Recent Stories with tag mike mcginn

At 2 p.m. today, despite an afternoon lashed by rain, the City Council chambers at City Hall were standing room only. Mike McGinn officially took office as Mayor of Seattle, with his two daughters reading his oath of office to him. [Video]

In a speech just afterwards, McGinn spoke about how his family has driven his engagement in politics. Noting that the city is facing a deficit, he announced that in taking office, his administration would be freezing salaries for senior-level employees and cutting back the number of the city's executive and managerial employees. (West Seattle Blog has the full release on McGinn's moves.) But he also said that Seattle was ready to put its money where it mattered, as demonstrated by recent support for affordable housing and parks levies, and light rail.

A week of inaugural events is ongoing, with a City Hall reception lasting until 7 p.m. tonight. This Saturday brings a City Hall Open House, and a music festival--with Wheedle's Groove, The Maldives, Hey Marseilles, and Gabriel Teodros--at Showbox SODO that night.

Yesterday alone, if you were reading Seattle's neighborhood blogs, you would have run across Queen Anne's burglaries and break-ins; Beacon Hill Blog's stolen cars, burglaries, and sketchy behavior; and West Seattle's three break-ins. PhinneyWood was feeling exercised about graffiti, but they also reported on the armed robbery at a Ballard Walgreens.

At least anecdotally, it doesn't look like that 22 percent increase in violent crime the first six months of 2009 has subsided. The rise was really led by assaults and robberies, with a smaller increase in property crimes (burglary and other theft). The news of workaday burglaries and break-ins continues unabated, with occasional stand-outs, like clock thievery, drawing attention.

Seattle Crime's Jonah Spangenthal-Lee, taking the long view, argues that if Seattle really did just enjoy a 40-year low in crime rates, a regression to the mean doesn't indicate anyone or thing is to blame. But his "Morning Blotter" post begins: "Burglars will steal ANYTHING," and yesterday's blotter contained a story about a man who claims a gang threatened to shoot him if he didn't rob a store in Northgate. So once again, statistics provide cold comfort.

The Seattle Times op-ed pages also contain a "parsing the crime stats" piece with "sobering reality checks." I'm not sure that I agree with the "parsing" that leads to this statement: "Nationwide, violent crime and property crimes have decreased. So what explains Seattle's uptick? One answer readily given by criminologists is that crime tends to rise during tough economic times." (That would not explain Seattle's uptick, would it? I can't think the Times editorial board means to argue that Seattle alone is experiencing tough economic times.)...

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"Here's the way I see it," said our legal correspondent over lunch, "the City Council sends a representative to the state legislature and asks that municipalities be given the choice to opt out of state enforcement." We were talking about legalizing marijuana, but not from any personal interest. (I prefer a smoky Scotch.) We were looking for "new revenue" responses to the state's fiscal crisis.

Raising property taxes is a nonstarter. Upping sales taxes is not only infeasible politically, but leaves the state dangerously dependent on consumer confidence. No one but budget policy wonks is still pushing an income tax. But there is a huge hole in the state budget that is cutting into essential services, and the future only looks to bring reassessed, post-bubble property values.

In Olympia, the political will for decriminalization is almost there--in Seattle, it's already been elected. Mayor-elect Mike McGinn told KUOW recently that "We recognize that, like alcohol, it's something that should be regulated not treated as a criminal activity and I think that's where the citizens of Seattle want us to go." ("Legalize marijuana and tax it" is the number two entry on the Ideas for Seattle website.)

On December 14, the Seattle City Council unanimously passed a resolution in support of SB 5615 and HB 1177, bills decriminalizing possession of small amounts of marijuana, which were introduced by Sen. Jeanne Kohl-Welles and Rep. Dave Upthegrove.

"We support reclassifying possession of small amounts of marijuana from a misdemeanor to a civil infraction," is the Council's word on the matter (video), putting possession in the realm of jaywalking in terms of public safety priorities. Under Kohl-Welles bill, possession would draw a fine of $100, but no jail time.

Wrote the senator in an op-ed: "Our state Office of Financial Management reported annual savings of $16 million and $1 million in new revenue if SB 5615 passes. Of that $1 million, $590,000 would be earmarked for the Washington State Criminal Justice Treatment Account to increase support of our underfunded drug treatment and prevention services."

