Ew. That's gross. No vote for you, Burgess!

Burgess as mayor better scare more than you. It better scare all of us.

No amount of shooting the shit and buying beer with the Stranger staff can cover his indefensible record on social justice and nonrelations with the city's poor, minorities and neighborhood interests. He is a wolf backed by Bust Your Chops Cops and downtown business interests. Not to mention he has a naked ambition that produces a gag reflex.

One word: Autocrat.

@3 has a very very good point.

And I like Burgess and his wife. I like them a lot.

But you folks should be scared silly of them.

Yet, this is the same guy championing the program to get teenage prostitutes a pathway off the street.
So, the blanket statement that he has a blind spot for "the poor" is a bit ham handed.

The question is following the process, the division of responsibility, and how not following the process leaves the folks not on specific committees stuck trying vote on something. If they don't want every councilmember to go to every detailed meeting, and have ever staff member fish through every proposal to ensure that criteria used to make decisions was actually followed, they have to follow the process.

I want Dorli Rainey to run for mayor.
Or Kshama Sawant.

So the council fought for this program all through the Nickels administration and then, when the mayor did NOT ask for the program to be eliminated, the council did it. Worse, the council did it in the most arbitrary and casual way - without subjecting the decision to the most ordinary sort of review.

Through all of this, Mr. Burgess remains unrepentant. He not only owes an apology (and restored funding) to CURB stakeholders, but to his council colleagues whom he decieved.

Mr. Burgess must have the shiniest pen ever. He spent the better part of ten minutes there looking down and polishing it.

Interesting how up until now, it appears there has been no analysis of whether this program works for what it was intended for. But council fought to keep it in the budget. This is one of the huge problems with our city. We fund programs, and then continue to fund them, because they sound good, but rarely if ever look at whether or not the program delivers up to any reasonable standard. Everyone here is worried about some process. I'm far more worried about whether this program is effective and why it's been funded by Council if they don't know whether it is or not. If it is, maybe we should expand it. If it's not, it should be defunded. Sure wish government types cared about how their programs work vs/ how they make the look.

Does this mean no more Stranger editorial freebies for Tim, or Slogs about how He Is Really Actually An Awesome Democrat And Not Really A Stealth Conservative And He's Sociable And Fuzzy And Nice? Please?

We need someone that will represent all constituencies equally, and Tim Burgess isn't it. He might be the nicest guy in the world--and I don't doubt he is, because I haven't heard a bad word about him in that regard. And he may have been sort of conservative once, but he's not now, and that's actually something to be cheer.

But this stuff with poor people is never ending, like the capitulation to the DSA over the panhandling law, defunding this program, and his constant slavish perceived deference to the SPOG. I'm probably one of his louder critics on here. I think that--if he got past that crap, got ahead of it, and started to do things for the poor and not acted like this, AND stood up to SPOG--he could be a good mayor. One I'd even vote for.

But the love affair with the DSA and SPOG has to end, along with his bumbling War On Poor People.

I'm not sure that I agree with Madrid's assessment of the meeting or Tim Burgess and blind spots. But congratulations on the fear mongering, Cienna. Fine work. I'm suprised that you didn't take the opportunity to call Sally Clark ineffective or Tom Rasmussen a dishrag but it's still early in the day.

@11

But congratulations on the fear mongering, Cienna.

Then maybe Burgess shouldn't give critics ammunition.

Every public official in Seattle, Washington State and the US at large has, at one time or another, given critics ammunition. It's part of the price and folly of public life. Interpreting and reporting that information is the job of journalists. Fear mongering is the job of fear mongerers.

This is a Council Top Ten Flick Pick. Rasmussen excoriates Burgess for the better part of 7 minutes in the passive aggressive manner only true Seattleites can invoke. Clark flails as she tries to help Burgess. Burgess twiddles his pen as the balloon above his head goes sh-t sh-t sh-t. Great political theater. And a scary insight into Burgess demeanor when the Mask of Authority slips.

@13, I think when Cienna cites previous examples of Burgess' blind spot, she is doing good reporting. She's observed a trend, reported the trend to her readers, and interpreted its meaning.

This is hardly yellow journalism. It's not as if Cienna wrote an article on how Burgess powers his Vespa with puppy blood.

Burgess' blind spot is a real problem, and it calls his ability to be a good mayor into question.

I disagree with her interpretation and that's the preogative of any reader. I'm not a big fan of the "objective journalism is dead" school of thought but I believe the Strangetr news dept. does subscribe to it. The statement of fear around Burgess as a candidate takes it up a notch. It may not be yellow journalism but it is not good journalism either.

Burgess takes the blame but is not clearly at fault in this case.

This looks like boring city politic democracy to me. He may not be John Fox, but he's certainly no Mark Sidrian.

Burgess as mayor better scare more than you. It better scare all of us.

Woah their, soldier. We're talking about the city's executive, not Project X for World Peace.

Burgess stands our best chance for getting substantive changes from the SPD.

None of the other candidates have the relationships or trust with the police officers necessary. Burgess can come down harder on the SPD brass because he understands their culture and he doesn't have to hide behind a soft-on-crime reputation.

"...and that scares me"

omg...drama! girl you so crazy!