Features
Dec 12, 2012 at 4:00 am
The Former Council Member Enters a Crowded Race, but with More City Hall Experience Than the Rest
Son of Victor Steinbrueck, who led the fight to save Pike Place Market.
Kelly O
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800 Maynard Ave S, Suite 200, Seattle, WA 98134
800 Maynard Ave S, Suite 200, Seattle, WA 98134
Can I just say what an idiot Brian Robinson is? "Sonics fans in the region will never allow him to be mayor of this city." Really dude. There's 50.1% majority of single issue voters out there and that issue is the new Sonics' arena. Get a fucking grip.
Steinbruck may or may not be a "freak", but his anti-density instincts are well documented. An endorsement from John Fox is all you need to know.
Consider the sweetheart deal the POS just gave Hanjin. Steinbrueck's anti-arena stance is a tad hypocritical.
http://www.bizjournals.com/seattle/news/…
Remember that quote about Newt Gingrich--he's a dumb person's idea of a smart person? Well, Peter Steinbrueck is an pro-sprawl nimby's ideal of an environmentalist. With friends like Steinbrueck, we don't need enemies.
It's amusing how easy it is to craft them so they push your buttons and you do what they want.
But, believe in your "logical" choices, if you must.
Of course he did. He was paid to, as a lobbyist for the Port of Seattle.
Is his position a good one? No, but McGinn was an emotionally elected mayor (remember he was going to listen to us and be a furry teddy bear?) and look where that go us.
Frankly, I'm not impressed with anyone running except for Murray...and we need him in the Senate more than we need him in Seattle.
But yes, you're right that the anti-housing kick that is bubbling up again is an emotional reaction. There needs to be an equally passionate reaction from everyone whose rents are poised to soar if Steinbrueck and the NIMBYs get their way and stop new housing construction.
It was neighborhoods that chose to accept density as part of the comprehensive plan, growth management act, the urban village strategy and neighborhood plans. Most of the vociferous opposition comes when the City acts outside of that framework.
For example it is the failure to provide concurrent transit amenities as density increases that has many pissed off. i.e. we don't mind more people, just tell us how the fuck they are going to get around, where their kids will go to school, where is the park space for them.
As we approach a major update to the comprehensive plan, we need leadership and voices that will drive growth in the city for the next couple of decades that makes Seattle a better place than it is today, controls gentrification and cost of living, and keeps a high standard for quality of life for both extant and our new residents.
Transit, complete streets, open space and other public amenities are the grand bargain that is to come with density. NIMBY? I think not. Unless you believe that density and tall towers are the only indicator of success for a city.
Steinbrueck understands this. As do the people that live in the neighborhoods.
A few wankers on this thread apparently don't...
The new construction in this city is geared 100% at the bizarrely, apparently limitless number of people who can afford it without a second thought. Where all the people who can pay $2000 a month for rent, or $500,000 for a 1B condo, are coming from I dunno. But they're here. If you can't, you're going to have to move to the middle of nowhere whether they build 65-footers or not.
I don't think the middle class or lower really has representation in city government.
Overall I think we've won the density argument (see: City Target, light rail systems under construction in most major cities nationally, etc.). Developers know this too and they're looking to roll their capital where more people are going, which is not into the suburbs.
In terms of city growth our definition of success should be density + quality of life, not simply density.
And giving more control to neighborhood groups? Why should we give control over a bunch of unelected busybodies who purport to represent their neighborhood but in reality only represent the narrow self-interests of a chosen few.
I could take or leave McGinn, but this guy? Whoever's running against him will get my vote and my campaign contribution.
To #21, 22, and 23: Amen. I'm a member of the city’s largest neighborhood group that you’ve never heard of – the 31 year old Seattle Neighborhood Coalition - until Dominic mentioned us after attending our November meeting. We meet for a delicious breakfast every second Saturday at the Union Bay Café, 5109 Shilshole Ave NW. With full bellies, articulate seasoned citizens then proceed to speak truth to power. Join us to learn more, just don’t park on the tracks! Special offer until further notice: First breakfast free to any working journalist.
There has been no bigger single factor in pushing jobs and housing to Bellevue during the past 20 years than the regressive, anti-urban policies that Peter championed before and during his time on City Council.
@21, you're right that there's a good deal of starry-eyed naivete surrounding Peter. In my experience, 99% of it is coming from Peter's supporters.
His signature accomplishment during his years on the City Council? Adding a preamble to the City Charter! You can't make that shit up. In fact, it sounds like an advertisement for Murray, or Burgess, or even McGinn.
@22 new construction itself won't be low-rent or even affordable for many workers. That's not where it has value. New construction helps keep existing rents in place and prevents displacement of existing tenants. If people have the money to afford new construction, they can go for that, and leave people alone where they already live. Cut off new construction, however, and you simply repeat San Francisco's experience where new density has generally been banned for 30 years and the result is an unaffordable city.
