News
Cola Candidate Ratings: City Council Position 9
Sticking with our commitment to be a more objective and balanced source of news (yep, this “liberal” site is the site that broke the story about the trickery of Democratic consulting firm, Moxie Media), we’re doing things differently this year than we have in the past. This year, we’re not going to tell you how to vote. Exactly.
Inspired by the even-keeled Seattle/King CountyMunicipal League, which ranks candidates based on skill, experience, and policy acumen rather than on ideology, we’ve been digging in to candidate resumes and doing interviews to come up with our own ratings.
In other words: We don't really care where a candidate stands on the tunnel. (OK, Erica does, but that didn't factor in to our ratings.) Instead, we’re grading the candidates on: Resume; Knowledge of the Issues; and Their To-Do List & Ability to Get it Done. We’ll also be issuing Bonus Points and Demerits.
Our scale: Exceptional; Above Average; Acceptable; So-so; Unimpressive; Unacceptable.
As for non-candidate election season stuff, including Ref. 1, we’re going to cut through the campaign rhetoric on both sides to tell you what this vote is actually about (and we don’t mean the arcane language on the ballot), and then we’ll break down the best and worst arguments on each side.
Our first batch: Seattle City Council.
Sally Clark challenger Dian Ferguson
City Council Position 9
Sally Clark (incumbent)
Resume: Above Average
Sally Clark is a strong contender, along with Tom Rasmussen, for Seattle's most boring council member. (In her Municipal League questionnaire, Clark tacitly acknowledges this, boasting that at the end of the long process of updating the city's multifamily plan, "I made a bold, difficult recommendation – that we step back and start again.")
However, that isn't necessarily a bad thing. A workhorse who heads up the (boring) land use committee, Clark has a deliberative style that's both infuriating (it took how many years to adopt the South Downtown zoning plan) and undeniably effective. On the council, she's worked to update the city's multifamily code, make it easier for food carts and trucks to operate, sponsored a "meathead law" that makes it easier to crack down on rowdy bar patrons (as opposed to the bar and clubs they patronize), and facilitate taller development in South Downtown.
Knowledge of the Issues: Exceptional
See above. Clark is a wonk's wonk, the kind of person who will stay up at night reading land-use reports and cite specific sections of the municipal code to make a point.
To-Do List & Ability to Get it Done: Above Average
In the future, Clark wants to come up with a compromise on paid sick leave (she likes the latest version of the sick leave ordinance, but worries it doesn't take companies that employ very-part-time or seasonal workers into account), implement inclusionary zoning (mandating things like affordable housing in new developments, rather than providing incentives), invest in job development programs like apprenticeships, and become council president---a perfect position for her bureaucratic brain.
Bonus Points
Clark isn't self-important or ashamed to change her mind when new information presents itself. For example, she now says she's "coming around to the idea of" reconfirming the police chief, a move she didn't previously support. And she now thinks City Attorney Pete Holmes is "doing a great job" in the office, despite being "nervous" when Holmes, a longtime police accountability advocate, was elected in 2009.
Demerits
Clark tends to vote with the council majority and land squarely in the middle of the road on almost every issue. Sometimes that instinct for compromise makes sense; other times, it strikes us as more reflexive than thoughtful.
Dian Ferguson
Resume: Above Average
Ferguson's resume is impressive (perhaps too impressive; see below). She majored in Asian studies, graduated from the Evans school with a degree in public administration, worked in D.C., coordinated a summer youth program for the city of Seattle, worked with the Girls Club of America, was a nonprofit manager, worked at the United Way of King County, directed the Women's Funding Alliance, was a program agent at King County, worked for several family businesses, including as a landlord in Tacoma, and headed up the Seattle Community Action Network, the public-TV network that was shut down last year due to budget cuts.
Knowledge of the Issues: Acceptable
Ferguson isn't terribly specific about why she's running or what she hopes to accomplish on the council, saying only that her opponent Clark votes with the majority too often and that she would move forward more quickly than Clark on things like the deep-bore tunnel (which she, like Clark, supports). She wants to improve South End schools, but questions the size of this year's Families and Education Levy, which would benefit those same schools. And on many other issues (upzoning around Roosevelt, reconfirming the police chief), her views are identical to Clark's.
Her main issue seems to be affordable housing, and she's well-versed in the details. Her command of the issues on this subject will aid her mission to redefine definitions around affordable housing.
To-Do List and Ability to Get it Done: Acceptable
Ferguson's her resume is so wide-ranging that it raises our eyebrows: Why so many career moves? Experience is good, but employers are right to question a job applicant who has move around so much. We question whether Ferguson will be able to stay focused and be effective through a four-year council term.
Bonus Points
Ferguson has energy and charisma, two traits Clark sometimes lacks. Effective or not, we do think she'd shake up the council and create sparks on a council that has lacked friction since the departure of Peter Steinbrueck, Jan Drago, and Richard McIver, to name a few.
