Nick Licata's jam-packed June 14 campaign kickoff at China Harbor on Westlake Avenue was crackling with energy. The ballroom was filled with Licata's allies and antagonists alike. Licata had clearly emerged, after four scrappy years of being the city council's smart, honorable lefty, as the one Seattle politician who commands attention and respect. Neighborhood, civil rights, and progressive activists count on his vote. Downtown power brokers, developers, and law-and-order types (all of whom unsuccessfully tried to recruit someone to run against Licata) long for his vote.
With the exception of Licata's kooky comments about the People's Revolution of 1863 or something, there wasn't a weird, nervous, contrived, or uncomfortable moment during the whole shindig. That wasn't the case at the season's earlier kickoffs. You couldn't keep from squirming when mayoral wannabe Greg Nickels (Chair of Sound Transit's finance committee) hyped light rail, or when incumbent mayor Paul Schell (at his sparsely attended kickoff) talked about his wealth of support.
Here's the irony: Unlike the cloying Nickels and the desperate Schell, Nick Licata isn't running for the city's top spot. He's running (unopposed!) to maintain his city council seat. This is a shame. Licata needs to drop the humble act and run for mayor. The city needs him.
While Mayor Paul Schell is not as bad as everyone would like to believe (just check out the city budget to get a sense of his excellent priorities), and while top challenger Nickels is a solid, hard-working Democrat, it's really hard to get amped about either guy as mayor of Seattle. Neither Schell nor Nickels--despite their left-leaning politics--are inspiring, bold, or popular politicians. Nickels has been running hard for months now (his picture has been in our paper three out of the last four weeks), and people still don't know who he is.
Well, voters certainly know who Licata is, and here's what they should do. On the September 18 primary ballot, or on the mail-in ballots that go out two weeks earlier, there'll be a line under the list of mayoral candidates that will say: "Write in name of candidate." Stranger readers should write in Nicholas J. Licata (you have to write his registered name) and color the oval next to the line. If Nicholas J. Licata is one of the top two vote-getters, he will move ahead to the general election for mayor.
Licata doesn't want to run for mayor in the primary because he's worried that--if he loses--he'll have forfeited his council seat. (You can't run for both.) However, once he sees how much damn support he's got out there, he's sure to change his mind for the general election. Let Nicholas J. Licata know the support is there. Write him in.
