Podcast appearances and mentions of cathy moore

Play Episode Listen Later Jan 5, 2024 52:02

On this week-in-review, Crystal is joined by Pulitzer Prize winning journalist and Founder and Editor of The Needling, Lex Vaughn! Crystal and Lex dive into the new year's headlines with a debate over Space Needle NYE drone shows vs fireworks, a rundown of new Washington state laws taking effect, and a discussion of why it's important to look past a poll's summary headline. They then chat about the new Seattle City Council taking office, a lawsuit against the City of Burien over its homeless camping law, and a new entrant into the Attorney General's race. As always, a full text transcript of the show is available below and at officialhacksandwonks.com. Find the host, Crystal Fincher, on Twitter at @finchfrii and find today's co-host, Lex Vaughn at @AlexaVaughn. Resources RE-AIR: Ending Youth Incarceration with Dr. Ben Danielson of AHSHAY Center from Hacks & Wonks “The new Washington state laws taking effect in January 2024” by Laurel Demkovich from Washington State Standard “Poll: Washington voters want to spend more — while cutting taxes” by Donna Gordon Blankinship from Crosscut Crosscut - Elway Poll | 2024 Legislative Preview “Tammy Morales, Rob Saka To Chair Key Council Committees During Pivotal Year” by Ryan Packer and Doug Trumm from The Urbanist “Seattle politics shift as City Council gets new members, president” by Daniel Beekman from The Seattle Times “New City Council Elects Former Conservative Outcast as President” by Hannah Krieg from The Stranger Council Vacancy | Office of the City Clerk “Unhoused people sue Burien over new homeless camping law” by Anna Patrick from The Seattle Times “Update: Eastern WA attorney who fought gun laws, COVID mandates plans run for state AG” by Eric Rosane from Tri-City Herald Find stories that Crystal is reading here Listen on your favorite podcast app to all our episodes here Transcript [00:00:00] Crystal Fincher: Welcome to Hacks & Wonks. I'm Crystal Fincher, and I'm a political consultant and your host. On this show, we talk with policy wonks and political hacks to gather insight into local politics and policy in Washington state through the lens of those doing the work with behind-the-scenes perspectives on what's happening, why it's happening, and what you can do about it. Be sure to subscribe to the podcast to get the full versions of our Tuesday topical show and Friday week-in-review delivered to your podcast feed. If you like us, the most helpful thing you can do is leave a review wherever you listen to Hacks & Wonks. Full transcripts and resources referenced in the show are always available at officialhacksandwonks.com and in our episode notes. If you missed our Tuesday topical show, we re-aired an important conversation I had with Dr. Ben Danielson, director of AHSHAY Center about ending youth incarceration. Today, we're continuing our Friday week-in-review shows where we review the news of the week with a co-host. Welcome back to the program, friend of the show and today's co-host: Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist and founder and editor of The Needling, Lex Vaughn. [00:01:20] Lex Vaughn: Hey, nice to be back. [00:01:21] Crystal Fincher: Hey, great to have you back - excited to have you back. I don't know that I'm excited to talk about everything on our list today, but we've got to get through it. But I do- [00:01:33] Lex Vaughn: There's a lot. [00:01:34] Crystal Fincher: There's a lot. And so - first show of the new year - we just had New Year's Eve, New Year's Day happen and we welcome that in in the greater Seattle area with a big Space Needle fireworks show. This year, it was a drone show pre-show and then a fireworks main show. And this year, there was a bit of a challenge with it - it was a smoky, hazy, kind of unintelligible soupy mess. What did you think about it? [00:02:09] Lex Vaughn: I was like, what is this? It's 2024 - did someone read like the last part of the year backwards, like 420, and go - This is a 420-themed New Year's Eve celebration? I don't know - it was funny. I mean, I was celebrating out-of-state with family, but I immediately was getting messages from people like - Did you see this? Did you see this? I mean, honestly, I think that - I know that a lot of people are flipping out and going like, Something needs to be done - but this is Seattle. Come on - you know that the Space Needle thing doesn't always work as planned and that's part of the fun. And the look of it was definitely fun this last year. [00:03:01] Crystal Fincher: You know, it was interesting - weather is always, always a factor in anything that happens in this region, whether it's 4th of July celebrations or New Year's Eve. I think for me, I have just been, I mean, I'm someone who has traditionally loved fireworks for most of my life and has enjoyed them. Yes, 100%. But I also, especially over the past couple of years, contending with the smoke generated by fireworks - not on New Year's Eve, but you know, July 4th, mostly, but I guess the neighborhoods on New Year's Eve - the fire hazard associated with it, which is definitely worse in the summer than it is in the winter. It just seems like now we have the option for drone shows and those seem like they're a bit more resilient - they don't create smoke. And part of the challenge of this current show was the way that the fireworks and the smoke interacted with the atmosphere, kind of making each other worse, making visibility worse. And it just seems like, okay - I am ready to move on from fireworks and to move on to drone shows. They seem like they can do everything the fireworks shows do and more. And it just seems like given where we are at with our climate, given where we are at with the volatility of just Seattle weather period, that it seems like it makes more sense to me to do that. But you know, I don't know if that's an option moving forward. You know, I don't know what's gonna happen with that. I'm not in any way affiliated with that. So it'll be interesting to see, but I wish we could move beyond fireworks personally. [00:04:38] Lex Vaughn: I'll never be over fireworks. I want that - well, I don't know - it's like, I know there's a lot of debate over it. But I also think any attempt to lessen fireworks only increases fireworks. So honestly, the best plan for reducing fireworks all over a region is always like a big, you know, show that people can watch. And when I, you know, go back to my hometown in California for New Year's or July 4th - that city stopped doing a central fireworks show. And what happened is just a proliferation of fireworks all over the city. There's just like a fireworks show going on everywhere all night. So I always think it's worth it to have one big show or you're gonna get that. [00:05:31] Crystal Fincher: Yeah, I do think that a big show that the community can come to is important. In the absence of that, people are definitely going to celebrate on their own. I'm just thinking the big show can be a drone show. We saw a pretty successful pre-show - I thought - [00:05:45] Lex Vaughn: The drone show is a good backup. I mean, especially in Seattle, 'cause it's like, you know, you might be excited about a show and then, something about the weather happens and it's - Oh, you're not gonna see anything. So it's like the drone show is the only thing that can be guaranteed if it can move to a little space where it's free from smoke or clouds or whatever. [00:06:09] Crystal Fincher: Absolutely. Well, also wanna talk about a few more things this new year is ushering in, and that's a number