Demerits
During our interview, Ferguson acknowledged that the reason she's running against Clark is that Clark waffled on funding for SCAN (and ultimately voted to open public-television services up to a competitive bidding process). City council races shouldn't hinge on grudges.
Inspired by the even-keeled Seattle/King CountyMunicipal League, which ranks candidates based on skill, experience, and policy acumen rather than on ideology, we’ve been digging in to candidate resumes and doing interviews to come up with our own ratings.
In other words: We don't really care where a candidate stands on the tunnel. (OK, Erica does, but that didn't factor in to our ratings.) Instead, we’re grading the candidates on: Resume; Knowledge of the Issues; and Their To-Do List & Ability to Get it Done. We’ll also be issuing Bonus Points and Demerits.
Our scale: Exceptional; Above Average; Acceptable; So-so; Unimpressive; Unacceptable.
As for non-candidate election season stuff, including Ref. 1, we’re going to cut through the campaign rhetoric on both sides to tell you what this vote is actually about (and we don’t mean the arcane language on the ballot), and then we’ll break down the best and worst arguments on each side.
Our first batch: Seattle City Council.
Sally Clark challenger Dian Ferguson
City Council Position 9
Sally Clark (incumbent)
Resume: Above Average
Sally Clark is a strong contender, along with Tom Rasmussen, for Seattle's most boring council member. (In her Municipal League questionnaire, Clark tacitly acknowledges this, boasting that at the end of the long process of updating the city's multifamily plan, "I made a bold, difficult recommendation – that we step back and start again.")
However, that isn't necessarily a bad thing. A workhorse who heads up the (boring) land use committee, Clark has a deliberative style that's both infuriating (it took how many years to adopt the South Downtown zoning plan) and undeniably effective. On the council, she's worked to update the city's multifamily code, make it easier for food carts and trucks to operate, sponsored a "meathead law" that makes it easier to crack down on rowdy bar patrons (as opposed to the bar and clubs they patronize), and facilitate taller development in South Downtown.
Knowledge of the Issues: Exceptional
See above. Clark is a wonk's wonk, the kind of person who will stay up at night reading land-use reports and cite specific sections of the municipal code to make a point.
To-Do List & Ability to Get it Done: Above Average
In the future, Clark wants to come up with a compromise on paid sick leave (she likes the latest version of the sick leave ordinance, but worries it doesn't take companies that employ very-part-time or seasonal workers into account), implement inclusionary zoning (mandating things like affordable housing in new developments, rather than providing incentives), invest in job development programs like apprenticeships, and become council president---a perfect position for her bureaucratic brain.
Bonus Points
Clark isn't self-important or ashamed to change her mind when new information presents itself. For example, she now says she's "coming around to the idea of" reconfirming the police chief, a move she didn't previously support. And she now thinks City Attorney Pete Holmes is "doing a great job" in the office, despite being "nervous" when Holmes, a longtime police accountability advocate, was elected in 2009.
Demerits
Clark tends to vote with the council majority and land squarely in the middle of the road on almost every issue. Sometimes that instinct for compromise makes sense; other times, it strikes us as more reflexive than thoughtful.
Dian Ferguson
Resume: Above Average
Ferguson's resume is impressive (perhaps too impressive; see below). She majored in Asian studies, graduated from the Evans school with a degree in public administration, worked in D.C., coordinated a summer youth program for the city of Seattle, worked with the Girls Club of America, was a nonprofit manager, worked at the United Way of King County, directed the Women's Funding Alliance, was a program agent at King County, worked for several family businesses, including as a landlord in Tacoma, and headed up the Seattle Community Action Network, the public-TV network that was shut down last year due to budget cuts.
Knowledge of the Issues: Acceptable
Ferguson isn't terribly specific about why she's running or what she hopes to accomplish on the council, saying only that her opponent Clark votes with the majority too often and that she would move forward more quickly than Clark on things like the deep-bore tunnel (which she, like Clark, supports). She wants to improve South End schools, but questions the size of this year's Families and Education Levy, which would benefit those same schools. And on many other issues (upzoning around Roosevelt, reconfirming the police chief), her views are identical to Clark's.
Her main issue seems to be affordable housing, and she's well-versed in the details. Her command of the issues on this subject will aid her mission to redefine definitions around affordable housing.
To-Do List and Ability to Get it Done: Acceptable
Ferguson's her resume is so wide-ranging that it raises our eyebrows: Why so many career moves? Experience is good, but employers are right to question a job applicant who has move around so much. We question whether Ferguson will be able to stay focused and be effective through a four-year council term.
Bonus Points
Ferguson has energy and charisma, two traits Clark sometimes lacks. Effective or not, we do think she'd shake up the council and create sparks on a council that has lacked friction since the departure of Peter Steinbrueck, Jan Drago, and Richard McIver, to name a few.
Demerits
During our interview, Ferguson acknowledged that the reason she's running against Clark is that Clark waffled on funding for SCAN (and ultimately voted to open public-television services up to a competitive bidding process). City council races shouldn't hinge on grudges.
