Comments

1
It's getting real in the Whole Foods parking lot.
2
Everything you said, Goldy.

So Murray calls it obstruction to advocate for low-wage workers. McGinn, so rare in this anti-union age, takes a stand for organized labor.

Hm... The guy who doesn't want to bother with higher wages versus the guy who does. I wonder which one would better represent me, as opposed to the corporate powers.
3
By the way, a little research on Whole Foods' actual salaries is pretty easy (hint: a small number of upper management tilts the average and workers are assumed to have 40 hour work weeks when that's nowhere near the standard reality).
4
@1 Ha ha.
5
McGinn has a point - if Whole Foods pushes out QFC and Safeway, that would put dozens of automatic checkout machines out of work.
6
Wow, Ed Murray's media strategy is to ignore The Stranger? Yea, that worked well for Rob McKenna.
7
West Seattle Blog broke the news. Not you, Goldy.
8
Ed Murray has never had to actually campaign for office before. He's in way over his head.
9
Murray's a knee jerk drama queen. Always has been.
10
Interesting that Murray complained (somewhere) that since he's not rich, he really needed that UW job that he didn't compete for or actually do, and yet he expects a very long drawn-out process in order to ensure that Whole Foods doesn't screw its employees while getting perks from the City.
11
Wow, so Murray's campaign took a whole week to respond to this issue and then the best they could do was copy and paste their boilerplate message on everything?? McGinn could cure cancer and Murray would accuse him of being divisive. Sheesh.
12
Wow -- Ed Murray is just making it too easy to strike him off my list. But you go, Murray! Speak up for your pal, John Mackey -- Ayn Rand/Milton Friedman-admiring CEO of Whole Foods! And isn't there some city property somewhere we can vacate to make room for a Walmart? These are just the kinds of businesses Seattle needs! (It's just a shame their workers will have to commute from so far away in order to afford rent. But since most of them will only be working part-time, they'll have plenty of time for it.)
13
Someone else said it best...was McGin demanding the same from the Chris Hansen suck off? Fuck that fat bearded fool retard mongoloid fuck off.
14
I fail to see where this process mentions liveable wages and employee satisfaction as a part of the process. And the SDOT recommendation has specific goals and evaluations, not "did the mayor smile or give a Kissinger grunt?"

http://www.seattle.gov/transportation/st…

Comments solicited include the following offices:

Community Groups
Neighborhood Organizations
Area Business Associations
Seattle Police and Fire Departments
Seattle Department of Neighborhoods
Seattle City Light
Seattle Public Utilities
Seattle Department of Parks & Recreation
Seattle Design Commission
Seattle Department of Planning & Development
King County/Metro
Washington State Dept of Transportation
Sound Transit
Qwest Communications
Puget Sound Energy
Seattle Steam Corporation
Union Pacific Railroad
Burlington Northern Santa Fe Railroad

This first level of review is intended to identify issues related to a proposed vacation and subsequent development. This includes technical issues such as utility or transportation impacts, as well as urban design issues, and land use impacts. Broader policy issues such as community concerns and compliance with Comprehensive Plan or Neighborhood Plan goals and other City policies and goals are also analyzed. This phase of the review should result in a clear picture of the proposed development, any issues or policy questions, and should produce a clear description of the public benefit provided by the proposal. During this phase of review, the petition will generally be reviewed by the Seattle Design Commission. Responding to issues and refining the public benefit proposal may involve significant design changes or revisions by the Petitioner.

SDOT Recommendation - After receiving all the comments on the potential vacation, all environmental documents, and other required information, and after completion of the review by the Design Commission and other reviewers, SDOT will review the proposal for compliance with the Vacation Policies and other applicable policies. SDOT will prepare an analysis for the City Council including a recommendation whether the vacation should be granted or denied, recommended conditions, mitigation measures, and the specific public benefits of the proposal.
15
@11 Papa Joffre is sorta referencing a great Bruce Harrell line from the Paid Sick Leave Act signing.

