"We need leadership that protects public safety, not just pays lip service to it."
So said Seattle City Attorney Mark Sidran at his mayoral campaign kickoff breakfast in the Westin Hotel's Grand Ballroom last Thursday, May 10. Unlike Mayor Paul Schell and King County Council Member Greg Nickels, Sidran couldn't pack his mayoral campaign kickoff event with elected officials or Democratic Party busybodies. With the exception of tough-on-crime Republicans like County Prosecutor Norm Maleng and County Sheriff Dave Reichert, and a quick appearance by County Executive Ron Sims (who told The Stranger he disagreed with Sidran on "free speech issues"), the early-morning crowd was made up of enthusiastic, well-dressed unknowns--all of them (1,300) Sidran supporters.
Indeed, Sidran's kickoff event was packed--alarmingly so--and the people crammed into the ballroom greeted Sidran's protect-public-safety line with a round of whooping applause. Sidran went on to promise Seattle a dose of tough love, Republican style. He boasted about combating nightclub violence, ridiculed building more homeless shelters, and blamed homelessness on alcoholism and drug addiction. And of course, he invoked "Mardi Gras mayhem." But Sidran wasn't the first speaker of the day to bring up our unpleasant Mardi Gras. Mike James, former KING TV anchor and a member of Sidran's steering committee, invoked the violence at Mardi Gras and the Civil War.
The rest of Sidran's speech focused on what is new terrain for Sidran: Sound Transit and transportation issues. And on this topic--while he didn't have any answers--Sidran emerged as the only candidate whose position on transit is based in reality. Clearly Sidran has spent some time cramming with Sound Transit critics like Rob McKenna: "Let's face it--the current light-rail project is dead," he said, before promising to scrap the failed project and start over. "We should not be afraid of going back to the voters if that's what it takes." Meanwhile, Sidran was on target about Schell's last-ditch proposal to lay light-rail track for the south line only: "I think Mayor Schell's recent proposal to just start building light rail somewhere in the belief that something good will turn up later is the kind of fuzzy, wishful thinking that created this mess in the first place."
Sidran did have some misfires, though. For example, during his speech, he sounded some stock Republican themes--bashing the city's "unrestrained budget," for instance. However, in a follow-up interview after the speech, the candidate couldn't give a single example of "unrestrained" spending (relying on Republican anti-tax sound bites). Nor could he tell The Stranger what specific services he would cut in order to bring the city's budget under control.
On the lighter side, Sidran's breakfast spread was, to put it nicely, pretty skimpy. For $35, the almost completely white law-and-order crowd was treated to a pathetic little fruit plate and a few greasy muffins. Sidran is clearly reading his Republican audience incorrectly. At John Carlson's fundraising breakfast at the Sheraton last fall (remember John Carlson?), an eerily similar law-and-order crowd was treated to a full breakfast: eggs, bacon, toast, the works. A candidate who runs on red-meat Republican issues--public safety, spending cuts, blame the homeless--really ought to feed his supporters a little red meat.
