When pollster Don McDonough released his sky-high monorail poll numbers earlier this month, some of the survey's other findings (negative findings) were kept quiet. The Stranger has learned that a page of results from the 80-item questionnaire was left on the cutting-room floor. Those findings were not about the monorail though, they were about, among other things, Sound Transit.

According to a source familiar with the poll, when the mayor's office and the monorail contingent met to go over the numbers at McDonough's office, folks were told to hand back the page with Sound Transit's poor showing. (The poll was commissioned and paid for by Monorail NOW! with fundraising help from Mayor Greg Nickels.) Monorail NOW! co-chair Tom Weeks, one of the few people at the meeting, confirmed that a page with Sound Transit findings got deep-sixed. "We all looked at it," Weeks says, "and thought, 'No one is going to benefit from this page being public.' We handed it back in."

The mayor's office was not as candid about the meeting. In fact, Nickels' staffers were downright cagey. First, they said they didn't remember if there had even been any Sound Transit findings in the poll. Moreover, they denied that any page with Sound Transit findings had been deep-sixed. Later, they acknowledged that there was a purged page that may have had some Sound Transit numbers on it. The mayor's office eventually responded by concluding that our story was "inaccurate." They insisted that the real reason for shelving the page was not Sound Transit numbers, but another set of findings: polling results about the mayor and the city council.

This reason seems suspect, though. First of all, they didn't exactly have their story straight. The mayor's office originally said there were numbers on specific council members, which would make that polling somewhat sensitive. However, that story turned out to be misleading. Pollster McDonough told me that there was simply a general rating about the entire council. Second, in re-telling the story, the mayor's office let me know that Nickels' numbers were good. Well why the heck would the mayor's office deep-six a page sporting Nickels' own positive numbers? All this leads me to believe that the actual reason the page got buried was in fact the thumbs down on Nickels' pet project: Sound Transit.

Weeks ultimately told me that "both" issues--Sound Transit's dismal numbers, and polling on local politicians--caused the group to bury the page.

Deputy Mayor Tim Ceis said he'd try to get me a copy, but he didn't know where the missing page was.

Luckily, Monorail NOW! consultant and local political muckety-muck Blair Butterworth hadn't been at the original meeting where the poll was discussed, and so (I guess) didn't get marching orders to nix the page. He was happy to fill me in. "It said what everybody already knows," Butterworth explained, "Sound Transit is very unpopular." (To be fair, light-rail technology polled well.)

Butterworth wouldn't give me the exact Sound Transit numbers, but one person familiar with the poll described Sound Transit's rating as "Schell-esque": a reference to one-termer Paul Schell's pathetic 20-percent showing during last year's election.

The tale of the missing page illustrates a couple of important things. First, it obviously highlights (ARE YOU LISTENING IN WASHINGTON, D.C.?!?) that Sound Transit is not popular.

More important, it illustrates some questionable political instincts by Weeks and Monorail NOW! Monorail NOW!'s acquiescence to Nickels' agenda (hushing up negative Sound Transit numbers) is befuddling.

Being cowed by Nickels (for fear of retaliation) is silly. Nickels would be a fool to get in Monorail NOW!'s way. Consider: Monorail NOW! is heading up a campaign for a populist issue that has a whopping 80-percent approval rating. Meanwhile, Monorail NOW! has everything to gain from trashing Sound Transit. After all, one big reason monorail is so popular is because people are frustrated with Sound Transit's inadequate and inefficient plan. (Sound Transit diehards recently tried to bail out the slipshod agency by requesting a quarter of a billion dollars just to get the starter line to Sea-Tac.)

If McDonough's poll showed that Sound Transit had only a 20-percent approval rating, Monorail NOW! should be working that into its campaign literature, not putting it in the shredder.

josh@thestranger.com