I believe the original quote is something like "If Mayor McGinn cured cancer tomorrow, they'd say he didn't do it soon enough". But PJ's new spin on the line is just as apt.
16
McGinn is a hypocrite.

Why not nix the arena deal on its crappy jobs? it required vacations. (oh right, Goldy is a pimp for that deal)

When he led the so-called "Great City Initiative" McGinn was asked to come out against the big box Dearborn project that would have had shit-tons of crappy retail jobs (and 3,000 parking spaces). McGinn: no comment.

Oh, so now the Comp Plan is his fall back? That is being selectively being used and ignored by his administration all the time.

Of course The Stranger's half-assed (or, more like non-) coverage of issues related to the GMA and the Comp Plan hardly make you all an authority to comment on it...
17
@14..."the specific public benefits of the proposal" seems to create an opening in my reading. That nobody has thought to apply such things in the past doesn't mean that there aren't new and beneficial ways to think of the general welfare of the people of Seattle.

I'm curious though; do those who oppose the Mayor in this effort think that wages and income inequality are pressing issues? My guess is that many of you DO think these things are a problem. And if so, shouldn't you welcome new and creative ways to address these issues?

The problem that has continually plagued the left is the inability to think outside the box in how to move our agenda forward. This is why, for example, you get democrat after democrat who says "I support transit!" but then do very little to move transit forward. Because, while they like transit, many of them think they can only build transit after all the proposed roads have been built. Transit is a lower priority for them.

Same thing here. If you support wage elevation and closing income disparity, then there's no way this issue should be controversial. Again, McGinn is merely using his bully pulpit here; if you aren't willing to join him in that bully pulpit, then how can I trust that you'll actually move the issue forward?
18
@14 you need to read the full ordinance: http://clerk.seattle.gov/%7Escripts/nph-…

Here's how it works. Section 5F of the Street Vacation Policies reads: "The City will also consider: * Compliance of the project with City policies and goals, including the Comprehensive Plan, neighborhood planning goals, and economic development goals;"

And then you look at the relevant Economic Development section of the Comprehensive Plan (page 5, section ED 16.5): http://www.seattle.gov/dpd/cms/groups/pa…

Which reads: ā€œseeking a greater proportion of living wage jobs that will have greater benefitsā€ and "support key sectors of Seattleā€™s economy to create jobs that pay wages that can support a family, provide necessary benefits, and contribute to the vitality of the City including, but not limited to, the industrial, manufacturing, service, hospitality and retail sectors."

You don't have to like it, but McGinn's position is very strongly supported by the relevant policies.
19
So where was McGinn when Amazon needed three alleys vacated in SLU. They're non-union, and Amazon Fresh is surely hurting union grocers.
20
@13 and @16, the arena deal does contain provisions for good jobs, and a community benefits agreement. Hansen has been proactive in reaching out to the neighboring Seattle communities and to unions. In fact, food service workers at Seattle's stadiums spoke at a press conference talking about how great the deal was for workers. So McGinn is being consistent (and awesome) with regards to his stance on alley vacations and the need for real public benefit.
21
@19: Amazon worker wages are not poverty wages. And Amazon did kick in a lot of other public benefits, more than any developer has had to do for an alley vacation before, like funding for a new streetcar.
22
@16 As pointed out by @20, Hansen negotiated a Community Benefits Agreement that includes guaranteeing that the Sodo arena will be a union shop. That's why the deal is supported by UNITE HERE Local 6, the Teamsters, and the stage handlers union. You can be damn sure that if Whole Foods offered a similar CBA, McGinn would flip on this in a heartbeat.
23
Didn't the mayor preside over the opening of a Target in downtown Seattle?
24
Goldy, will you ever take McGinn's stiff dick out of your throat?

To everyone else: There are already six Whole Foods stores in Seattle. Kind of amusing, isn't it, that McShithead never said a word about their oppressed employees until the week the primary ballots were mailed out?

