Meanwhile, over in the pro-monorail camp, things were looking grim, as jubilation over last month's Superior Court ruling tossing out the anti-monorail initiative yielded to weariness and outright despair. "Six weeks is not enough time to really get together a true grassroots campaign," monorail stalwart Peter Sherwin lamented. "I think this will be fought [on the Monorail Recall side] by earned and paid-for media." As for himself, Sherwin said, "I'm just tired."
That was understandable: Just that morning, in a decision remarkable for its brevity, the State Court of Appeals had overturned an injunction against the initiative that had been issued by King County Superior Court judge Steven Gonzalez, saying only that "there is insufficient justification to permit this court to interfere with the initiative process in this case." The ruling left unanswered the major legal questions in the lawsuit, which the Seattle Monorail Project filed against initiative backers in July: namely, whether the measure was outside the legal scope of the initiative process, and whether some 10,000 signatures gathered under an old ballot title should be counted toward the total number of valid signatures required to get the measure on the ballot. The SMP has appealed the decision to the Supreme Court, which would probably have to take up the request in the next three days in order to keep the measure off the ballot, which many observers say is unlikely to happen.
The agency, for its part, seemed perplexed by the court's refusal to issue at least a preliminary ruling, particularly given the substantial cost to the city--nearly $900,000--of putting the initiative on the ballot. "The court has a fundamental responsibility to try to effect the best public-policy result for the greatest good," SMP deputy director Anne Levinson said late Monday afternoon. "The notion that the court would let it be voted on, only to say later, 'Sorry you went to all that trouble and spent all that money [campaigning], but your vote didn't really count... it just frustrates the voters." The SMP made a similar argument in its appeal, claiming that the order "will cause significant confusion" by asking people to vote "on an initiative that the trial court has invalidated and that was certified based on a substantial number of invalid signatures."
Besides confusing the public, monorail supporters say, putting the initiative on the ballot is just another grenade in the path of the already embattled agency. The SMP had planned to finalize a contract, sell bonds, and break ground later this fall. Now all those plans have been thrown into question. Although Levinson says the agency is "bound and determined to get this project done without falling into the kind of delays so many other projects have fallen into," it's hard to see the ruling as anything other than a monkey wrench in the agency's already tight fall schedule. Moreover, if the initiative passes and is later overturned, the agency will be in the uncomfortable position of moving forward on a project the voters have rejected.
Meanwhile, the campaign continues. Monorail Recall, backed by local landlord and money man Martin Selig (who showed up at last week's appeals court hearing wielding an art catalog from Christie's, the upscale auction house) starts with a significant advantage: deep pockets (Selig's) and a campaign structure that has been in place since last March. Pro-monorail forces--who reacted to Judge Gonzalez's decision, less than one month earlier, with audible sighs of relief--have no headquarters, no campaign, and no plan for what to do about the impending election, now just six weeks away.
"We're waiting until Thursday," when the council will likely vote to put the initiative on the ballot, Sherwin says. However, he adds, "I don't see us putting up 5,000 yard signs in six weeks." The grassroots pro-monorail effort will also have to contend with a campaign whose financial resources are only matched by its mendacity. The campaign's paid signature gatherers, many of them brought in from out of town, became notorious for making false and disingenuous statements, including claims that the monorail is over budget; that the line has been cut from 14 miles to 4; and that the initiative would only change the route, rather than undoing the entire project. Monorail backers will have to marshal all their resources to combat the anti-monorail campaign's well-funded, deceitful crusade to stop the voter-approved transportation project.
Grant Cogswell, who coauthored I-41, the first monorail initiative, could hardly disguise his disdain when he described his reaction to the decision. "Lies plus money gets a lot done," Cogswell says. "These people try to make us appear to be what they are, which is a monolithic, powerful force that's unaccountable to the people, and they try to make themselves appear to be what we are, which is a grassroots movement that is trying to take care of the welfare of the city. Their disregard for the welfare of the city is despicable."
Back in council chambers, the elected officials who would be charged with putting an initiative they opposed on the ballot were already making dour predictions about the outcome of a November election. "I feel pretty discouraged about transportation in Seattle," council member Peter Steinbrueck said, "given the imbalance of funding between the two sides, and Seattle's historic reluctance to move forward with transportation improvements." The initiative, Steinbrueck added, appears to be "headed for the ballot, and you can bet which way it's going to go."
