3:36 PM: A short time ago, the Seattle City Council unanimously passed a resolution supporting the idea of a “high-earner income tax,” co-sponsored by West Seattle/South Park Councilmember Lisa Herbold and Council President Bruce Harrell. Since it was a resolution, not legislation, all this means is that they like the idea – nothing actually happens until and unless a bill is drafted and approved. The resolution sets a goal of making that happen by mid-summer.

If you’re interested in more information about what could and might happen, a group called Trump-Proof Seattle has a town-hall meeting this Thursday in West Seattle – not a city-convened event, but Councilmember Herbold will be there – 6 pm May 4th, at Olympic Hall on the South Seattle College (WSB sponsor) campus. That organization is proposing a tax it says would be “affecting only the wealthiest 5% of households … 1.5% on income in excess of $250K.” The council resolution expresses support of that, but city legislation has yet to be drafted, and “legal viability” is a big question. We’ll update this report later with video from this afternoon’s meeting.

3:51 PM: Video now added above.

So you’ve probably heard by now that former Mayor Mike McGinn wants that title again. He announced it this morning with this tweet:

… and then invited reporters to his Greenwood home at midmorning to find out more. (We were on the list but couldn’t go. Pick your favorite citywide source for details.)

Though citywide media has focused on just a few candidates, even before McGinn’s announcement, nine campaigns were registered with the city Ethics and Elections Commission. They are, in alphabetical order, with links to campaign websites when we could find them, so you can learn a bit about who they are and what they want to do:

Casey Carlisle
David Ishii
Mary Juanita Martin
Ed Murray (incumbent)
Nikkita Oliver
Jason Roberts
Andres Solomon
Alex Tsimerman
Keith Whiteman

None listed a West Seattle address with the city, at least for the campaign. The two who don’t seem to have websites, Ishii and Martin, also ran in 2013; Ishii dropped out before the primary, in which Martin received 1.06% of the vote, far behind Murray with 30% and McGinn with 29% (in the 2013 general, Murray won with 52% to McGinn’s 47%).

While those listed above have registered their campaigns, the official candidacy-filing period is still four weeks away – to get onto the August 1st primary ballot, candidates will have to file with King County during the week of May 15 through 19. Top two vote-getters in the primary advance to the November 7th general.

By Tracy Record
West Seattle Blog editor

The 34th District Democrats‘ forum for Seattle City Council Position 8 had a winner – but did not result in an endorsement, for now.

The forum, billed as a “showdown,” was the almost-three-hour meeting’s main event, though U.S. Rep. Pramila Jayapal‘s appearance – which punctuated the candidates’ forum, because of her time constraints – brought down the house. So we’ll start with her – here’s our video:

Rep. Jayapal said the Democrats are not a “minority party” but rather an “opposition party” right now. She explained that the transition into her new role has been easier than she expected because the focus has been on immigration and health care, two issues she has long worked on. She also talked about the health-care bill that was scrapped, calling it really “a tax bill” with tax breaks for the richest Americans that at one point carried a “trillion dollars” in breaks. “It was really hard to sit there in committee and hear about all these people who ‘didn’t deserve to have health care’.” While she hailed the victory in getting the bill pulled, “don’t think that it’s over,” she warned, and said that goes for other issues, such as privatizing Social Security. She said she’s signed onto the “Medicare for All” bill. And she said that it’s important to “fix what needs to be fixed.” Overall, our area is “the moral conscience of the country,” she declared. But she also said there are some Republicans “who want to work on immigration reform” so there is some hope on that issue, “working on a proactive solution as well as all the things that we are fighting against.”

Regarding the Syrian situation, “it was unconstitutional for the president to do what he did with that strike … You cannot bomb your way to peace; that is my belief. … We were all devastated by the images we saw, but if you care about those kids,” let refugees in, she said. She also criticized the proposed budget for “cut(ting) everything that you care about.” She said an “educational campaign” is planned to explain to people what’s in the budget. “It’s a horrible horrible budget for all of us, for the entire United States.” Overall, she urged people, “stay engaged … As a longtime organizer, I believe that strength emerges in times of crisis … We are in a fight for the soul of this country.” It was noted that she has a Town Hall on Vashon Island tomorrow night (“and we already have an overflow room!” someone pointed out).

Last but not least, Rep. Jayapal delighted the locals by saying she is hoping to move to West Seattle within the next six months – which means, she pointed out, she will officially live in the 7th District. (She currently lives just outside its boundaries, in Columbia City.)