And here we have all kind of self-important idiots prattling on about how "smart" and "educated" this city's voters are. We'll see about that, because if The Shithead is re-elected after pulling a stunt that the average (insert term of your choice for someone in the bottom 20% of the I.Q. distribution), then we'll know for sure just how "smart" and "educated" the Seattle voter really isn't.
25
Fuckhead @24...

None of the other Whole Foods are asking for city land, fuckhead.
26
@24: None of those Whole Foods developments needed alley vacations.
27
@21: Amazon worker wages are not poverty wages.

Whole Foods worker wages are not poverty wages. In fact, they're the same as the other, shittier grocery stores that have replaced their union checkout staff with machines.

But hey, if West Seattle prefers to eat corn syrup and Monsanto, then please, build a fucking Whole Foods in Capitol Hill instead.
28
@27 Only if you credulously believe Whole Foods' claims, despite their stubborn refusal to release any data to support their numbers.

29
@27: Whole Foods is not an organic market and has plenty of GMO products. If West Seattle wants to shop organic, they already have a PCC.
30
Goldy, will you EVER quit shamelessly whoring for Mike McShithead? What's the deal? Does he have pictures of you screwing a goat or something?
31
Simple question: How many of you actually live in West Seattle? Truly care what happens to the neighborhood in question? There's currently a run-down funeral home, a gas station, and a car lot there. Is that really more appealing to your sensibilities than a health food store?

West Seattle is not the proper venue to play out the psychodrama of your hatred for Whole Foods' CEO (who is a libertarian and has dared, for those just tuning in, to insult the Affordable Care Act). Reality is not a Huffington Post comments thread.

Understand that McGinn's move, if taken seriously by the City Council, could absolutely kill the entire mixed-use project (they tend to depend on the anchor tenant), leaving West Seattle with years of more nothingness on that lot. Whole Foods, and other businesses, want to come in. (Whole Foods, by the way, has been on the Forbes' list of the 100 best places to work in the U.S., as voted by its own employees, for the past 15 years.) This is not a coal mine. Seattle already has six. It's primary season --- time for the mayor to get divisive. Don't get worked up by it.

Step back from the ledge, folks. Economic vibrancy and growth are good things.
33
@31 is right - currently there's a funeral home, gas station and car lot on the land in question. I'm sure none of which are union shops. If the Whole Foods development is not built, what other likely use of this property would result in the "living wage" union jobs the Stranger is advocating? Be specific and only mention businesses that have a track record of success.
34
It's clear that the rejection of the alley vacation is due to Whole Foods being non-union. Another question - is the Stranger a union shop paying a "living wage"?
35
@31: Whole Foods is not a "health food store".
36
@Goldy: Only if you credulously believe Whole Foods' claims

I put links to my source directly in the post, old man.
37
@34: The Stranger is not a union shop. (The Seattle Weekly is, though.) I'm guessing most of them make about as much as your average Whole Foods employee.
38
@37, not only is the Stranger not a union shop, but they don't pay their interns, in violation of federal law and common decency. They are the some of the biggest hypocrites in liberal Seattle, but hypocrisy is the coin of the realm for people like them.
39
@37 that's what I suspected - a non-union employer that does not pay a living wage.
40
@39: Hard to say given The Stranger's "stubborn refusal to release any data".
41
Have any of you McGinn supporters ever heard of 'single issue voting'?

Youll vote for a guy whos helping to make the city unaffordable to live for poorer and working class people because he (politically) decided to attack an anti-union grocer in ONE SPOT in the city? For a place that half of you shop, over a job category that none of you pro-mcginn trust funders have ever had to work at?

Where was this indignant when the other WF's were being put up around the city? Im not defending Whole foods or attacking unions. Whole foods is awful as a company and its president is a libertarian nutjob. But using this one politically calculated widely published 'make an example of' event to vote for a person when a fucking PLETHORA of life and livelihood issues are on the table is just fooling yourselves.