of new state laws taking effect as of January 1st. One of them includes marijuana testing and changing in how that can be used by employers. Under the new law, employers are blocked from conducting drug tests for cannabis when making hiring decisions. They can still test for other drugs before hiring and they can still test employees for cannabis in certain situations, like after accidents or if they suspect someone's impaired. There are also some exemptions for companies that need to test for federal requirements and other workers potentially - including police, airline crews, corrections officers - may still have to test. But it's a pretty significant change in just kind of pre-employment testing overall - that's done with a lot of lower wage jobs, certainly not so much predominant and higher wage jobs. But it does, there has been a tension for quite some time in going - Okay, well, if it's legal, then why are you testing for it? And so this seems to bring things more in line. Do you think that makes sense? [00:07:21] Lex Vaughn: Yeah, and I hope the message of a law like this is it's not worth it because you could be breaking the law and you can get sued. Like it's a liability for you now to try to judge people this way - If you haven't like sped up with the times here and realize that it's generally not that big of a deal to use cannabis. [00:07:46] Crystal Fincher: Another law that took place is a - that is taking effect - is a 10-day gun waiting period. So as of now, those wishing to buy a firearm in Washington need to complete a background check and then wait 10 business days before they can complete that purchase. We've seen this referred to as kind of a cooling off period before wanting to purchase a gun and actually owning one. We have certainly seen a number of examples from mass shootings to domestic violence situations where people use guns to murder people immediately after purchasing them. And so while no gun reform is going to solve everything - usually no anything solves anything for everything - and it really is gonna take a patchwork of policies and laws to move forward. And this seems like a positive one to me that has some evidence behind it. [00:08:39] Lex Vaughn: Yeah, honestly, this is like, I think the most positive new law of this next year that I'm really looking forward to seeing put in place and I hope becomes more commonplace because like you said - yeah, there's a lot of reform that needs to happen to make this country safer from gun violence. But this cooling off period is a major one. When I was a reporter at The Seattle Times, I definitely covered some very tragic situations where it was very clear that a young man or something was distraught over somebody breaking up with them and made a horrible decision really quickly. And it's like in a lot of these cases, it's - what could have happened if this person had just been held to a few more days of thought before pulling that off. [00:09:31] Crystal Fincher: Absolutely. Another law taking effect impacts hospital staffing. Hospitals in Washington need to establish staffing committees made up of nursing staff and administrators. This is in response to years of advocacy really by healthcare workers saying that - Hey, these staffing ratios have gotten way out of whack. We're not able to provide adequate care to patients, patient care quality is suffering and we need to get back to staffing ratios - happening during a time where we're losing healthcare workers. There's been a lot of attrition. The pandemic only has made that worse. And so this is trying to still allow hospitals to have their say, but to do it with the input of nurses and hospital staff to say - Let's put patient safety first. Let's really work on these ratios and make sure that we're moving in the right direction and really putting patients at the center of this year. And I think this is a step forward in this direction that will bring a little bit more transparency and accountability to the process. [00:10:43] Lex Vaughn: And it's awesome that hospital staff is getting this extra leverage to make that happen. Because I mean, obviously they've been pressing for stuff like that as unions and all. But it's crazy the way they have to fight to give us quality care. Increasingly, unfortunately, in our health systems here in the US, it's like a lot of hospital administrators are more focused on turning hospitals into these profit machines without as much thought about what's happening to staff and their patients. And those staff - those are the ones rooting for us and protecting quality of care. [00:11:30] Crystal Fincher: Absolutely. So there's a new voting rights law. It's intended to address situations where there are signs of polarized voting among different groups in a community, and where there are risks to some groups having their votes diluted so they don't have a fair opportunity to elect candidates of their choice. It makes it easier to try and address this with a couple different mechanisms - it allows organizations to sue on behalf of their members, it allows local governments to voluntarily reform their election systems to be more representative of their populations, and for lawsuits to be filed if the locality refused to take such steps. So it hopefully can bring the cost down. I mean, sometimes there are clear violations, but it has been very costly - prohibitively costly - for someone to pursue it if they feel they have been wrong and want to bring that in court. So this seeks to try and address that and provide a pathway for people to be able to sue without that cost prohibitive element involved and to recover costs they incur when researching those possible legal challenges. What are your thoughts on this one? [00:12:42] Lex Vaughn: I have to admit, I was like, when I, you know, just kind of heard about this one and got a general sense of it, I was like - wait, what? This sounds a little bit confusing to me. The motivation of it is just that like, if someone is feeling outnumbered in a community, that they have strength and power to - I have to admit like this one, I didn't totally get, 'cause I don't know if I've seen a law like that before. [00:13:11] Crystal Fincher: Yeah, it is in line with previous voting rights act laws. And we have passed legislation in the same vein - I think five years ago, we passed a voting rights act in the same vein. But it's really an issue of like - we see a challenge when it comes to districting that's happening right now in Yakima, or issues where it looks like - Okay, a community's overwhelmingly voting in the same way if you look at it geographically, but things are sliced up and that's not turning out the way it is in government. I mean, there's a case to be made in a city I'm pretty familiar with - the city of Kent, the largest city in the state that doesn't have any council districts, no form of districted government, which makes the government certainly less representative than it is in other areas. But to try and bring a case or bring a suit and rectify this has been prohibitively expensive. You can see something being wrong, but whether you can pursue any remedy or whether there's any recourse is a whole different subject. And so it's like - okay, we see that there are problems happening, but we don't have the tools and power to make it realistic to expect something to be done about it. And if someone doesn't expect something to be done about a violation, if they see that there's no consequence for bad actions, it makes it more likely that that's going to happen. So this makes it more likely that - hey, if you are violating