Nervous About Rumors

Hmmm if there is truly a lobbying effort to not pick Pollet, to violate the will of the precinct committee officers and the 46th district group, that’s amazing.  I wonder who’s behind such an effort?

Is there any connection to the fact that Scott White worked at the county for many years?

I believe the Council picked Steve Hammond, the PCOs’ third choice behind Pam Roach and Phil Fortunato, after the death of Kent Pullen. This is not unprecedented.

I really doubt it. Scott taught me first and foremost to respect the process.  I don’t think he would want the vote to be disregarded.

When was this?!

I live in the 46th and am extremely disappointed that Gerry Pollet was “elected” by the PCOs.  They are all out of touch with reality and the community.  If anything, we should have an election.  Gerry lost for good reason.  PCOs installing him in office is a joke.

Well you cann always come up with an ”exception that proves the rule.”  Again:  who’s behind this? 

Could be.  White was forced out of his job as Chief-of-Staff to the Council after he campaigned for Carolyn Edmonds against Bob Ferguson.  I heard that Bob cut a deal with Larry Phillips to vote for Phillips again as Council Chairman as long as White was released.  Perhaps the democrats want to honor White and/or poke Ferguson in the eye by picking White’s former legislative aide.  

There will be an election next fall. This appointment is only for the rest of the term.

you mean Sly Cann.  (I heard  he was not a top level legislative aide, by the way, just a mail opener for Scott White.) If he pledged to honor the district organization’s choice, and people are out there working on his behalf to try to get the Council to name him, then the honorable thing would be for him to publicly disavow that effort and say he wouldn’t even take a council appointment to the state rep position as he gave his word to abide by the legislative district group’s choice.  Just publicly announce that and cut off this lobbying now.   Right? 

There will be an election soon in which anyone is free to run.

It would help Publicola separate itself from the rest of the lame-stream media (I’m afraid that Palin did call it correctly) by using TIME as an element of rumor-spreading.

For example, you state above “Democrats in Olympia are working on a potential $1.5 billion bond proposal for construction projects to send to voters this year. The current package—being discussed on both the senate and house side—would end up bringing in about $100 million through sales tax revenues from construction and would create about 30,000 construction jobs.”

Don’t you think your rumor might be a little more useful if you could add some thing like “…and would create about 30,000 construction jobs…FOR X PERIOD OF TIME”?

Or maybe acknowledge that “…would create about 30,000 construction jobs…BUT NO ONE IN OLYMPIA WANTS TO DISCUSS HOW LONG THE JOBS WILL LAST.”

The number of jobs created really shouldn’t be much consideration of any political calculus — it’s absurd to borrow money to create jobs UNLESS YOU REALLY WANT THE WORK DONE.

But it’s even more absurd for Publicola to fail to ask whether those jobs are for the NEXT THIRTY YEARS (the presumed lifetime of the bonds) or the NEXT SIX MONTHS (a plausible duration for a project.)

You elected the PCOs, who elected Gerry. If you think your PCO is “out of touch”, run against him/her.

Sly did exactly that.

One very salient reason why midterm vacancies are filled by PCO appointments are that elections cost money — your tax dollars and mine — that are better spent elsewhere. Vote him out in 2012 if you don’t like him.  

PCOs are elected (or if no one steps up, appointed) to represent their precincts. 105 of 116 PCOs showed up for the meeting called to select candidates for the vacant House position and Gerry Pollet was supported to fill the position by a majority of those PCOs. That’s an awful lot of people to call “out of touch with reality and the community”. If you don’t like the result of this process, a process that ALL the candidates agreed was fair, you are more than welcome to campaign for Gerry’s opponent in November. In the mean time, you should keep your insults to yourself.

I don’t think PCOs should have any say in this, David.  They are all nut jobs.  I want a real election where real people get to vote.

Having PCOs decide something as important as who represents the people in their state legislature is a bizarre way of filling vacancies. Most states have special elections to fill these seats. Yes, it’s costly, but democracy is not free.

What district does Dan Satterberg represent on the King County Council?

Don’t worry, I will.

Don’t worry, I will.

Yeah, let’s throw a few thousand more kids off of Basic Health, so that you can have your precious fucking process.

Very interesting.  Ferguson is also one of the PCOs who voted for Pollet,

It is called democracy, ivan.  

Basic Health will be gone regardless of this.

So run against the PCO in your precinct so you can get someone better.