State Rep. Mary Lou Dickerson takes it even further, reports Publicola:

Dickerson wants Washington farmers to grow pot and sell it in our state’s liquor stores. The revenue, she says, will go to pay for drug and alcohol treatment programs (and to cover the WSLCB’s costs for adding the new product to its shelves.) She estimates the revenues from pot sales would be similar to booze sale revenues, which are currently at $330 million.

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"Squirrel Mural" courtesy of The SunBreak Flickr pool member Great Beyond

The Greenwood arsonist may turn out to be...an arsonist. Seattle police have collared a 46-year-old homeless man with a long history of setting fires. The Seattle Times also reports that while there have been 17 arson-related fires in Greenwood in the past two months, there have been 68 in the past two years. Sleepy little Greenwood was wide awake--hundreds of residents and business owners packed an arson meeting earlier in the week, and a reward of $25,000 was offered.

Mayoral candidate Mike McGinn broke out the whiteboard and YouTube to update Seattle on his transition plans. One side effect may be ruffling Redmond feathers: McGinn is soliciting your input via Google Docs, famously uses an iPhone, and now his staff wants to use Macs, not PCs. Former Seattle-Times political reporter, current-Vulcan-PR-guy David Postman is advising McGinn on transition communications--Publicola commenters fear the worst.

Commercial real estate news continued to go down like a doubleshot of skunk-infused castor oil. The Mastro bankruptcy isn't going to be amicably settled. Calculated Risk calculated that 25 percent of Washington banks were "troubled," and Seattle Bubble noted that in terms of assets, not just institutions, 38 percent of the in-state lending market is held by "troubled" banks....

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Mayor Mike McGinn

When the Seattle mayoral election was finally decided last night, after King County Elections dutifully counted up the votes, Joe Mallahan graciously conceded, and Governor Gregoire announced she was looking forward to working with the new mayor.

It sounded like business as usual, but Mike McGinn’s election was the biggest upset victory in Seattle politics in more than three decades. This was the 1980 U.S. hockey team over the Soviets, Truman over Dewey, David versus Goliath. It was an epic long shot and it shakes Seattle politics to its very core.

Seattle is no Chicago, but we have our own version of the political machine. Business, plus labor, plus the Democratic Party equals victory.

Mallahan won endorsements from state Democrats, the Governor, the Seattle Chamber of Commerce and its political arm the Alki Foundation, big business and labor. McGinn won the election.

Mallahan outspent McGinn by a 3.5-to-1 margin. Mallahan loaned his own campaign about as much as McGinn received in total. McGinn won the election.

Now, Seattle’s traditional powers-that-be are scrambling to figure out just how it all happened. All the money, all the powerbrokers, and all the political muscle didn’t deliver the knockout punch. There are all sorts of theories.

McGinn was helped by Mallahan’s complete ineffectiveness in debates. Mallahan struggled to get two thoughts together in a coherent fashion. In nearly every debate, he bobbled the easiest questions and completely missed on the major issues. The fact that McGinn’s lead increased as the counting went on suggests that the late voters broke for him, not Mallahan. Seems the longer Joe talked, the less people liked what they heard.

McGinn won the election just the way he said he did, by talking to people and by listening to people. He won by energizing his supporters with a message of common sense and a determination to fight for change....

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"Taillights through the rain" courtesy of The SunBreak Flickr pool member Great Beyond

As of Friday evening, mayoral candidate Mike McGinn was looking like a winner, with a lead of 2,384 votes over Joe Mallahan. This makes the news of 860 ballots found in a ballot drop box with a vandalized lock less earth-shattering. In general, the election results were pleasing for King County's right-thinking lefties, with R-71's "everything but marriage" approved, I-1033's "government-spending straitjacket" rejected, and Prop. 1's "homelesss housing" passing handily even in a recession.

On the same day as the police procession to honor slain Seattle police office Timothy Brenton, just as his memorial at Key Arena ended, in fact, police confronted a "person of interest" in the shooting of officer Brenton, who was shot by police after drawing a handgun. (Monfort's now in critical condition.) The Seattle Times reports that bomb-making materials, linking Christopher Monfort to the October 22 pipe-bombing of SPD patrol cars, have been found in his apartment. Seattlepi.com worked up their own profile.