the law, if there are violations happening here, you can expect more of a consequence for that than you did before. So hopefully one that prevents further violations from happening, but for those that currently are, it makes them easier to remedy and rectify. So I think that's a positive step. Will it solve anything? Will it immediately change anything? I don't think this is like an immediately transformative piece of policy - we're going to see something that flips from night to day in this. But I do think that it's part of, again, patchwork of legislation like most things that makes it easier to hold people and entities that are violating voting rights laws accountable and to give people more tools to fix it. [00:15:25] Lex Vaughn: And maybe like slow the role of people who were planning on exploiting people in new ways or something like that. [00:15:31] Crystal Fincher: Yes. Because there's a lot of that happening right now. Okay. Absolutely. Another law that a lot of cities have been dealing with is one that addresses street racing. So this law imposes tougher penalties for street racing. If you're caught, you can have your car impounded for three days on the first offense and forfeited on the second one. It also increases penalties for those who are found to be aiding and abetting street racers. I don't know if this is going to get there. I mean, that seems like a really tough penalty. I am not personally familiar with how these laws have resulted in any changes, or whether they've resulted in any changes. But it seems like they're trying to do more. That people are seeing that this is a problem - and it is a problem - it's a problem for a variety of reasons. And they're trying to do something to address it - and hopefully it does help. We will see. [00:16:28] Lex Vaughn: Honestly, I think it's - of course this is dangerous. I mean, whenever I hear something like this happened - I can't believe sometimes I hear this happened in Seattle sometimes. I'm like - What street are you on? Oh my God. This is horrible. This is not the place. But I think the thing is - there is a culture for this that will always be there. And no matter what law you put in place, I mean, you're just going to make it sexier. So, I mean, honestly, I wish that there was some way to - I don't know - give people a space to do this more safely or something. That's the real solution, 'cause it is going to keep happening. [00:17:11] Crystal Fincher: Yeah, I think you're onto something there. I mean, clearly you're right - there's a culture around that - and I mean, it's so interesting. And it's kind of an offshoot of car culture. There are car enthusiasts and this is a subset of that. And it's kind of tangential, but we, as a community, as a society have been reducing the number of just alternative, recreational opportunities in spaces, particularly for younger people. And then criminalizing a lot of activity there. Some of that, you know, may be warranted. Not all activity is positive. Like we said, there's a lot of danger associated with street racing, but what are we doing to give people options to do safer activities? Whether it's racing activities or others, if we aren't providing positive, affirmative options, particularly for younger people - places for people to congregate and share that don't require an entry fee, that don't require purchase necessarily, that are places where people can congregate and recreate and do things that are meaningful to them together - that we're moving in the wrong direction overall. I think that's a valid concern and one we need to do better with as a community and society. [00:18:28] Lex Vaughn: But it's not going away. So it's - we just need a more proactive approach. [00:18:35] Crystal Fincher: Yep, and so we will keep our eye on how these laws pan out, on new laws as they pass. We have a new legislative session starting on Monday, and we'll be following along with what happens there. But we're seeing these results now and we'll keep paying attention. Also wanna talk this week about a new Crosscut poll that was just released - part of the poll at least. And the headline of this poll is - Washington voters want to spend more - while cutting taxes. Also another headline saying that 57% of people are in favor of repealing the state's new capital gains tax. Now this is interesting. We've talked about this before in the podcast, but polls are very interesting things. And it's very important to pay attention to the questions asked, who they're being asked of, and what the particulars are in this. And this one - I think there are some interesting findings in this poll, I think that you have to dig a lot deeper than these headlines. And I think that this doesn't actually tell us much about what voters' likelihood of voting for or against some of these questions asked in here. And one of the reasons why this is being asked is because there is likely to be an initiative, a statewide initiative, to repeal this tax. But it's very important to actually read the poll, to go beyond the synopsis in the article and to take a look at the actual poll. And when we do that, we see that these questions were asked in a way that they aren't asked when people are invested in, where like people working, right - if you're actually working on this thing, you would not trust this. You're not asking questions in this way. Usually when you're trying to figure out what happens - one, kind of the most important thing, you wanna ask the question in the same way that it's gonna be asked to voters on their ballot. Now we're kind of before that point, right? So a lot of times you'll hear - Well, is it the ballot title? Is it the ballot language? We don't have that yet, but you wanna get close to that. You wanna describe it in a way that you feel that they're gonna encounter it in the real world with voters. You also with this, it's very important understanding, particularly with something like this - there's gonna be a lot of money, there's gonna be a lot of communication in these campaigns. So people are gonna hear messages in favor of it. People are gonna hear messages opposed to it. They're gonna be getting mail in their mailboxes, they're gonna see digital ads, they're gonna be seeing political commercials about this - and they're gonna be getting a lot of messages. You want to expose the people you're asking those questions of of likely messages that they're gonna hear so that - okay, afterwards, is it more likely or less likely that they're going to support it? - or that you're coming closer to the conditions under which they're gonna make their decision. That's really informative and really predictive and a pretty accurate way of figuring out where support really lies. And really in those things, when you have a poll, you're asking those questions - there's a lot learned by asking the initial question before they hear any pro and con arguments. And then asking that final question - the question again - having heard all that, are you still in favor of, more likely to support, less likely to support this initiative or this law? And seeing who that moves and who different arguments influence is all part of how people put together these campaigns. None of that was in here. This was asked in kind of a kludgy way, actually, kind of a muddled way in how they did this. They kind of asked - Hey, they're expected to have a surplus from a capital gains tax and a carbon pricing trade system. What should we do with this money? And so it's just - Okay, we should put it into schools. And actually the majority of people did not say they want to keep