City Hall
City Council Retreat: Kazoos, Cutouts, and Golden Elephants
It was no match for previous years' karaoke-filled, out-of-town, multiday excursions, but this year's council retreat---held last week at Seattle Center---was a marked departure from the previous several years' staid, over-facilitated affairs, featuring kazoos, bad jokes about Tim Tebow, fake dating profiles, gold elephants,, and a larger-than-life-size (and presumably Photoshopped) cutout of a shirtless, shorts-clad Bruce Harrell.
This year, instead of presenting their own accomplishments and plans for the coming year, council members and staff did presentations for each other. Some high(low?)lights:
• Jean Godden, noting that she is "the only single councilperson," trotted out a fake OKCupid! profile for the council's central staff, which touted staffers' "focus on your analytical needs and desires," their "interests, [which include] purchasing and payroll," and their search for someone who "can talk long into the night about plastic bags, strip clubs, and rezones";
• Staffers for new council president Sally Clark, protesting that they didn't come prepared, read fake Stranger "I Saw U" ads in their presentation for the city clerk's office ("Let's meet for a public disclosure request. Maybe we can make history together");
• And council staffers parodied incoming land use committee chair Richard Conlin with a skit called "Mr. Conlin's neighborhood," with Conlin as Mr. Rogers ("Trolley will take us to our first stop---the intersection of Transportation Terrace and Land Use Lane!")
The elephants and Bruce Harrell cutout, by the way, were part of a presentation by council central staff director Ben Noble, who presented Harrell's agenda for the public safety committee (along with what Noble called several "elephants in the room").
In a brilliant case of media deflection, Clark's schedule for the retreat alternated committee and department agendas (of potential interest to us media types) with snooze-inducing panels on topics like equitable development, race and social justice, and "Leadership in the 21st Century." The result was that not one media outlet showed up for the retreat. PubliCola watched the event after the fact on Seattle Channel, which, unlike the retreat itself, has a fast forward button.
This year, instead of presenting their own accomplishments and plans for the coming year, council members and staff did presentations for each other. Some high(low?)lights:
• Jean Godden, noting that she is "the only single councilperson," trotted out a fake OKCupid! profile for the council's central staff, which touted staffers' "focus on your analytical needs and desires," their "interests, [which include] purchasing and payroll," and their search for someone who "can talk long into the night about plastic bags, strip clubs, and rezones";
• Staffers for new council president Sally Clark, protesting that they didn't come prepared, read fake Stranger "I Saw U" ads in their presentation for the city clerk's office ("Let's meet for a public disclosure request. Maybe we can make history together");
• And council staffers parodied incoming land use committee chair Richard Conlin with a skit called "Mr. Conlin's neighborhood," with Conlin as Mr. Rogers ("Trolley will take us to our first stop---the intersection of Transportation Terrace and Land Use Lane!")
The elephants and Bruce Harrell cutout, by the way, were part of a presentation by council central staff director Ben Noble, who presented Harrell's agenda for the public safety committee (along with what Noble called several "elephants in the room").
In a brilliant case of media deflection, Clark's schedule for the retreat alternated committee and department agendas (of potential interest to us media types) with snooze-inducing panels on topics like equitable development, race and social justice, and "Leadership in the 21st Century." The result was that not one media outlet showed up for the retreat. PubliCola watched the event after the fact on Seattle Channel, which, unlike the retreat itself, has a fast forward button.
