In this morning's quick recap of last night's first debate between the four Democrats vying to make it through the primary in the race for King County Executive—K.C. Council Member Dow Constantine, State Rep. Ross Hunter, State Sen. Fred Jarrett, K.C. Council Member Larry Phillips—I said I'd follow up with more.  

Here goes.

1. Judging from the cheers, the Constantine campaign did the best pre-debate organizing—filling the room with his supporters. For example, the crowd broke out into inexplicably heavy applause after Constantine's opening statement.

I say "inexplicably" because Constantine's opening statement—"it's time to get past the politics of division"—was cliche-heavy and, arguably the weakest of the bunch (not including Hunter's desultory philippic.)

2. I did not see a single Jarrett or Hunter sign. The place was plastered with Constantine and Phillips signs.

3. While Phillips  wasn't asked the question we suggested in yesterday's Morning Fizz (how can you be so critical of Ron Sims and the recent County budgets when you've been the budget chair and Council chair?), he stepped in it, boasting that he'd been the budget chair four times. And, giving himself a gold star, he said his budgets had never been vetoed by the Executive, Ron Sims. 

4. I wasn't, in fact, impressed with the evening's line of soft-ball and open-ended questioning ("What's your best environmental accomplishment?" "How will you help entrepreneurs?"). The biggest waste-of-time question of the night was when the four Democrats were asked if they supported Tim Eyman's latest let's-shrink-the-government initiative, I-1033. And if so: WHY? 

Well duh, none of them support it—I-1033 puts formal limits on the state budget—and the question simply gave the crew a chance to blather; except, to his credit, Hunter, who refrained. In one of his best moments (after Phillips and Jarrett exploited the moment to pontificate), Rep. Hunter  simply said, "No, I don't support it. It's a bad idea," forgoing the rest of his allotted time.

5. Asked what their "top environmental priority" was—Phillips talked about the "mobility revolution" and expanding light rail (good answer); Constantine talked about fighting sprawl and condemned our County's history of bad land use planning (good answer); Jarrett said there wasn't one answer—"the number one priority is the environment" (cop out); and Hunter talked about a bill  that passed in the House—a tax on petroleum to pay for storm water clean up—that failed in the Senate (a dig at Sen. Jarrett?) While the bill never got as far as a vote in the Senate, environmental lobbyists report Jarrett was not on their list of 'Yes' votes.  

6. Hunter had some of the evening's most provocative answers; i.e., he wasn't in lock step. That doesn't necessarily mean they were the best answers, but it's always impressive to see someone challenge the Democratic herd. (The event was sponsored by the King County Democrats.)

First, Hunter said he was open to the idea of consolidating the County jail under the purview of the Sheriff ("I'd be open to that if it saved on costs").

Second, Hunter acknowledged that the critical areas ordinance (which drives conservative property rights advocates bonkers) was "the most hated" ordinance, and he offered a different way of enforcing it. He said the County should start by telling property owners, "Here's the outcome we need, you show us the best  way you can fit with that." That does seem much smarter than the knee jerk liberal approach of telling the rubes to F-off and follow the top-down law or else! 

Phillips, for example, played to the Democratic faithful saying: "Most of that work is on the books, and it's behind us. It's required." 

7. Another cop out from Jarrett: Asked about fixing the state's unfair tax structure, he said it was up to the people to pass an initiative. "We politicians are never going to do that."

8. Turning a positive into a negative. One of Hunter's big failures this session was his inability to get a 6 percent utility tax authority for King County to fund social services.

That might be because Hunter's colleagues in the House think he's a little arrogant and so don't rush to support his bills. (Note that while Hunter was the big education reformer in the House this year, the big education reform bill was sponsored by friendly Rep. Pat Sullivan. It passed.)

Anyway, Hunter turned his utility tax defeat into boasting rights for going to bat for King County.

9. There weren't a lot of fireworks last night, but things did get feisty toward the end when the candidates were asked how they would make sure Sound Transit gets built. (Key funding for light rail, about $20 million, was left out of the transportation budget this year.)

Constantine, who fielded the question first, pounced. "Of course, we can talk to the legislators in the room," before going on to say the legislature had to "stop trying to sabotage light rail."

Phillips was even more on point saying we had to elect legislators, "who understand that transit is a priority ... we have to make sure members know [transportation] is not just highways and cars." 

Hunter botched this question. He kept repeating his tone deaf sound bite that the legislature had to "stay out the way"—by which he intended to mean that Olympia shouldn't stymie local transportation projects. But he came off sounding like he believed legislators shouldn't go to bat for transit.

Jarrett, the real target of Phillips' and Constantine's jabs, boasted that he passed legislation this year calling on the state to honor its commitment to light rail. True. But this came after he caught hell earlier when the Senate transportation committee (which he's on) left $30 million for Sound Transit out of the budget. In fairness to Jarrett, he restored about $10 million. 

That's my report. A weird thing is this: I feel like Larry Phillips was the standout last night—confident, articulate, and in command of the issues. But my notes don't flag much of what he said. 

Here are some other reports: 

These two are from the Northwest Progressive Institute, whose 22-year-old executive director, Democrat Andrew Villeneuve, moderated the debate.

And this, from the Stranger's Erica C. Barnett, is what we call a "burn." In this instance, a burn on Hunter and Jarrett.