spending at the current level or reduce taxes somehow. They were saying - majority 55% said put more money into schools, reducing homelessness, mental health programs, and combating effects of climate change. Then they asked - Okay, the following are some proposals that the legislature is expected to discuss in the coming weeks. As I read each of these, please indicate whether you favor, strongly favor, oppose, or strongly oppose each one. And so all it says is - Repeal the state's new capital gains tax. And that's it. And the other ones are - Eliminate some restrictions on when police can pursue criminal suspects in cars. Put more money into mental - like they're just asking the sentence. Now, if there's one thing, especially people involved in politics, involved in reporting know - it's that people do not have the context for this at all when you just ask that. [00:23:23] Lex Vaughn: In just a general sense, the average person is like - less taxes. Like no context, like what is it? [00:23:32] Crystal Fincher: Yeah, sure, it's a tax - repeal it. What is that? [00:23:32] Lex Vaughn: Are you taking more money from me? And it's like, if this does end up on the ballot, you know, again, like this year, the main message that I know we've kept saying to defend that capital gains tax is - it affects such a small number of people. It's probably definitely not you. [00:23:51] Crystal Fincher: Yeah, exactly. [laughing] It is such a small percentage of people. And when people are like - Oh, okay, you're not talking about something that applies to me and I'm already struggling and trying to figure this out. [00:24:02] Lex Vaughn: Honestly, that thing needs like a rebrand or something - capital gains tax. [00:24:05] Crystal Fincher: Well, and I don't even - you know, I don't know. [00:24:08] Lex Vaughn: The 1% tax - I mean, I think it's even smaller than 1%. It's like - tippity-top. [00:24:13] Crystal Fincher: I would question whether it even needs a rebrand because the other thing about this is that we have seen a lot of high quality polling that turned out to look like it was pretty accurate when it came to this. And basically the numbers look flipped. When people actually are asked a reasonably composed question, when they - after they hear pro and con messages, they're more likely to support the capital gains tax. It has actually been a popular policy in polling that we've seen till now. And, you know, the questions were asked more comprehensively and differently than they were here. It'll be interesting to see as this continues - I mean, certainly this is going to produce a great headline, which in today's media environment is a goal for many people. Most people don't read beyond headlines. So if you can get a great headline, that is a win because then that gives people an impression of something, even though it may not be completely accurate or there's not other contexts surrounding it. But it'll be interesting to see where this comes out. I would just be leery about these results based on the way that these questions are asked, based on the fact that it does contradict other publicly available polling that we've seen. And it'll be interesting to see, but I am taking this with a grain of salt - for these results. I do think that there are - just looking, polls are always interesting things. And even if it's not the number one thing that the poll may have been designed to elicit, it'll be interesting. There's this larger discourse, kind of want to say Stancil-ized discourse - discourse about the economy, and whether people are happy, and what this means for Joe Biden, and like where people are at. And that there are a lot of economic indicators that seem positive, but people are kind of sour on the economy overall - more sour than traditional economic indicators would indicate is logical. But these questions, there's a question asked here - Hey, what's your outlook for the country? - basically - do you expect things will - in general terms, get better over the next year or get worse? Much better, somewhat better, somewhat worse, or much worse. And in these, what we saw is that people said - Okay - and it was asked four ways in four categories. Do you think this for the United States, for Washington State, in your community, and in your household? And across the board, people gave, you know, majority of people said - Hey, things are actually gonna get better for my household. Majorities across the board there. And then slightly less for their community, and then less for Washington State, and then less for the United States. So there's this difference where if you look and you ask people individually - Hey, do you think the next year for you in general terms is gonna be better or worse? Most people say better. But if you ask people - Okay, generally for the United States, do you think the next year is gonna be better or worse? Most people say worse. And the further out it gets from them, the less likely they are to think that it gets positive. There are lots of theories for why this is, there are lots of people's views - but it's an interesting dynamic that is there. And it's not a new dynamic - we've seen this before, but it certainly is more pronounced. It's very pronounced and there's a very wide gulf, wider than we've seen in quite some time. The other interesting thing about that is when you look at the crosstabs broken up there - younger people are actually more optimistic than older people, which is interesting. [00:27:52] Lex Vaughn: Now I don't trust anything in this poll. [00:27:54] Crystal Fincher: [laughs] What I don't have at my fingertips right now is enough data on this asked in different polls in a variety of different ways to immediately be suspicious and wanna look into more. Like with that question about the capital gains tax, it's just at odds with other polls that we have seen - certainly publicly available, certainly at odds with a lot of private polling. [00:28:21] Lex Vaughn: But young people being optimistic - about anything political - hmm. [00:28:24] Crystal Fincher: In some ways, right? And about like, does it, are you more optimistic about your own prospects? Like looking at the personal, 'cause the further away you get, the more politically influenced it is. But looking at the personal, it's really interesting. And I just find that very, very interesting in what that means and the difference there. And to me, when I see those things, the interest is in wanting to dive down and - okay, what explains that difference? Who is experiencing kind of in that zone between you thinking things getting better for yourself and worse overall? You know, who is in that category? Who are the people who move? What's influencing that movement is interesting to look at. So we'll link this poll. And like generally, I would just say for people, when you're consuming polls, there's usually a whole article breakdown, and then there should be in each article - there is in this article - a link to the actual poll. Always read the actual poll. Always read the questions. Because a lot of times, some of these challenges or things that seem non-standard or problematic are often visible to a layperson if they read it. Like, okay, that's a weird way to ask the question. Or, you know, if you ask me that, I might be confused. Or like, what does that even mean? So there's a lot there, but that was an interesting finding. But we're certainly hearing about this today - we're recording this on Thursday - and we'll be hearing a lot more about it. What did you think just generally about it? [00:29:53] Lex Vaughn: First of all, I have to admit - I think a lot of times I don't click on that kind of external PDF like there is here with a breakdown of who was interviewed, breakdown of landlines, cell phone, text. I'll say at least this poll does a very good breakdown of exactly who they interviewed. But in general, I don't take a lot of reporting on polls very seriously. I usually think it reveals the bias of a media organization or a polling organization. And I'm - that's informative. That's what I'm taking from this. [00:30:36] Crystal Fincher: Yeah, it's, you know, polling is an interesting thing. Polling is - not all polling is predictive. Not everybody is polling likely voters or trying to mimic an election result. Some polls are just trying to take the pulse of where people are at. This, you know, is asking some things that they're gonna be dealing with in the legislature. And it's not like there's gonna be an immediate vote up and down on proposed legislation, but it could indicate people's general satisfaction of the legislation or not. I think with these things, it is important to read the actual poll. I will say - just for here - it's important to read the poll 'cause I have seen more than one misleading breakdown of a poll, or things that omit some significant or even contradictory findings. And so I think it's important to look for yourself to - okay, not a synopsis, but if we're really talking about how important this is about policy or what people think, let me look at everything people ask and let me look at this whole poll and see what happens - because we can't always trust the breakdowns. But also just understanding what polls do and don't do. A poll that - things can change massively in either direction, right, between now and the election. These are a snapshot in time. Something, especially at this point in time, is not predictive. They're very early. There's usually - if you're asking about a specific candidate or policy, a lot of people who aren't familiar with it yet, or who don't have all of the context - there's still a lot of pro and con arguments and a lot of communication that's gonna happen. So they're not determinative, certainly. They're not absolutely predictive. But they can be useful information points. And usually they're most useful - not in the horse race sense - but in the who does something appeal to and why, if it's done well. And just understanding that - certainly from a campaign perspective is really important - Even if you set aside the - ultimate who's likely to vote for this or not type of questions. So just another interesting one. I'm sure we're gonna see other ones. I think this is part one of two that they've released, so we're going to see some more from this soon. And that was a Crosscut poll. Also this week, Seattle City Council - councils all across the state, really were sworn in - the new Seattle City Council was sworn in. And so we have a new council. We have committees that were assigned. We have Sara Nelson, who is now the council president. Sara Nelson, who is a moderate conservative, who is now seeming to be very aligned with the mayor and leading a council that is much more aligned with the mayor's office - that is much more moderate to conservative. And so we're going to see a new council and seemingly a new direction here in the state. We saw one of Sara Nelson's first actions as council president was to disband the Renters' Rights Committee, which former Seattle City Councilmember, Kshama Sawant, had chaired since 2019 - disbanded that committee, and which is not that surprising. More than half of the residents of Seattle are renters, so it seems like that is applicable to the majority of people - it would be useful and helpful. But Sara has indicated distrust and hostility of several of those efforts before, has hosted landlord support groups before. And so it is not surprising, even though it may be really unfortunate. [00:34:18] Lex Vaughn: Yeah. [00:34:20] Crystal Fincher: But we're gonna see. What do you think about this whole thing? [00:34:24] Lex Vaughn: It's really unfortunate that a whole slate of people was elected that are probably gonna just kinda be in lockstep with the mayor. And I see all of them as like, faux-gressive - they know how to kinda have the facade of progressive to fit into Seattle, but their policies that they're rooting for are just so obviously conservative and Republican to me. Like making your first order of business disbanding a Renters' Rights Committee. [laughs] It's like, it's just amazing. And it just kind of adds to the cognitive dissonance of the whole identity of the city - who these council people are and what they're probably gonna do legally this year, the policies they're gonna enact - just makes me laugh that anyone thinks the city is liberal. 'Cause it's - unfortunately, these people that were just elected are probably going to move forward with basically a lot of conservative policies on a local level. [00:35:33] Crystal Fincher: It's gonna be really interesting to see. And for me, there's a lot that they're going to be dealing with. And just so people know - that for committee chairs, the people who are going to decide the general direction of these areas, what kind of legislation they pursue within their committees. Rob Saka will be chairing the Transportation Committee. Tammy Morales will chair the Land Use Committee. Joy Hollingsworth will chair the Parks, Public Utilities and Technology Committee. Maritza Rivera will chair Libraries, Education and Neighborhoods. Cathy Moore will chair Housing and Human Services. Dan Strauss will chair Finance, which will handle the budget, Native Communities and Tribal Governments. Bob Kettle will chair Public Safety. And the vacant Position 8 position - the person who will be appointed to the council - will chair Sustainability, City Light, Arts and Culture. Sara Nelson will chair Governance, Accountability and Economic Development. Within those, there's a lot that's gonna happen. And I think one thing that some people discount or don't expect is just how much practically they're going to have to deal with. Now it's kind of like - Okay, strip the progressive or conservative, whatever labels. There are serious issues that people have to deal with and a range of options, like a range that could be under the progressive label, a range that could be under the moderate label, right? But they're going to have to chart - well, they don't have to - their job is to chart a path forward for lots of this. Rob Saka, Chair of Transportation, which, you know, there's certainly a lot at stake - when it comes to transportation, there's gonna be a new Move Seattle Levy. He's overseeing the $700 million annual budget. We see a lot of asks and needs from the community. He's talked about getting back to the basics and being "the pothole king." And there, and it'll just be interesting to see. There's a lot of practical daily things that have to be dealt with. How is he going to do that? What approach are they going to take to a lot of things? We've seen Bob Kettle, Chair of Public Safety, talk about a lot of law and order oriented things, building a better relationship, promoting respect. We heard Sara Nelson talk about - one of her other first acts was proposing another pay increase for SPD, which is, you know, without anything changes, would deepen the budget deficit that the city is facing, barring any new revenue on the heels of other additions to that budget and elements of pay. It'll just be really interesting to see, because these things are having practical effects. They're all going to impact the budget that they're all