Yeah, well your PCOs are elected, too. The vote for the House is every two years. Chances are that campaign is beginning already. The appointment process has served the people well. Quit trying to make the perfect the enemy of the good. 

uh huh.  whatever, ivan.  The PCOs are losers.  Their meeting is an exercise in torment.  No one in their right mind would want to deal with them.  Going to their meetings makes me want to be an independent.

Who replaced Dow, how did that process go?

Joe McDermott moved from the House to the Senate and Sharon Nelson was voted for by PCOs and appointed to the House to replace Joe. It was drama-free as far as I can tell.

A committee of stakeholders from Dow’s district was brought together. They went through CV’s of people who expressed interest and interviewed them, and made their recommendations to the Council. The Council then interviewed the selected candidates and selected one from those recommended (Jan Drago).

You’re thinking of the resignation of Erik Poulsen.

They didn’t have 5 votes to get it out of committee.
I didn’t see Patterson on the video, and none of the Republicans were in the meeting.
They passed it subject to the 5th signature due by 1:30. After 1:30 it looks like they have an amendment to the Ord to relieve the committee of the legislation and move it foreword.
Lots of “honoring the process” talk from the only 4 councilmembers in attendance.

They try again at 1:30.

They didn’t have 5 votes to get it out of committee.
I didn’t see Patterson on the video, and none of the Republicans were in the meeting.
They passed it subject to the 5th signature due by 1:30. After 1:30 it looks like they have an amendment to the Ord to relieve the committee of the legislation and move it foreword.
Lots of “honoring the process” talk from the only 4 councilmembers in attendance.

They try again at 1:30.

Don’t waste your breath, Ivan. This “voter” is obviously more interested in whining and tossing insults than doing anything constructive. Reminds of the saying, “Don’t try to teach a pig to sing. It wastes your time and annoys the pig.”

Don’t waste your breath, Ivan. This “voter” is obviously more interested in whining and tossing insults than doing anything constructive. Reminds of the saying, “Don’t try to teach a pig to sing. It wastes your time and annoys the pig.”

“real people” vote on “real ballots” in “real elections” for PCOs, most of whom are not nut jobs.

Also, election of PCOs is currently up in the air due to fallout from the top two primary litigation. Counties don’t want to pay for election of PCOs, but state law explicitly gives PCOs authority to fill vacancies in partisan offices.

“real people” vote on “real ballots” in “real elections” for PCOs, most of whom are not nut jobs.

Also, election of PCOs is currently up in the air due to fallout from the top two primary litigation. Counties don’t want to pay for election of PCOs, but state law explicitly gives PCOs authority to fill vacancies in partisan offices.

It sounds like you’ve been to quite a few of “their meetings”.  Based on your statement above your mind isn’t quite so right, after all.

You know the drill:  If you aren’t part of the solution you are part of the problem.  What’s your beef exactly??

The parties belong to those who show up and do the scut work to make them functional and effective. In my experience, the people in the 46th take what they do very seriously. They do the best they can with the resources and the people that they have, and most of the time they get it right.

If what they do isn’t to your liking or to your satisfaction, then either engage and make it better, or shut the fuck up and go be a fucking independent. The woods are full of whiners like you who are quick to criticize everybody else and absent when there’s work to be done. The PCOs in the 46th don’t owe you jack shit, and quit pretending that they do.    

One more time, who replaced Dow on the council, how did that part go?
Plenty of drama, ended up after a big delay Jan Drago.

How about that non-partisan county council.

One more time, who replaced Dow on the council, how did that part go?
Plenty of drama, ended up after a big delay Jan Drago.

How about that non-partisan county council.

I’m curious how many of that 105 actually did the other part of PCO work – precinct walking in 2011 for 46th endorsed candidates.

Sounds like you and the 46th District Dems would both be better off for you to be an independent. Go for it.

Problem with a special election after such an unexpected vacancy is the district goes without representation for a couple of months or more. The PCO selection process takes only a week or two.

When Sen. McCaslin died in January, the PCOs in the 4th LD got together and sent 3 names to the County Commissioners, who interviewed the three candidates and picked the one they want.  In that case they didn’t pick the #1 vote getter, Matt Shea, because of some pretty silly irregularities that occurred during the whole process.  They instead went with Jeff Baxter, who held the seat last year but lost the special election to complete the term just last month.

