Councilmember says she was removed as vice chair; leaders dispute process and cite committee norms

Councilmember Saka told the Seattle City Council on Monday that she was removed as vice chair of the select committee on the comprehensive plan and said the removal occurred without a direct conversation from the council president.

"I was removed as the vice chair of the comprehensive plan committee," Saka said, describing being told of the change through staff while returning from another meeting. She said she was concerned less by the decision than by the process and asked that changes to committee assignments be handled with direct member-to-member conversations to preserve institutional norms.

Saka described a pattern of decisions that she said were disrupting predictability for committee planning, noting the importance of June and July select budget committees that had not yet been approved. She also connected the staffing and scheduling issues to recent efforts to lift a proviso on the transportation levy, which she said could have been delayed if the select budget committee had not met.

Council President Nelson and Councilmember Hollingsworth responded. Hollingsworth said the land-use chair historically leads the comp plan work and that, with the land-use chair now in place and supported by land-use staff, it was appropriate to align the comp plan leadership with the land-use committee. Nelson said scheduling choices were made to publish meeting dates promptly when members were not in their offices; she said there was no deliberate effort to exclude Saka from conversations.

No formal committee assignment vote or council motion was recorded in the briefing. The exchange was a public airing of internal governance concerns and a request for clearer communications around committee role changes.

The council president and other members urged colleagues to avoid extended public back-and-forths and to resolve personnel and leadership questions through direct conversations when possible.