going to have to deal with, with a major budget deficit coming up. They were all, most of these people who are new on the council were very hesitant to discuss what their actual practical plans were for dealing with this budget deficit, most hesitant to put support behind any new taxation, progressive taxation, proposals from the work group that the mayor convened on this that came up with options. But they have talked about cutting in areas. They have talked about the need to trim overall, but were hesitant or unwilling to talk about what specifically that would be. They're going to have to get into specifics now. They're going to have to deal with the things that they were hesitant to talk about during the campaign. It's going to be really interesting to see how this, how this carries out. Also, this is a very new council overall. They're going to have to get their feet underneath them. Sara Nelson announced that they are not going to be having regular committee meetings for most of this month to allow people to get up to speed - there's a lot of that that needs to happen - and that their first council meeting of the month will be on the 23rd to appoint the new councilmember that is going to take over for Teresa Mosqueda, who is, was just elected to the county. So it's going to be really interesting and just FYI - applications for that vacancy, if anyone is interested, are being accepted until January 9th. And that is Tuesday and the appointment will take place on the 23rd. Certainly a lot of talk about who might potentially take those places. We have heard a couple names bandied about, one of them being Tanya Woo, who lost - [00:40:10] Lex Vaughn: Yeah, how about not Tanya Woo? [laughing] [00:40:13] Crystal Fincher: You know, I just have a hard time - you're representing all of Seattle. It is a city that has made a strong stance and has made strong statements - fortunately - when it comes to protecting all members of the LGBTQ community, including trans people. And there's an interview with Hacks & Wonks, it's been covered elsewhere where Tanya Woo did not fully support the ability of trans people to participate in regular everyday life like everyone else, expressed reservations about trans people participating on sports teams - said if they wanted to exclude them, she would be willing to support that in a position on the city council - which just to me, there are policy differences, but then there are issues of just basic humanity and support of people and residents of the city. And that, to me, is one of those that's automatically disqualifying in my personal evaluation of that. And so it looks like that is not necessarily disqualifying for some people who might be considering this on the council, but I certainly think it should be considered with this. Now I do understand that she, I think, made an Instagram post apologizing for that and trying to clarify their position. I would just suggest that, you know, and lots of people evolve over that. So I'm not saying that that is what she thinks or believes for the rest of her life. Maybe she has changed and maybe she has learned more, and I hope that she has and that other people are on that journey. I just think that when it comes to appointing someone responsible for the city, we can appoint someone who is further along in that journey and not learning about the humanity of people at the same time that they're having to learn about all of these policies and operations that they're now having to. So it's gonna be really interesting to see. There are certainly other people who have held various elected office, school board candidates that have had exposure and that may be able to be really positive additions to the council, particularly with a number of councilmembers that have not served in elective office before - having someone who had in whatever capacity could be a very positive, helpful thing for this council. It'll be interesting to see. I think that there are - certainly there have been some names that have been talked about publicly. I think there are more names that are circulating privately. It'll be really interesting to see how this shakes out. But either way, I also don't think that's gonna tip the balance of this council. I do think that it could help with policy formation and general operational items. But I think just, you know, it's not gonna tip the balance of power of the council. [00:42:55] Lex Vaughn: Yeah, I think the direction the council is gonna go is pretty well set. [00:43:00] Crystal Fincher: Yeah. [00:43:01] Lex Vaughn: Yeah. [00:43:02] Crystal Fincher: Yep, so we will see. Also this week, news of a lawsuit against the City of Burien over their new homeless camping law that - we have heard about the saga of Burien for quite some time. There was also an independent report this week that came out really chastising the city manager for not handling some of the major issues that they're doing with due care and seriousness. But this is a lawsuit being brought on behalf of unhoused people by a regional advocacy organization suing the city, claiming that it banishes homeless people, inflicts cruel punishment, and it violates Washington's constitution. The Northwest Justice Project filed the lawsuit on Wednesday in King County Superior Court on behalf of the Seattle King County Coalition on Homelessness and three individual plaintiffs. What were your thoughts on this? [00:43:56] Lex Vaughn: I mean, it seems like this is the next step in inevitable plan to get this in the Supreme Court. I think there's probably a variety of cities, not just Burien, who have been wanting to challenge this. So this is another showdown that'll go to a higher court. But in general, I think it's just sad that it's happening because it's - we're talking about people's right to exist. It's not just a right to be homeless or something. It's a right to exist. There are people who cannot afford shelter. We as a society are not providing them enough aid in a dark period of their life. And you can't just ask people to go poof. Like, there's no magic wand that makes them just dissipate in air overnight. They have to exist somewhere. And to criminalize that is incredibly inhumane. [00:45:00] Crystal Fincher: Yeah, I mean, they have nowhere to go. Homelessness is a housing problem - it's the lack of housing. There has certainly been a lot of talk and skewed coverage presenting the homeless population as basically criminals and violent drug abusers. And one - homeless people are more likely to be victimized by crime than any other group. And if we were looking at facts and data, we would start from that point - they are not more violent than the general population. [00:45:35] Lex Vaughn: A lot of people are escaping violence. I mean, especially homeless youth, you know? [00:45:41] Crystal Fincher: 100%. [00:45:42] Lex Vaughn: Yeah. [00:45:42] Crystal Fincher: But, you know, criminalizing - it doesn't help that. Sending someone to jail because they don't have shelter doesn't help them to get shelter - it moves them further away from it. It destabilizes people. And it's just incredibly expensive. [00:45:58] Lex Vaughn: Yeah. [00:45:59] Crystal Fincher: There is just- [00:46:00] Lex Vaughn: So ineffective. [00:46:01] Crystal Fincher: Yes - so really expensive and ineffective. Seems like - okay, that should be the thing not to do. But that's the thing that they are rushing to do. Interesting about this lawsuit is it doesn't cite Martin v. Boise, which is a previous 2018 decision that came out of the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals, saying that homeless people can't