Another example is when Steve Hailey died and Don Cox was appointed to take his seat for the year in the 9th LD, or when Laura Grant was appointed by the county commissioners in Franklin, Walla Walla, and Benton Counties to fill her dad’s old seat when he passed in 2009.

Oh yeah, I just remembered that Joe moved from the House to the Senate and Dow went from the Senate to the Council and I got confused and didn’t check that they lined up. I’m not a 34th resident so not surprising my memory was off.

See my comment below. When the Council was made non-partisan, there was no process specified in the charter amendment on how to fill vacancies.
The Council passed legislation to set up a committee of stakeholders from the area represented on the Council previously by Dow (District 8). This committee was made up of volunteers from businesses, non-profits and other community involved individuals.
Any individual who was interested in serving was invited to contact the committee and put themselves in the running. Those individuals submitted paperwork (resume, letter of interest, etc) and were interviewed by the committee. The committee then sent forward to the Council their top picks.
The Council then interviewed these candidates. They had hoped to select someone before they adjourned for Christmas recess, but could not come to agreement. A major sticking point was whether the selectee should promise to be only a caretaker until the next election, or if someone who wished to run should be appointed. I seem to recall the (formerly elected as) D’s supported Sen. Joe McDermott, and the (formerly elected as) R’s supported Jan Drago. But I don’t recall why there was a deadlock (perhaps 6 votes were needed?).
In January, the Council appointed Jan Drago to occupy the seat for a year (approx) based on her promise to only be a caretaker.

Did he say he voted for Gerry?  I know he voted, but I don’t think he has said exactly which name(s) he wrote down.  And at this point it doesn’t matter.

The council was split 4-4.  their “non-partisanship” meant nothing, and still doesn’t.  So the D’s wanted Joe, and the R’s didn’t, so they played games with the process and slowed things down until Larry Phillips made a motion to put Jan’s name up, which passed.  Life moved on.

shouldn’t be hard to find out, they are supposed to be signed ballots.

not suprising at all.  Just last year the Snohomish County Council picked Roe over Kenny for County Prosecutor when the PCO’s overwhelming went for Kenny.  The council is not required to go along with the PCO’s top choice.  If they are doing their due diligence, they should interview all 3 candidates and go with the best qualified.

Exactly. Proves again why the Rs successful move to change county council to “non-partisan” was a scam.

Yep, that is what happened, and I expect that is what eventually happens down the road, not with this one seat.

The problem was the cascade effect, and the desire of the Republicans to accept a caretaker.
With Dow out the council became 4 and 4 “non-partisan” council members.

Exactly Comrade, every communal farm is allowed to endorse their candidate to the party congress

Julia Patterson is on the phone, attending the non-partisan King County Council meeting.

Yeah, it was fun to watch people jump when they had the speakers on so loud she almost shouted “Here!!!” during roll call.

Meanwhile the Democratic Party silently continues to support its rogue and disloyal “roadkill” faction, and the leadership of the Democratic Party caucus in the State Senate continues to show that it has little sway over its members when it comes to issues of budget and tax policy. So are we going to have an another all cuts budget, blame Tim Eyman, and say it’s the best we can do?

For the record it was the “former” Republican members of the King County Council who were behind the  effort to ignore the vote of the 46th LD Democratic  PCOs and the King County Democrats. They perhaps thought with Julia Patterson being home sick that they could derail the nomination on a 4 to 4 vote. 
 Peter von Reichbauer and Kathy Lambert and Reagan Dunn mounted  an intense effort to grill Gerry Pollet on a number of issues but failed as he displayed his wide grasp of the issues.  They left the meeting of the Committee of the Whole after the grilling to prevent a vote of the Committee to send it to the King County Council meeting in the afternoon.
The Democrats then proceded to move the nomination out of committee by signature and after consulting legal counsel got Julia’s signature for the fifth one needed. In the afternoon Julia Patterson was present on the phone to provide the needed 5 vote for Gerry and the Republicans capitulated in their opposition and voted for Gerry in the end.
When David Frockt was nominated to be appointed Senator, Peter von Reichbauer was absent also but was on the phone to vote and did so just like Julia Patterson.
All in all it seemed like a silly exercise by the Republicans but actually it helped Gerry because he showed  through his grasp of the issues and his demeanor in responding to the Republican grilling that he was well qualified to be a Legislator.
 

Correct. She’s got an inferiority complex a mile wide to go with her inch-deep intellect.