News
Evening Campaign Fizz: Car-Tab Opponents Form PACs
Opponents of the proposed $60 vehicle license fee, including Seattle Displacement Coalition founder John Fox, have formed two separate groups to oppose the fee. The first, Sidewalks and Streets, is apparently being organized by former city council candidate and Maple Leaf neighborhood activist David Miller; the second, Citizens Against Raising Cartabs, by Fox, Aurora Ave. business leader Fay Garneau, and Seattle residents Andy McDonald and Ken Bertrand.
The city council voted to put the $60 fee---which was smaller than the $80 fee originally recommended by a citizens' advisory group earlier this year---on the November ballot earlier this month.
In an email to fellow car-tab opponents, Fox said he would be willing to organize a meeting and possibly set up a PAC to fight against the car-tab fee, depending on how many people were willing to "join me in fighting $60 tab fees for the extension of Paul Allen's streetcar and other non-essentials!" That meeting reportedly happened last night. The fee will, as Fox claims, pay to study extending the South Lake Union streetcar, but it will be much more heavily focused on improving bus corridors, investing in pedestrian safety projects, and basic road maintenance.
Neither group has registered with the state Public Disclosure Commission, which they are required to do once they start campaigning, yet. Although Seattle Ethics and Elections director Wayne Barnett says the latter group, which has reportedly raised $5,000 so far from Garneau, does not have to file disclosure documents with the city ("We can encourage them, but we've got no muscle here" to regulate a campaign that effectively deals with a separate government entity, the citywide Transportation Benefits District, he says), Fox says the group plans to file with ethics and elections "soon."
The city council voted to put the $60 fee---which was smaller than the $80 fee originally recommended by a citizens' advisory group earlier this year---on the November ballot earlier this month.
In an email to fellow car-tab opponents, Fox said he would be willing to organize a meeting and possibly set up a PAC to fight against the car-tab fee, depending on how many people were willing to "join me in fighting $60 tab fees for the extension of Paul Allen's streetcar and other non-essentials!" That meeting reportedly happened last night. The fee will, as Fox claims, pay to study extending the South Lake Union streetcar, but it will be much more heavily focused on improving bus corridors, investing in pedestrian safety projects, and basic road maintenance.
Neither group has registered with the state Public Disclosure Commission, which they are required to do once they start campaigning, yet. Although Seattle Ethics and Elections director Wayne Barnett says the latter group, which has reportedly raised $5,000 so far from Garneau, does not have to file disclosure documents with the city ("We can encourage them, but we've got no muscle here" to regulate a campaign that effectively deals with a separate government entity, the citywide Transportation Benefits District, he says), Fox says the group plans to file with ethics and elections "soon."
