Lloyd Hara, a Seattle port commissioner and candidate for King
County Elections director, reportedly plans to keep his part-time
Port Commission seat if he is elected elections director, numerous
sources say.

State law stipulates only that a candidate’s name can’t appear twice
on a single ballot. Because the elections director position is on the
ballot in February and the port position comes up in November, the two
positions would appear on separate ballots. State Public Disclosure
Commission spokeswoman Lori Anderson says the state has no “position or
jurisdiction to decide” whether Hara can hold both a King County and a
port position; neither a port spokesman nor the King County Prosecuting
Attorney’s office could speak to the legality of holding both jobs at
once.

There is some precedent for holding both a state and a local office.
Tim Sheldon, a state senator from Potlatch, ran for Mason County
commissioner in 2004 and won, and Pam Roach, a state senator from
Auburn (whose name is also on the list of likely candidates for
elections director), ran for King County Council in 2003 and lost.

However, Hara’s case would be different in one key respect: As
elections director, he would be overseeing his own election.
Under Washington State’s “incompatible offices” doctrine, a person
can’t hold more than one office if “the functions of the two offices
are inconsistent,” such as “where one office is subordinate to
another.” That same doctrine was raised—unsuccessfully—in a
complaint against Sheldon in 2005.

The elections director job would pay substantially more than Hara’s
Port Commission position—$146,000, compared to about
$6,000. Hara did not return calls for comment.

Sherril Huff, the current King County Elections director, announced
Tuesday that she’s running to keep her position, contrary to earlier
reports—a story I broke on The Stranger‘s blog on
Monday. Although Huff currently lives in Kitsap County, making her
ineligible to run for a King County position, her campaign spokeswoman,
Lesley Rogers, says she just signed a lease on a house in Seattle and
will officially move to King County before the filing deadline of
Friday, December 12.

Also running: former port commissioner Alec Fisken, former
King County Council member David Irons, former elections director Ellen
Hansen, high-school teacher Chris Clifford, ex–county council
chief of staff Ross Baker, unsuccessful secretary of state candidate
Jason Osgood, and recent UW graduate Ted Maroutsos.

According to King County Elections spokeswoman Megan Coppersmith,
the election, which will be the only item on the ballot in most of King
County, will cost the cash-strapped county between $2.6 million and
$3.3 million. recommended

5 replies on “In the Hall”

  1. Erica, you left one call for Lloyd, which he returned, and you were unable to take. things have been unusually busy on Lloyd’s beat, as you might have read elsewhere.

    FYI, Osgood is out, Hansen is out, Baker indicates he will drop out, and Dwight Pelz has been telling people (falsely) that Hara is out.

    As to the non-issues you raise here, you trotted out the same ones a few days ago, and the ensuing comment – from all sides – explained your errors to you.

    Whose axe are you grinding here?

  4. Fisken is a nice guy who has no business managing the elections office.
    Hara is a good Port Commissioner who has been looking to get a job as an elected official for years and years. Not a reason to run for elections director.

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