Seattle Police Chief Norm Stamper got some instructions in racial sensitivity last week from the new head of the Seattle Urban League.

When Stamper and Mayor Paul Schell held a joint news conference at Capitol Hill's First African Methodist Episcopal Church on September 21, Stamper messed up by failing to introduce two black officers -- both of whom are active in the neighborhood. One of the dissed officers, in fact, was the East Precinct commander -- Captain T. Malliet.

According to Urban League president James Kelly, one of the mayor's aides overheard him grumbling in the back of the room and immediately passed the chief a note. Stamper quickly corrected his mistake. Kelly approached Stamper and Schell later about it. "I just wanted to put it on the record that I thought it was an oversight," Kelly says. "If I went into the Asian community or the Jewish community or the Latino community and I made that mistake, people would bring that to my attention." -- PHIL CAMPBELL

Inaccessible Government

The brand new King County administrative offices, located by the Kingdome at 201 S. Jackson, opened its doors last week for 1,400 county employees from the Department of Transportation, the Department of Natural Resources, and Metro. Unfortunately, the doors aren't so easy to open for disabled employees and disabled Metro passengers who come to the new center for bus passes and the lost and found. Wright Runstad, the contractor, didn't equip the building with handicap accessible buttons. After employees started a minor ruckus about the problem, management pledged to make the building more accessible. "It's not required by code," says King County project manager Laurel Rhoades, "but if the tenants want to go beyond the code, at extra cost to them, I'm going to put it in." -- JOSH FEIT

Stir Stick

A gay Starbucks barista in San Francisco has served up a hot lawsuit against Seattle's $3.1 billion Seattle coffee chain. In the complaint, filed in San Francisco Superior Court on September 13, Peter Eastwood says two different supervisors sexually harassed him. One supervisor, Eastwood says, whipped out his dick and said, "Come here, Pete, how bad do want your promotion? I can tell you like black dick; why don't you come here and I'll make you my assistant." A second supervisor, the complaint alleges, rubbed his groin against Eastwood's butt. Eastwood says Starbucks management did not take the instances seriously, calling him a "drama queen" who was "blowing things out of proportion." The "drama queen" is taking them to court. -- NANCY DREW

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