Ask a native or black person in Seattle about what they think of McGinn and his SPD policies. As a poor person who has lived in Rainier (of any color) or Colombia City or Beacon Hill or Greenwood for the last few decades what they think about McGinns development of the city. Ask a person who works in Seattle but cant afford to live close enough to bike so they take 4 buses a day or spend 3+ hours daily commuting what they think of his transit polices.

You wont. Because you know that answer. And if theres one thing the privileged in Seattle love, its convincing themselves of their own hardship and artificial community consciousness.
42
McGinn's Whole Food action is the worst sort of gesture politics. One, he's directed the SDOT to make a decision on criteria not in their legal domain. The agency is supposed to be an independent arbiter on these issues under the legal criteria. Two, the City Council has the role of final approval, not McGinn. Three, the Mayor has no legal role in this decision process. Four, the action could embroil the city in pointless litigation and expense, solely so McGinn can score a few cheap political points before the election. This is the worst sort of governing and narcissism. He puts his short term political and personal interests ahead of the law and ahead of the City. It doesn't matter if you think higher wages is good policy - this is a flatly frivolous and illegal way to go about it. And McGinn is a lawyer and should know better. (Actually such a flatly illegal action by a lawyer could be subject to discipline by the bar . . . Look out, Mike. Maybe you should think twice. Or once. I can't vote for a lawyer who has so little respect for the law and process.
43
Wow.

So Ed stands for the Powers That Be and Big Developers - and against Seattle liberals.

Painting yourself into a corner there - this is Seattle, we're all liberals, even our conservatives are regarded as pinkos anywhere else in the world.
44
Goldy, it would be nice, as a journalist, if you actually read the City Codes and Alley Vacation policies prior to just reposting some b.s. that the McGinn camp fed you. It's so sad that he can't read the code and admit, maybe just once, that he's wrong. Good lord.

Here's a link to the policies so all you McGinn blowhards can finally read them.
http://clerk.seattle.gov/~scripts/nph-br…

1) Only the City Council has the authority to vacate an alley or a street. See the City Charter, SMC 15.62, and the Street/Alley vacation policies.
2) The SMC does not require the recommendation of the Mayor for the City Council to take action on a street/alley vacation petition. See Chapter 15.62 SMC.
3) SDOT makes a recommendation to the Council at the request of the Council--I quote from the policies: "Seattle Department of Transportation (SDOT) administers the review
process at the request of the City Council and analyzes the impacts of a proposed
vacation and the consistency of the proposal with the street vacation policies and
other adopted policies and goals." i.e.--Beverly Barnett is working for the City Council here, NOT for the Mayor.
4) SDOT is not required to give (to quote Goldy/McGinn) an "up or down" recommendation to the Council. Again--from the policies: "SDOT will make a recommendation to the City Council, including conditions to address the impacts of the proposed vacation and to ensure the provision of the required public benefit. This recommendation will include comments from other reviewing agencies, including the Seattle Design Commission, and may include a recommendation whether to grant or deny the vacation."
5) Please note in all of this that there is no mention of the Mayor. It's only SDOT, working for the Council. The only time the Mayor weighs in is when he signs the ordinance to approve the final vacation after the project is built!

It is beyond frustrating to me the way McGinn/Goldy obfuscates the process here by saying that the Mayor has to make a recommendation. In fact, the Mayor does not GET to make a recommendation.

Please, as a journalist, Goldy. Do your job. And as Mayor, Mr. McGinn--do your job, and don't mislead the people of this City just because it's a pretty technical thing. You did this to get an endorsement--fine. But lying about the process (or being deliberately misinformed about the process) does the City a big time disservice.
45
Goldy, it would be nice, as a journalist, if you actually read the City Codes and Alley Vacation policies prior to just reposting some b.s. that the McGinn camp fed you. It's so sad that he can't read the code and admit, maybe just once, that he's wrong. Good lord.