Now, to the forum for Seattle City Council Position 8, the at-large position that has no incumbent because Councilmember Tim Burgess is not running for re-election. Read More

3:36 PM: One month after County Executive Dow Constantine proposed a sales-tax increase to pay for increased arts/culture access, the County Council’s budget chair says he’s shelved it. South King County-representing Councilmember Dave Upthegrove pulled the proposal from the agenda for a committee meeting tomorrow, “effectively killing” it, according to a subsequent news release, which quotes Upthegrove as saying, “This is the wrong proposal at the wrong time. As currently configured, the funding is distributed in an unfair manner that hurts, rather than helps, our efforts to achieve equity.” He says he’d be willing to reconsider it next year.

5:16 PM: Responding to our request for comment from or on behalf of Constantine, Deputy County Executive Sung Yang told WSB that the executive is not giving up hope of getting it onto the August ballot. He noted that three councilmembers co-sponsored it, and that there’s still time to take action by May 1st to let voters decide its fate in August.

Both at-large (citywide) positions on the Seattle City Council will be on the ballot this fall. One – Position 9 – has an incumbent, West Seattle resident Councilmember Lorena González, and two challengers so far. The other – Position 8 – is open, since Councilmember Tim Burgess isn’t running for re-election. So far, 10 people have filed to run for that seat, and you can see and hear from all 10 of them at Wednesday night’s 34th District Democrats meeting. An endorsement vote is expected afterward. The organization also is scheduled to hear from 7th Congressional District U.S. Rep. Pramila Jayapal. Tomorrow night’s meeting starts at 6:30 pm (program @ 7) at The Hall at Fauntleroy (9131 California SW).

P.S. Everybody campaigning for city offices so far this year is listed here.

Tuesday morning, King County Executive Dow Constantine watched Bertha’s breakthrough with other VIPs at the north end of the future Highway 99 tunnel. Tuesday night in West Seattle, he launched his second re-election campaign. Here’s what he told the crowd:

(WSB photos and video by Leda Costa)

As you can hear about 11 and a half minutes in, the event at The Hall at Fauntleroy drew protesters as well as supporters. Some held signs outside.

For months, there’s been a campaign to try to convince Constantine to cancel a county project that includes a new youth-detention center. He issued a statement two months ago saying “zero youth detention” is a goal to work toward, but the project, approved by voters five years ago, is proceeding. (As you can hear in the video, his speech also addressed the issue before the interruption, saying his administration had been reducing “disproportionality” in the system.)

Meantime, his second re-election campaign since moving from the County Council to the Executive position in 2009 is starting without anyone actively campaigning against him so far – the main opponents he cited last night were the Republicans in the White House and Congress. “The last seven years have seen some challenges and some successes,” he said. “But the next four years … are going to be a fight.” Even without an opponent, the state Public Disclosure Commission website shows he’s raised $1.1 million in campaign contributions.

The official call has gone out this morning for volunteers to serve on the city’s newly created Renters’ Commission. Here’s the announcement:

Established by ordinance in March, the SRC will advise the City on policies and issues of interest to renters citywide.

The Commission is composed of 15 members – six are appointed by City Council, six are appointed by the Mayor, and one position will be filled by a young adult through the Get Engaged program. Two positions are selected by the SRC once established. Commissioners will serve without compensation.

The SRC will consist of people living in an array of rental housing types, including students, low-income renters, LGBTQ renters, people with past felony convictions, people in subsidized housing, and those who have experienced homelessness. It’s also expected that members be geographically representative of Seattle. SRC meetings will be open to the public.

Those interested in being considered should complete the online application by Monday, May 1 by 5 p.m. If you cannot submit the application online, contact Seferiana Day at 206-684-8806 and an application will be mailed to you, or you can pick one up at the Seattle City Council main office – Seattle City Hall, 600 Fourth Avenue, 2nd floor, between 8 a.m. and 5 p.m. You can also learn more on the Seattle Renters’ Commission’s website.

(King County photo: County Councilmembers Jeanne Kohl-Welles, speaking, and Claudia Balducci, with McDermott, Constantine, and Murray)
Elected officials including King County Executive Dow Constantine, Mayor Ed Murray, and County Council Chair Joe McDermott have just announced a new regional collaboration on homelessness. As part of it, the mayor is dropping his proposal to ask Seattle voters for a property-tax increase to raise more money for homelessness-related efforts, and instead, county voters will be asked next year to approve a one-tenth-of-one-percent sales-tax increase. Here’s the full announcement, published as a city news release:

Today, Seattle Mayor Ed Murray and King County Executive Dow Constantine announced a new regional effort to help people experiencing homelessness receive services and access to a permanent home.