Arson flared up twice in Greenwood, making a total of seven arson-related fires over the past few months. Just two weeks ago, four Greenwood businesses were burnt out. This time, the businesses were an accountant's office and a guitar shop....

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Mayoral candidate Mike McGinn hung on to his slim lead overnight, and even gained a few votes, leading Joe Mallahan by 515 votes. Yesterday he was up by 462. Over 131,000 votes have been counted, and it is unlikely that the remaining ballots contain a surprise Mallahan victory.

It's a squeaker! Mike McGinn still leads Joe Mallahan, but by just 462 votes. City Council races are not so close: Richard Conlin, Sally Bagshaw, Nick Licata, and Mike O'Brien all have comfortable leads over their rivals. Pete Holmes has still soundly thrashed Tom Carr in the city attorney's race. Full results are here. More updating this time tomorrow, and tomorrow, and tomorrow, until the last syllable of recorded time. I don't agree with Susan Hutchison on that much, but waiting for all the mail-in ballots to arrive is anti-climactic.

Shot of the Dow Constantine election party around 10:30 p.m., by Seth Kolloen

As SunBreak editor Seth Kolloen continues making his way through the detritus of 101 election night parties in Seattle, I've returned home to the comforts of hot tea and cats to bask in the warm glow of a good night. While the verdict is still out on both the mayoral race and Referendum 71, Seattleites can at least half-relax in the knowledge that they've done well tonight.

The success of the Mike O'Brien-Pete Holmes-Mike McGinn ticket (should McGinn's lead hold) is good news for Seattle, and not just because I agree with their policies. And the groundwork for their success was laid over the last decade, by a dedicated core of activists who nearly (or actually) burned themselves out fighting the prevailing winds on transportation issues, like Cary Moon and Grant Cogswell.

These candidates' success shows that progressives and environmentalists in Seattle can prevail in a one-party climate, which stands in marked contrast to the rest of the country. No doubt John Corzine's defeat in the New Jersey gubernatorial election is already being used as right-wing fodder to suggest the public is turning against President Obama's policies, when in reality it's owed mostly to the corrupt, ossified political culture of New Jersey Democrats.

The Seattlepi.com's description of McGinn's campaign as "populist," while charming, is a disservice. McGinn's success, like Pete Holmes's and Mike O'Brien's, is owed to the fact that he ran on solid policy positions that both appeal to the city's sensibilities while constituting sound, far-sighted choices. While Mike McGinn has backtracked on his opposition to the tunnel, his potential election signals a departure from the failed tenure of Greg Nickels and breathes new life into the city's liberal political culture.

Susan Hutchinson's once-competitive campaign was owed largely to the public's increasing lack of faith in the local Democrats. She was an attempt to hitch the radical, anti-environment policies of the ex-urban fringe to a candidate with suburban appeal. Dow Constantine's decisive victory should put to rest idle talk of the region swinging to the political right. And while it's unlikely to put to rest the town-country divide and the attendant vitriol that was aimed at Ron Sims for his environmentally sound land-use policies, the fact that Sims's protege has prevailed clearly signals that the majority in the region understand that the value of our natural resources justifies the inconveniences.

Pete Holmes's victory is especially pleasing. Tom Carr was fundamentally out-of-step with Seattle in his longstanding battle with the city's thriving night-life. Not only has Seattle unequivocally stated that it believes there's a better way to balance neighborhood quality-of-life with a thriving bar and club scene, but it has spoken strongly in support of the cultural scene--the theaters, rock clubs, galleries, and literary events--that's so closely tied to night-life.

Tomorrow, most commentators will be talking about how King County's overwhelming support for the Approve 71 campaign (roughly two-to-one in favor) played a decisive role in likely swinging the entire state (where it's tentatively passing 51-49 percent), but that's also unfair. Sixty-five percent of King County voters are not pinko commies. The success of the Approve 71 campaign is owed to great outreach to voters of all stripes, and the ability of gay rights advocates to convince the larger community that gays are your friends, neighbors, and co-workers, and at the very least deserve most of the rights and privileges afforded to their straight neighbors.

Oh, and as for Tim Eyman's failure to pass his latest anti-tax initiative? It means nothing except that the vast majority of Washingtonians aren't stupid.