be punished for sleeping outside on public property if there are no adequate alternatives to offer them. Doesn't cite that, and it is also citing that it's a violation of Washington State's Constitution. So this, you know, which to me is notable because we'll see if Martin v. Boise stands. I don't think there's absolute confidence that that's going to continue to stand, although I certainly believe it should. But this could be something else that could prevent the large-scale just criminalization of homelessness without there being any place for anyone to go. No surprise to listeners of the program - I do believe we have an obligation to provide shelter and housing for people and that we have done a poor job of that, we have not kept up with the demand. And we continue to spend tons of money on these criminalized solutions that could go so much further if we invested them in ways that have shown they're more likely to reduce homelessness. There's been lots of coverage about Housing First models, which have been under attack, and there's actually an article recently about a very coordinated, conservative attack on these models. Just anecdotally, I've seen lots of people - Housing First policies have failed - when the truth is they haven't been tried yet. We've done a lot of criminalization. We have not done that - and man, we would love to, but suggestions that they don't work and that they failed are just false and not rooted. In reality, we haven't tried them. We have tried criminalization, and that's what's gotten us here. [00:47:53] Lex Vaughn: Criminalization, another word for addiction to punishment. Doesn't matter that there's just mounds of research showing that these old techniques of criminalization don't reduce homelessness, they don't make us safer. It's just frustrating to continue to see this happen when it's like there's so much evidence and research showing that criminalization is an expensive and ineffective strategy for solving A) homelessness, and B) making us a safer community in general. [00:48:33] Crystal Fincher: Absolutely. The last item on our list today is there is a new entrant into the race for attorney general - a Republican from central Washington, an attorney named Pete Serrano, is the first major Republican to toss his name into the ring for Washington Attorney General. So he joins former US attorney Nick Brown, senior King County Deputy Prosecutor and State Senator Manka Dhingra in the race - who are both Democrats. So if he was elected, he would be the first Republican to hold the office since Rob McKenna vacated the seat in 2012. He's running on pretty standard conservative policies right now, which are kind of out there. He announced his candidacy with the host of the Washington Gun Law blog, if that gives you any hint - he is not in favor of any kind of gun control or gun laws. He, I believe, fought against vaccine mandates, filed legal challenges against the state's COVID-19 emergency order, fought against gun control legislation, and wants to bring more of that to the AG's race. What do you think of this? [00:49:48] Lex Vaughn: I think it's interesting that the first person he was coming out swinging against is Bob Ferguson. And I think as he campaigns, he'll probably keep his aim there because even though Bob Ferguson isn't running for AG again, he's running for governor. I guess this guy is gonna sell himself as like the check on Bob Ferguson if he wins the governor's race. I think - hopefully this guy won't stand a chance - but he will make these campaigns a little bit more colorful. [00:50:21] Crystal Fincher: Yeah, certainly a new dimension in this race. There were - the main people in the race, two well-known Democratic candidates or fairly well-known Democratic candidates. This being the first Republican candidate is a new dimension in the race. We will continue to follow it. We're gonna have a lot of very interesting statewide races, which is not an unusual thing - except in Washington State for the past decade, basically, where we haven't had much change there. So will be interesting to follow, and we'll keep our eyes peeled on what happens there. And with that, we thank you for listening to Hacks & Wonks on this Friday, January 5th, 2024. The producer of Hacks & Wonks is Shannon Cheng. Our insightful co-host is Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist and founder and editor of The Needling, Lex Vaughn. You can find Lex on Twitter @AlexaVaughn - you can also find her on several other platforms, as well as me. I'm everywhere @finchfrii. You can catch Hacks & Wonks on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever else you get your podcasts - just type "Hacks and Wonks" into the search bar. Be sure to subscribe to get the full versions of our Friday week-in-review shows and our Tuesday topical show delivered to your podcast feed. If you like us, leave a review wherever you listen. You can also get a full transcript of this episode and links to the resources referenced in the show at officialhacksandwonks.com and in the podcast episode notes. Thanks for tuning in - talk to you next time.

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Hacks & Wonks 2023 Post-Election Roundtable Part 1

Play Episode Listen Later Nov 21, 2023 49:57

On this Tuesday topical show, we present Part 1 of the Hacks & Wonks 2023 Post-Election Roundtable which was live-streamed on November 13, 2023 with special guests Katie Wilson, Andrew Villeneuve, and Robert Cruickshank. In Part 1, the panel breaks down general election results in Seattle City Council Districts 1 through 6. Similarities and differences between the contests are discussed as well as the impact of low voter turnout, lopsided outside spending, and campaign messaging. Stay tuned for Part 2 of the roundtable releasing this Friday for more election analysis! As always, a full text transcript of the show is available below and at officialhacksandwonks.com. You can follow Hacks & Wonks on Twitter at @HacksWonks. Find the host, Crystal Fincher on Twitter at @finchfrii and find guest panelists, Katie Wilson at @WilsonKatieB, Robert Cruickshank at @cruickshank, and Andrew Villeneuve at https://www.nwprogressive.org. More info is available at officialhacksandwonks.com. Katie Wilson Katie Wilson is the general secretary of the Transit Riders Union and was the campaign coordinator for the wildly successful Raise the Wage Tukwila initiative last November. Andrew Villeneuve Andrew Villeneuve is the founder of the Northwest Progressive Institute (NPI) and its sibling, the Northwest Progressive Foundation. He has worked to advance progressive causes for over two decades as a strategist, speaker, author, and organizer. Robert Cruickshank Robert is the Director of Digital Strategy at California YIMBY and Chair of Sierra Club Seattle. A long time communications and political strategist, he was Senior Communications Advisor to Mike McGinn from 2011-2013. Resources Hacks & Wonks 2023 Post-Election Roundtable Livestream | November 13th, 2023 Transcript [00:00:00] Shannon Cheng: Welcome to Hacks & Wonks. I'm Shannon Cheng, Producer for the show. You're listening to Part 1 of our 2023 Post-Election Roundtable that was originally aired live on Monday, November 13th. Audio for Part 2 will be running this Friday, so make sure you stay tuned. Full video from the event and a full text transcript of the show can be found on our website officialhacksandwonks.com. Thank you for tuning in! [00:00:38] Crystal Fincher: Good evening everyone, and welcome to the Hacks and Wonks Post-Election Roundtable. I'm Crystal Fincher, a political