Here's a link to the policies so all you McGinn blowhards can finally read them.
http://clerk.seattle.gov/~scripts/nph-brā€¦

1) Only the City Council has the authority to vacate an alley or a street. See the City Charter, SMC 15.62, and the Street/Alley vacation policies.
2) The SMC does not require the recommendation of the Mayor for the City Council to take action on a street/alley vacation petition. See Chapter 15.62 SMC.
3) SDOT makes a recommendation to the Council at the request of the Council--I quote from the policies: "Seattle Department of Transportation (SDOT) administers the review
process at the request of the City Council and analyzes the impacts of a proposed
vacation and the consistency of the proposal with the street vacation policies and
other adopted policies and goals." i.e.--Beverly Barnett is working for the City Council here, NOT for the Mayor.
4) SDOT is not required to give (to quote Goldy/McGinn) an "up or down" recommendation to the Council. Again--from the policies: "SDOT will make a recommendation to the City Council, including conditions to address the impacts of the proposed vacation and to ensure the provision of the required public benefit. This recommendation will include comments from other reviewing agencies, including the Seattle Design Commission, and may include a recommendation whether to grant or deny the vacation."
5) Please note in all of this that there is no mention of the Mayor. It's only SDOT, working for the Council. The only time the Mayor weighs in is when he signs the ordinance to approve the final vacation after the project is built!

It is beyond frustrating to me the way McGinn/Goldy obfuscates the process here by saying that the Mayor has to make a recommendation. In fact, the Mayor does not GET to make a recommendation.

Please, as a journalist, Goldy. Do your job. And as Mayor, Mr. McGinn--do your job, and don't mislead the people of this City just because it's a pretty technical thing. You did this to get an endorsement--fine. But lying about the process (or being deliberately misinformed about the process) does the City a big time disservice.
46
West Seattlites (I actually live here) have been waiting for a decade for the promised Whole Foods store. I'm sick of driving across the bridge mess to the north end just to shop at Whole Foods, which has organic food at much more affordable prices than PCC. I have a family to feed on a very limited budget, and I can promise you the Whole Foods workers will make more than I do hourly. (Maybe I will even apply there!) McGinn is really out of touch with a huge segment of the city on this issue... which is no surprise, really.
47
@43:

Will, arent you a pro-Chief Diaz anti OWS conservative? A little odd to get on the slog and start talking about whos in favor of liberals.

McGInn is NOT a liberal. That man is a corporatist who placates to the rich faux liberal crowd.
48
@45, this isn't one bit about Whole Foods or living wages or appropriate land use. Never has been, never will be. Not even remotely. Anyone who says it's about either of those things is either a blind idiot or a cheesy liar. In Goldy's case, it's Door #2. For the Stranger's readers, it depends. For those who are here as McShithead campaign types, it's a Hail Mary pass for a candidate who is widely despised in Seattle. For others who are on that fucker's side, it's sheer brain damage.

Back to Goldy. He loves McShithead because his hero still wants to build a basketball court at taxpayer expense, and Goldy is a sports fan. In Goldy's mind, that alone justifies any whoring he can do. Goldy also loves the real estate shysters, for what specific reason we don't know. McGinn's in their pocket, and so's Goldy. The rest is nothing but blah-blah-blah.

The hypocrisy of the Seattle liberal types knows no bounds. They are every bit the equal of the wingnuts they claim to hate.
49
Murray just got my vote. As a resident of West Seattle I would much rather have an amazing grocery store in my neighborhood rather then the abandoned car dealership that has occupied that space for the last six years. Obviously no one who actually lives here cares about that ally, there are plenty of other places in the area for drunk people to break glass bottles and for kids to smoke pot. The opposition to Whole Foods clearly has nothing to do with the quality of life for the people that live here or the people who will benefit from the new jobs that will be created. Look at what this wonderful activism has brought us in the past, three years of a gigantic hole in the earth on one of our most valuable corners. Hmmm a great grocery store that will bring jobs improve the neighborhood, increase property values and tax revenue vs. our Mayor's need to cater to special interest groups. Pretty easy choice.

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