND LEGISLATIVE RESPONSE: In a 28-page ruling issued last Wednesday, King County Superior Court Judge Robert Alsdorf declared as unconstitutional certain provisions of 695, including its attention to more than one subject and its voter referendum provisions on taxes, fees, all `monetary charges.' The case is under appeal to the State Supreme Court, which has pledged to take up the matter expeditiously—perhaps by June. While Alsdorf did not specifically preclude continuation of the "$30 car tab"provision of 695, both parties of the Legislature rushed to re-codify this aspect of the Initiative. The State Senate on Friday, by a 39-9 vote, passed Senate Bill 6865,the title of which is "Replacing Vehicle Excise Taxes with a Fixed License Fee." The no votes were cast by Sens. Lisa Brown, D- Spokane, Darlene Fairley, D-Lake Forest Park, Lorraine Wojahn, D-Tacoma, Margarita Prentice, D-Renton, Karen Fraser, D-Olympia, and Seattle Democrats Ken Jacobsen, Adam Kline, Jeanne Kohl-Welles, and Pat Thibaudeau. Nearly all are from districts which voted against 695 in the first place; Wojahn is retiring. Incidentally,the House is expected to act quickly to approve SB 6865 —and already had in place its oven similar bill, FIB 3160. Meanwhile, a 695-response issue which is playing along partisan lines involves whether to codify the `vote on all new taxes and fees' portion of 695. GOP members strongly believe this should be re-codified, and in the House had proposed HB 3161, which re-codified most of the voter- requirement provisions of 695, except that the bill keeps it to all new taxes and discards the fee and `monetary charge' portions. Democrats in the Senate and House, and Governor Locke, strongly oppose this step, believing the matter needs more study and the State Supreme Court needs to be given a chance to address and rule on the issue. Look for the voter-requirement matter to become a major Campaign 2000 issue with state legislative races. HOUSE BUDGET COMING OUT SOON? (YES, WE THINK): It appears a unified House Democrat-Republican budget will be shared with members as early as today and made public on Tuesday. House Appropriations staff was directed to work through last weekend—another sign the budget is near. CONTENT OF BUDGET—OPERATING: The unified House budget, when it comes out tomorrow, will have approximately $49 million in 1-695 'backfill' funding for cities. This is up from the $32.1 million in the prior House Democratic budget—but less than the $66 million package offered in SSB 6404. The budget will contain an $80 million spending provision for Sound Transit—in either the form of a tax credit or a direct appropriation. Sound Transit had aggressively lobbied for a$214 million tax credit over 6 years to extend light rail to Northgate and make a series of other capital investments(including the Kent comuter rail parking garage)— with the House Democratic Budget granting the tax credit and the Senate Budget not providing it. The $80 million would appear to be a compromise gesture. CONTENT OF UNIFIED HOUSE BUDGET—TRANSPORTATION: It appears that the unified House budget would make these investments: • Transit `bridge' funding for one year- $80 million. This is the same level of bridge finding as had been in the House Democratic Budget. It would include approximately $33-36 million for METRO, unless changes have been made. METRO's `bridge'amount in Hoarse vs. Senate is pretty close. • Freight Mobility Funding- $43 million for I I projects, three more than the 8 directly funded in the Senate budget. One of these is the 277"' Street project in Auburn; House also advertises its budget as having $3 million more for Tukwila's 1801h Street project. • A significant level of bonding for transportation highway/road projects. While the Transportation Improvement Board (TIB) request of$100 million in additional bonding capacity was not granted, there is enough general bonding authority to assist TIB projects as well (up to $800 million compared with $560 million in the Senate). • The unified House budget would also restore Freight Mobility Strategic Investment Board funding reductions;NOT use $10 million in Public Works Trust Fund money for a Columbia River channel-deepening project; use more underlying funding sources for debt service; and have less cuts to the Washington State Patrol operations. "TWO LINES" WATER BILL—NEW VERSION: Another special session topic is the so- called `two lines' bill for processing of water rights—authorizing the Department of Ecology, under a series of pre-stated conditions, to expedite water rights changes and transfers ahead of new water rights. SSB 6525,the two-lines bill as amended by Rep. Gary Chandler, R-Moses Lake, in the House, cleared the House on the Final day of the regular session and was within minutes of clearing the Senate—but members of the Senate ultimately felt the bill had been moved too quickly without enough due process and review. A new bill draft makes more explicit the fact that Water Conservancy Boards would not have any additional authority. GOVERNOR BEGINS SIGNING BILLS INTO LAW—Governor Locke has begun the process of signing policy bills into law. 33 House and Senate bills have been signed into law. Most of them have little or no direct bearing on cities. One of them, however, was House Bill 2851, increasing the maximum state share for flood-control projects from 50 percent to 75 percent. The bill attempts to remedy the fact that the current matching-fund provisions slanted available dollars much more to planning documents than to projects. One other bill which was signed, Engrossed Substitute House Bill 2589, clarifies the conditions under which private parties may qualify for state salmon-recovery funding. A number of other bills still await Governor Locke's signature. Among them are two off of our Kent agenda: HB 2505, making the City eligible to use a 10-year property-tax exemption as a tool and incentive for multi-unit housing in areas where it is currently lacking; and HB 2397,to strengthen the Local Government Fiscal Note process.