Seattle is shaping a $6.5 million “Green New Deal Opportunity Fund” including big chunks of spending earmarked to upgrade a surprising element of the plan — the city’s libraries.
The Seattle City Council’s Finance and Housing Committee weighed in on the plan Wednesday including $1.7M to fund “electrification, heating, cooling, and air quality upgrades at both the Northeast and Southwest Branches of the Seattle Public Library.”
The fund’s proposals from the 19-member Green New Deal Oversight Board also include $2 million “for engineering analyses and capital costs required to convert affordable housing projects currently in development to fully electrified cooking and climate control systems” and $1.35 million for resiliency projects as part of the Duwamish Valley Program.
The 2022 Green New Deal Opportunity Fund investments will be the first to be funded by proceeds from Jumpstart funds and Seattle’s tax on its largest employers.
A similar funding package will also be shaped in 2023.
Seattle’s Green New Deal effort was formed out of an executive order in 2020 from then-Mayor Jenny Durkan.
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