Along with city leaders, service providers and All Home, Mayor Murray and Executive Constantine will convene a joint task force to assess needs and resources, and propose a strategy that will get people living unsheltered into permanent homes, keep people in their homes and out of homelessness, and coordinate responses to root causes such as behavioral and mental health and substance use disorders. The scope of the effort reflects the reality that homelessness is a regional crisis, and presents an opportunity for a robust, coordinated response.

The effort would be funded by a 0.1 percent sales tax increase that would go to King County voters in 2018. Seattle, King County and other jurisdictions have been working together closely to address this regional crisis, creating a more coordinated system that focuses on the individual needs of people living outside and that uses a data-driven approach to ensure programs are accomplishing the goal of getting more people into permanent housing. Today’s announcement will lead to increased coordination and accountability, while the City of Seattle continues its work to address other impacts, such as increased trash and needle cleanup.

This region-wide, $68 million per year funding package would replace the previously-proposed, Seattle-only property tax levy.

Read More

Next Wednesday night (March 15th) your phone might ring – and it’ll be your state legislators calling. 34th Legislative District State Sen. Sharon Nelson and Reps. Eileen Cody and Joe Fitzgibbon are holding a “telephone town hall” 6 pm-7 pm that night. Thousands of numbers will be auto-dialed to offer the chance to participate, but if you don’t get the call, today’s announcement says, you can call in by dialing 877-229-8493 and using ID Code 116287. Or, two live-streaming links are promised to be available: Here or here. With the Legislature handling hot topics such as school funding right now, they’re inviting you to join and ask about the issues that matter to you.

Mayor Murray has just concluded his annual State of the City speech, which made history, for starters, simply by the choice of location – Idris Mosque in North Seattle.

The speech concluded as does the Pledge of Allegiance: Vowing “justice for all.”

There were two West Seattle shoutouts – talking about the city’s vibrancy, he mentioned the “bustling evening sidewalks” of The Junction (scripted as “Alaska Way Junction”). And while talking about education and youth programs, he noted the expansion of the South Seattle College (WSB sponsor) 13th-Year Promise program, which offers a free first year of community college for students from certain high schools (in West Seattle, Chief Sealth International High School [added] and soon WSHS).

The big headlines from the speech will no doubt include the two new taxes Murray proposed:

-A $55 million property tax to double the annual spending on homelessness, likely to go to voters in August

-A two-cents-per-ounce tax on “sugar-sweetened beverages” to raise money for education/youth programs – here’s the city-provided infographic on that:

[More info here.]

The proposed property tax was far from everything he said about homelessness. Murray also announced he will be opening the city’s Emergency Operations Center to deal with what he described as the “homelessness disaster.” [More info here.] And he promised to “dramatically increase the clean-up of discarded debris on our sidewalks and streets.”

In his discussion of the HALA Mandatory Housing Affordability rezoning proposals, Murray echoed City Councilmember Rob Johnson‘s recent suggestion that opposing the upzoning is more in line with supporting the President’s policies: “We cannot be a city where people protest the exclusionary agenda coming from Washington, D.C., while at the same time keeping a zoning code in place that does not allow us to build the affordable housing we need.” [More info here.]

We’re adding a few more toplines shortly, and will add the video when it’s ready.

ADDED 3:34 PM: We’ve added some links above, identified with the phrase “more info here,” with additional details about some of the programs/initiatives the mayor anounced. Here’s another one: He announced “Our Best: Seattle’s Commitment to Young Black Men,” described as “the City of Seattle’s first ever initiative focusing specifically on improving life outcomes for young Black men.” [More info here.] He also talked about ongoing efforts to increase police accountability [more info here],

(back to original report) After the jump, the full text of the mayor’s speech, as sent by his office: Read More

By Tracy Record
West Seattle Blog editor

New 34th District Democrats chair David Ginsberg opened his first full meeting – before a standing-room-only-and-spillover-room crowd at The Hall of Fauntleroy – saying, “This gives me hope.”

Ginsberg explained that he ran for chair because, after the presidential election, he wondered what he could do, what he should do. He decided “to stand up and fight. … If we stand together, I have no doubt we will win.” The first thing he and his new executive committee did was organize tonight’s meeting, titled “How To Resist Trump And Protect What We Hold Dear.” (Not only did it bring in new attendees – with the crowd estimated at ~500 – it brought in 85 new members.)

The Pledge of Allegiance, said after the vow, grew in volume on the closing words “… indivisible, with liberty and justice for all,” and was followed by applause.