In H1N1 news, two weeks ago the swine flu vaccine arrived in King County and health professionals got first dibs. This week the vaccine was publicly available...but only for a few days, before supplies of the H1N1 vaccine ran out. Replenishments are on the way. President Obama has now declared the flu variant a national emergency--it's killed 1,000 people across the U.S. so far.

Twists in the race to be Mayor of Tunneltown this week: mayoral candidate Mike McGinn said he wouldn't seek to block deep-bore tunnel construction after all, and Joe Mallahan said he was okay with building it even if Seattle was solely on the hook for any cost overruns. WSDOT was accused of being "in love" with the deep-bore tunnel nyah nyah.

Books were big news: CHS provided a round-up of discussions about the Elliott Bay Book Company's potential move to Capitol Hill: Crosscut's Knute Berger and the Seattle Times' Jon Talton took the bird's-eye view of what the move says about Pioneer Square and Seattle itself.

Then the same week that Barnes & Noble launched the Nook, Amazon puffed up its chest, put the stock market on its back, and flew off in an up-and-to-the-right direction. Jeff Bezos ended the day worth over $2 billion more than when he woke up. Microsoft still lost money, but less than expected, and besides: Windows 7! TwitterBing!

Seattlepi.com tipped me to news from the Dave Ross Show that at least one state lawmaker, Sen. Jim Kastama (D-Puyallup), doesn't think Seattle will wriggle out of deep-bore tunnel cost overruns.

It's a measure of how worried everyone is about the hot-potato tunnel project that no one wants to admit responsibility for its cost. In the face of a study that shows typical cost overruns at 30 percent or more, Seattle tunnel boosters have been downplaying the possibility that Seattle might be, legally, on the hook.

Rep. Judy Clibborn told Ross today the cost overrun requirement wasn't a legal amendment, according to the state attorney general. "...[T]hat would seem to be trying to trick people into thinking that they're protected when they're not," responded a bemused Ross. "It was a way to get three more votes and to get the tunnel bill passed," explained Clibborn. "[...] We did whatever it took to get it."

Ross spoke next with Sen. Kastama, who said that while he had been unaware that the amendment wasn't legal, it didn't make much difference to him, practically speaking. He assured Ross that the Senate Transportation Committee had already committed all it was going to to the project.

Knowing that transportation funds would be trending lower--along with gas tax revenues--Kastama said they "saw the need to cut significant funds in the transportation budget." But while the state cut almost every other transportation project in the face of our $9 billion deficit, it did not cut the original $2.4 billion allocated for the Viaduct's replacement.

The cost overrun amendment was a response to there being no money to pay for real projects across the state, let alone cost overruns on a single one. (For context, 30 percent of $1.9 billion for the deep-bore tunnel alone is $570 million, or a new total of $2.5 billion.)...

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With yesterday's announcement that he won't try to block the deep-bore tunnel, mayoral candidate Mike McGinn managed to buy another news cycle while his adversary Joe Mallahan has been campaigning the old-fashioned way: on credit. It also puts into a new light McGinn's statement at a debate last Saturday that, "I might not win this election, and the tunnel still might not get built."

This morning Publicola interviewed McGinn on the strategic reasons for his shift, and McGinn said, "Yesterday, I acknowledged that it’s not the mayor’s job to ignore legislation passed by the council," referring to the City Council's unanimous vote in favor of the tunnel plan.

The Seattle Weekly is scratching its head over McGinn supporters' equanimity following the news--don't they realize that McGinn is a one-issue candidate who only has support because of his tunnel opposition? Strategic preemption and partisan jeering aside, what this means to voters is that they remain faced with a choice of mayoral skills and...

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Let me say at the outset, this is a judgment call. While Seattle has been scratching its head over which of the two neophytes to choose for mayor, we can at least be glad that we're choosing between two candidates who are deeply invested in Seattle, and who each represent, in their ways, a lot of what Seattle has going for it.

I've been wrestling with which of the candidates to vote for. Even though McGinn is far and away the more knowledgeable about city politics, I still wanted to know if he could be mayor of all of Seattle, not just The Stranger.

