100-Day Check-In: What Have Councilmembers Lin and Foster Achieved for the South End?

The first 100 days of an elected official's term can set the tone for the rest of their time in office. Seattle City Councilmember Eddie Lin's first 138 days (his term began Nov. 25, 2025) and Councilmember Dionne Foster's first 103 days have taken slightly different paths: Lin has notched several small, achievable legislative wins, whereas Foster has focused on setting herself apart from her predecessor.

Councilmember Lin

"There's just so much to learn, a lot in the first hundred days," Lin told the Emerald after Thursday's special Libraries, Education & Neighborhoods Committee meeting. He continued, "There's [also] been … deep policy work that [my office] just jumped right into."

In the early days of his term, Councilmember Lin sponsored five Council bills that passed, with one currently in committee.

Passed 

• Two companion bills to update the permitting process to make housing development and small and medium-sized business development more efficient, along with supporting transit-oriented projects.

• Two companion bills to extend and permanently adopt Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) regulations on floodplain maps, permitting processes, and flood insurance.

• A bill to align the Seattle Municipal Code with the Keep Washington Working Act, which legislates law-enforcement inquiries into an individual's immigration status.

In Committee

• A bill to repeal an ordinance to allow for residential development in the Stadium Transition Area Overlay District, which was deemed illegal.

Lin says his legislative strategy has been to go after "a lot of little wins," adding, "Somebody did advise me — and this is not necessarily the approach that we're taking, but it does make sense — those little wins are achievable, and they do add up."

Lin expects to get larger legislation passed through the Council, primarily in the Land Use & Sustainability Committee, which he chairs. He also plans to push for "progressive revenues sooner than later … like a local capital gains [tax]," he said.

Councilmember Foster

In her first 100 days, Foster had two bills pass the Council, one regarding Seattle's Social Housing Developer and the other on data privacy.

Passed

• The first bill, co-sponsored with Councilmember Dan Strauss, allows an interlocal agreement between the executive branch and the social housing developer to define how the designated payroll tax will be implemented and how the developer's loans will be repaid to the city. This bill showed a clear difference between Foster and her predecessor, Sara Nelson, who did not support the payroll tax and proposed an alternative that voters rejected. After the passage of the bill, Foster said at the Council dais, "Voters have voted not once, but twice, to reaffirm their commitment to building social housing in Seattle, and as … part of ensuring that the developer is able to do that, we must enter into this interlocal agreement."

• Foster's other bill focused on protecting data for people seeking services from the City. The bill mandates a review of the City's data collection and sharing practices and requests that City departments incorporate privacy standards into future contracting requirements. Foster told the Emerald at the time, "I think it's great to have unanimous support from colleagues … that we [are] ensuring that we do the right thing in keeping people's data safe and secure."