@23 the problem is that the people Steinbrueck is appealing to believe that density and quality of life are incompatible. I don't think there's an issue more important for this city than adding more density and the grade-separated passenger rail to serve it. There are a lot of people who feel the same way. Probably not a majority of the electorate, but enough to play a key role in determining who makes it out of the primary. And they're not going to abide someone like Steinbrueck telling them Seattle has to grow slower.
Electing city council by districts, like the county does, would be more democratic. I like democracy, we should try it, rather than this coalition of neighborhood breakfast clubs bullshit. This is a city, lets try acting like it.
There is no yesteryear nostalgia here. He has been paid to run by lobbyist money, it's his job.
As I was drafting this rant, it occurred to me that Peter Steinbrueck was actually on the Council at the time the Stadium Overlay was enacted. And yes, it took about five minutes to figure out that the "Stadium Transition Area Overlay District" was created pursuant to City Ordinance 113161, passed unanimously by the City Council on June 12, 2000, when you-know-who was on the City Council.
Like I say, you can't make this shit up.
It seems he wants one job with ego stroking rather than 5 jobs without. There is absolutely no point in continuing to mention his father, because Peter is not Victor. It's actually difficult to determine who Peter is, because the City's quite a bit different from when he was on the Council (when it was also hard to determine who he was), and the lobbyist jobs he's been doing are pretty diffuse.
The lesbians dress like him
They are make the fucking pretend, after all.
What don't you get?
He wants to put the Sonics NEAR HOME?
Oh wait, that's gentrification.
Or is it URBAN PIONEERING?
Wait, no its not.
You're too busy watching the W fucking NBA.
Ever had to wait an hour to get 100 yds on Mercer during rush hour?
No?
Regards,
Bizworldusa
Also rents have as much to do with demand (desire to live in Seattle) as supply (new construction). By the logic "more housing=reasonable rents" Manhattan should be a bargain. A bit (but not exactly) like the logic that says more freeways will get rid of traffic. Seattle will continue to be a desirable place to live in the foreseeable future and rents will continue to be relatively high to historic standards. But, one way to guarantee there are at least some reasonable rents is having some spine and making sure there are significant amounts of affordable housing stipulations in development deals.
With comments such as those @37 it's little wonder that you were asked to resign from the SHA board.
WELCOME TO USA IN 2013
For the record Yusuf, I've NEVER posted anything to Slog (or anywhere else) about you. I've never met you, but I've heard plenty of stories. Your unfounded accusations against me and the candidates for mayor confirm to me what I've heard about you - that you're a complete piece of shit.
or you can just fill up every building envelope with ugly lego style blocks, like ocurring in the big projects in ballard today.
the density argument has won. now, it's time to make GOOD density, not CRAP density.
go down to mercer. there's an amazon building with a facade on mercer that is a huge blank wall. it fuckin sucks. it's not attractive. it's not vibrant. it's not going to be filled with people hanging out on the sidewalk. it sucks. much of the new ballard buildings are the same way; blank walls of glass straight up from the same four foot wide sidewak that was there before. just a big pile of dwelling units plopped down. we need more corners like the one in front of la coupole, more plazas like farragut square, more ubran space like dupont circle, more buildings like the kennedy warren, and not just the same old mixed use rectangular pieces of shit we are getting today, and no, adding a tower on top of a rectangular block podium doens't help. the issue isn't the height. it's the the street level facade to facade distance, number one, and what's in the public space number two, and this takes an entirely new approach that we're not even talking about. our debates focusing on height or givebacks for affordable housing do NOTHING to make the urban forms BETTER. when the problem is they are ugly blocks leaving the public space undeveloped, and too narrow, and too often facing blank walls of glass or maybe, woohoo, some dog shit colored sem orange panels that say nothing and speak the pattern language of blah.
this man would be a horrible mayor.
Right, an arena that has one third of Century Link's capacity is a threat to port operations.
Your belief that Rainer Valley or Bellevue are good options is nothing more than good old NIMBYism.
The decision has already been made it's not going to be undone anymore than the DBT is.
We will never forget and will vote accordingly.
The Sonics/Thunder were just a little too eager to leave Seattle. Peter isn't responsible for them leaving. The owner would have moved them regardless. Read up on Clayton Bennett. What - you think a stadium would have kept them here? And you know what? Any organization whose loyalty to its city is that fragile and tenuous? They need to go anyway.
In all the time I've lived here, I don't think I've ever once seen this city's "progressives" display one bit of interest in Seattle's working middle class.
For the Seattle "progressive," it's entirely about poses, and the sort of the status climbing behavior that Thorstein Veblen identified more than 100 years ago in his book, Theory of the Leisure Class.
It's comical and pathetic, in a darkly humorous sort of way, to watch this city's "progressives" spew utter bullshit at every turn, and show every sign of actually believing the crap they put out.
If you build an arena at the very edge of the place you designed as the transition zone, there is no longer any transition along that edge. Go ahead and read the statute.