I stopped in at a mayoral candidates debate held over the weekend at Seattle University to get an in-person read. While McGinn's anti-tunnel stance warms my heart, I'm not prepared to vote for him on that basis alone--as McGinn himself mentioned during questioning Saturday, if the deep-bore tunnel is the boondoggle he thinks it is, it may very well stop itself in its tracks.

Mike McGinn

I want to bring up the very-much-alive ghost of Governor Moonbeam because Jerry...

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"I'm thinking of writing in Nickels," writes a commenter on the seattlepi.com recap of the Monday mayoral candidates debate hosted by City Club. "I wonder if people didn't realize how the top-two system worked and thought they were voting for who to run against Nickels, and then forgot to actually vote for Nickels."

At The SunBreak offices, we've been kicking around the idea of a "Write In Nickels" campaign, now that everyone has had their chance to punish the mayor in the primaries. While there are certainly Mallahan and McGinn partisans, another segment of Seattle remains bewildered by the primary results.

If you missed the standing-room-only debate at the Seattle Public Library, you didn't miss much. "Monday night's debate at the downtown Seattle library was a departure from the campaign's focus on the candidates' disagreement over whether to replace the Alaskan Way Viaduct with a $4.2 billion tunnel project," reports the Seattle Times.

That meant the evening focused largely on management style and ducking...

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I keep hearing people talking with stunned surprise about the fact that Greg Nickels lost in the mayoral primary. McGinn and Mallahan fans alike seemed to be picturing their guy running against Greg--with the unspoken "safety" option of voting Nickels if their initial crush faded. So let's take the temperature of the room. If you had to vote today, who would it be?

Seattle had its first mayoral debate, hosted by the Seattle Chamber of Commerce. So far as debating goes, Mike McGinn won handily on points; Joe Mallahan tied, I think, with Admiral Stockdale. If you want a deep-bore tunnel like you might just die if you don't get it, McGinn's performance will have mattered little to you. But if you were looking for a hyper-competent business perspective, Mallahan made you wonder what goes on, exactly, over at T-Mobile. Here's the political wonk recap at Publicola. Joel Connelly takes a closer look at Mallahan's bona fides here.

Muggers have been working Green Lake, a story My Green Lake has been covering closely. This reminds me of my post reminding our mayoral candidates about rising crime city-wide.

CHS has an enjoyable profile of local chef-entrepreneur Becky Selengut. West Seattle Blog reminds you that it's harbor seal pup season and to watch for the little bundles of cute when casting for salmon.

We here at The SunBreak had a great first full week of existence. We talked...

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Dude, where's my mayor?

Last night two men had a shoot-out with a third man, firing at each other across 23rd Avenue at Jackson. (The bullets lodged in a Bank of America building, but it's not likely meant to have been a statement.) The city has recently launched a sweeping Drug Market Initiative that aims to reduce the open-air drug trade. Across town, in Belltown, there's been a high-profile series of assaults, and crime of all kinds is on the rise. Capitol Hill generates a steady stream of theft and assault. Oh, and there's an arsonist in Greenwood.

In the meantime our two mayoral candidates are squaring off over a streetcar. Mike McGinn is excited about getting government on your iPhone. Joe Mallahan is trying to become visible in daylight. One of the pitfalls of having accidentally selected two neophytes in the mayoral race (I know I was counting on Greg Nickels testing the primary winner's mettle) is that they don't have ingrained a sense of the job's fundamentals.

The Seattle Times is gamely trying...

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"Geek engagement!" is a note I underlined. It was hot in the room, and people were talking longingly about APIs and datasets. But outside of the hotbox of new ideas, it was underwhelming for campaign season.

Monday afternoon, August 31, Seattle's two (yes, just two ) mayoral candidates were in distinctly different places. Joe Mallahan was adding $30,000 of his own money to his campaign fund, and Mike McGinn was standing in front of a motley group at the Northwest Film Forum on Capitol Hill, pitching what he calls "Government 2.0." The public face of this push is a new website, Ideas for Seattle , which solicits ideas from Seattle citizens for improving the city (leading the list: "open city data" and "build the Green line").

Called a "policy summit," the meeting drew an audience consisting of McGinn's aides, hyperlocal bloggers , Seattle Weekly 's Damon Agnos , neighborhood planning activist Dennis Waxman, and various people who spend their time lobbying city, county, and state governments...

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