It's too hot to think, too hot to write, and certainly too hot to throw a party. Nonetheless, with the first round of fall elections just eight weeks away, that's exactly what candidates for state and local races are doing, with at least a dozen political events planned in the next week alone. But the busiest candidate is also the one with the best odds for reelection: Sally Clark, who was appointed to the city council seat vacated by Jim Compton just six months ago. With the city's filing just days away, Clark has drawn not a single challenger. Despite the phenomenally uncrowded field, Clark has held 12 campaign events in June and July alone, raising an impressive $58,000. Meanwhile, Citizens for a Better Waterfront, the Ethics and Elections–sanctioned front for Greg Nickels's pro-Alaskan Way tunnel campaign, has raised about $40,000 despite lingering uncertainty over whether the viaduct question will make it onto the ballot at all. Much of that is from the Downtown Seattle Association, the Holland America cruise line, and the Seattle Mariners.
So far, the pro-tunnel folks have spent the overwhelming majority of their money on exactly three things: polls, focus groups, and fundraising for more money. By far the biggest chunk has gone to Seattle political consulting firm Evans/McDonough, for polls ($15,000) and focus groups ($25,000). Pollster Don McDonough would say only that the focus groups and poll, "looked at opinions about the viaduct and various replacement options," but given the difficulty Nickels has had separating his campaign activities from his official business, it wouldn't be surprising at all to see some of those poll results morph into official Nickels sound bites in the near future. Legally, according to Ethics and Elections Director Wayne Barnett, it isn't campaigning unless there's something on the ballot; and even then, he says, a challenger would have to prove that Nickels used the focus-group results in his official capacity. In unrelated (?) news, the city's Department of Transportation is hiring a viaduct communications officer to "coordinate with the mayor's office in all communications efforts related to the project," among other duties. The position will pay between $54,000 and $60,500 a year.
On Wednesday, July 26, the city council's urban development committee will take up the ever-controversial issue of detached accessory dwelling units (DADUs), also known as mother-in-law apartments. Nickels proposed allowing DADUs citywide a couple of years ago, but abandoned that plan in favor of a much more limited proposal (in the south end only) after neighborhood activists shrieked that the apartments would bring traffic, noise, and—horrors!—density to Seattle's sleepy single-family neighborhoods. (Opponents call DADUs, oxymoronically, "in-city sprawl.") According to a council staffer who works on the issue, a city-commissioned study predicted that the new legislation would lead to the construction of just 10 to 20 new DADUs across Southeast Seattle. Nonetheless, I wouldn't be surprised to see a barrage of opposition from anti-DADU activists at the urban planning committee briefing on the issue Wednesday afternoon.