Centerpiece of the meeting, a five-woman panel representing advocacy groups both new and not-so-new (see their bios here):

Read More

After last year’s uproar over proposed encampment-removal rules that some interpreted as allowing camping in parks and on sidewalks, a new set of rules was promised. Today, the proposal has gone public, and a comment period is open. It’s in four documents, all here as PDFs. The main ones you’ll want to review are these two – first, the proposed removal rules:

Second, these are the proposed Multi-Departmental Administrative Rules:

Click the plus sign to expand the “for public comment: encampment rules” section of this page for commenting info.

It’s been three and a half months since the set of rules that the City Council was working on was basically shelved. The cover page for what’s now on the city website includes this summary:

Compared to the existing rules, the new rules:

*Identify specific criteria for prioritizing the removal of encampments.

*Require the offer of a shelter alternative in order to remove many encampments.

*Require the City to deliver materials it stores from encampments to their owners.

*Streamline the process for removing encampments that obstruct the intended use of public facilities like sidewalks and parks.

We’ll be taking a closer look later but are publishing the documents now so you can read for yourself if interested.

SIDE NOTE: While these rules apply to unauthorized camping, we’re taking this opportunity to remind you about tomorrow night’s West Seattle meeting related to the plan to authorize an existing camp on Myers Way. The meeting is at 7 pm Wednesday (February 1st) at the Joint Training Facility (9401 Myers Way S.)

The City Council usually starts Mondays with a morning briefing, and then gets down to business in the afternoon. Tomorrow morning’s briefing has three topics of interest – not to mention the likelihood they’ll be talking about some of what’s developed since the agenda came out. But just in case you’re interested, the agenda includes a Port of Seattle presentation (the slide deck includes a mention of the Terminal 5 project), an update on the city’s surplus-property disposition process, and the annual report on the Transportation Benefit District (fee/tax to raise money so the city can buy extra Metro service – you’ll see some C Line stats in the slide deck). You can watch live on Seattle Channel (online, or cable 21) starting at 9:30 am.

Trying to get a meeting with City Councilmember Lisa Herbold, like the person who started this WSB Forums thread? If you haven’t already heard via e-mail or via her blog-format website, next Friday brings Herbold’s next “district office hours” event. She’ll be at the Southwest Neighborhood Center (same building as SW Pool), 2801 SW Thistle, on Friday (January 27th), 2-7 pm. “Drop-in friendly” as usual, she says, but if you want to make an appointment, she says you can do that by e-mailing alex.clardy@seattle.gov.

(Photo by @34dems via Twitter)

Our area’s biggest political organization elected new leadership tonight, at its every-two-years reorganization meeting. The 34th District Democrats‘ new chair is David Ginsberg, shown above with Marcee Stone-Vekich, who declined to run for re-election after two 2-year terms. Per prescribed party process, the meeting was convened by the King County Democrats, and then Ginsberg took over after his election.

Two positions were contested: The first to be voted on was state committeeman – incumbent Chris Porter, challenged by Patrick Wicklund; Porter won 43-24.

(Voting in most races involved Precinct Committee Officers – the rules empower them to vote for all positions, while members who aren’t PCOs can only vote for secretary and treasurer.)

Also contested, county committeeman: Les Treall won over David Toledo, 55-12.

The rest of the slate of newly elected officers (asterisk denotes incumbent):

First Vice Chair – Treina Aronson
Second Vice Chair – Michael Taylor-Judd
State Committeewoman – Lisa Plymate*
County Committeewoman – Carrie Alexander
Alternate County Committeewoman – Martha Koester
Alternate County Committeeman – Ted Barker
Secretary – Jason Cheung
Treasurer – Gina Topp

The 34th Dems’ website has bios on those who had declared their candidacy pre-meeting – you can see them here. The group’s next meeting will be 7 pm February 8th at The Hall at Fauntleroy.

ADDED 9:29 PM: One more note from the meeting:

THANKS … to King County Council Chair Joe McDermott and the official @34Dems Twitter feed for info from tonight’s meeting.

(WSB photo, April 2016: Councilmember Herbold during brief break between appointments at a ‘district office hours’ session)

By Tracy Record
West Seattle Blog editor

This week marked the start of Lisa Herbold‘s second year as the first City Councilmember for District 1, West Seattle and South Park – one year since her swearing-in ceremony on January 4, 2016.

As we had done just before she took office, we invited her to sit down with us for an interview.

At the time we talked in December 2015, she had just been declared the winner of a race that had nine candidates on the primary ballot – with even more in the running before that lineup was finalized – and ended with her winning the seat by a 39-vote margin over Shannon Braddock.

Herbold won’t be up for re-election for three years. But we couldn’t resist asking, at the start of our conversation, if she is considering running for the biggest gig on this year’s city ballot.

Read More