consultant and the host of the Hacks & Wonks radio show and podcast, and today I am thrilled to be joined by three of my favorite Hacks and Wonks to break down what happened in last week's general election in Washington. We are excited to be able to live stream this roundtable on Twitter, Facebook and YouTube. Additionally, we're recording this roundtable for broadcast on KODX and KVRU radio, podcast, and it will be available with a full text transcript at officialhacksandwonks.com. Our esteemed panelists for this evening are Katie Wilson. Katie is the general secretary of the Transit Riders Union and was the campaign coordinator for the wildly successful Raise the Wage Tukwila initiative last November. Andrew Villeneuve is the founder of the Northwest Progressive Institute and its sibling, Northwest Progressive Foundation. He has worked to advance progressive causes for over two decades as a strategist, speaker, author, and organizer. And Robert Cruickshank - Robert's the Director of Digital Strategy at California YIMBY and Chair of Sierra Club Seattle, a longtime communications and political strategist, and he was Senior Communications Advisor to Mayor Mike McGinn from 2011 to 2013. Welcome, everyone. [00:02:02] Robert Cruickshank: Thanks for having us. [00:02:04] Katie Wilson: Yeah, thanks, Crystal. [00:02:04] Crystal Fincher: Well, absolutely. Let's start talking about the City of Seattle City Council races. There are quite a number of them - we'll break them down by district. So there were 7 districted positions. This was the first election since the latest redistricting process, so these districts are not exactly the same as they were the last time we had an election, so that may have played a little role - we'll talk a little about that later. But going into Position 1 - as we see, Rob Saka currently holds a commanding lead and he will win the race for Seattle City Council District 1 with 54% of the vote to Maren Costa's 45% of the vote. Turnout in this election was 46%, compared to 2019's 54%. Quite a bit difference. Starting with Robert, what was your take on this race? [00:03:09] Robert Cruickshank: You know, I have to say I was a little surprised at the margin of victory for Rob Saka here - for a couple reasons. One is that I thought Maren Costa ran what seemed to me to be a strong campaign that potentially would have resonated with a majority of voters, not just 45% of voters in West Seattle and in Georgetown-South Park. But also Maren Costa got endorsed by all of the other candidates in the primary aside from Rob Saka. And one might have thought that that would have conferred added legitimacy and certainly support for the campaign. It does not seem to have turned out that way. One thing I think we'll certainly want to talk about tonight is the effect of lower turnout - did that wind up sinking progressive candidates or was it other factors? But here you see the first of the seven districts - significantly lower turnout. Now if we had 2019 level turnout, would that have been enough to bring Maren Costa to victory? Hard to say. Maybe not. But this certainly is one where Maren Costa, who had a great record of standing up to Amazon - she was one of the two employees who was fired by Amazon for doing climate organizing, and then wound up getting a settlement as a result of that. I'd be interested to dive more deeply into what happened there. But it's also - one thing I would keep in mind is West Seattle - voters there have been pretty cranky and upset ever since the pandemic began - because while for the rest of us in Seattle, pandemic 2020 meant lockdowns, it meant protests, it meant a lot of disruption. For West Seattle, it also meant being cut off from the rest of the city because the bridge went out. The bridge closed right around the time the lockdowns began due to safety concerns it might collapse. And having spent a little bit of time there in West Seattle lately and talking to voters out there - there is a strong sense of disconnection, of anger and frustration, at City Hall and it's possible that got taken out on Maren Costa, who's seen as a progressive candidate. There's definitely a narrative that the business community - and their wealthy PACs and Seattle Times - tried to tell to paint progressives as a kind of incumbents here. And it's entirely possible that that was another factor here too. But certainly worth looking at to see what happened in District 1. [00:05:23] Crystal Fincher: Definitely. What do you think about this, Andrew? Oh, you are currently muted. [00:05:35] Andrew Villeneuve: I was surprised too. I think this was a result that not a lot of people maybe saw coming because if you look at the top two results, Maren had a significant lead - plurality lead, but a lead. You look at the difference - they are in two different brackets when you have - Maren Costa's up there in the 30s, Rob Saka's back there in the 20s. So I think a lot of people assumed in the general election that there was going to be a significant advantage for Maren Costa, especially having the support of all of these rivals who had not made it to the general election. But I think when you look at Rob Saka's message, I think we have to conclude that it did resonate with the voters in the district. And I'm looking at his website and just checking out all of his enendorsements - and he emphasized he was endorsed by Seattle Mayor Bruce Harrell - I think that was a key endorsement that he got. I think the mayor is very popular - our organization does quite a bit of polling - some of Hacks & Wonks listeners may know. And in all of our polling this year we've seen the mayor is very popular with Seattle voters. And that includes District 3 voters, voters across the city - really he's popular all over the place. So having that endorsement and touting that as prominently as he did - I think that was a key factor. And then of course The Seattle Times - I think they have more pull in certain districts than others. And District 1, I think, is a district where I think that they have more pull than some of the other publications that endorsed in the race. I think The Stranger's endorsement matters more in District 3 than it does in District 1. And I think we saw the result of that here with this result. And it could have been closer if there had been higher turnout. I have to agree with that as well. And the fact is right now we may see the lowest turnout in the history of the state of Washington in a general election. It's not clear yet if we're actually going to get to that worst turnout marker but we are certainly close. Currently I am looking to see how many ballots are left because the Secretary of State is saying - Well, we think the turnout is going to be somewhere between 36% and 39% - that's statewide. And if we don't surpass 37.10% then it is the worst turnout 'cause that was the low mark set in 2017. And as we can see, Seattle has higher turnout than the state as a whole, but it's lower than it has been in past odd years. This is part of a disturbing trend where we keep seeing turnout declining in odd-year elections - it is not going in a healthy direction, so that could definitely have an effect. If there is an opportunity later we can talk about even-year elections and what that could do for Seattle, but I'll leave it there and we'll continue to talk about the other races. [00:08:13] Crystal Fincher: Definitely. What did you see? We will go over to this next slide here - looking at the role of independent expenditures in addition to campaign fundraising, did you see the role of money in this race being significant, Katie? [00:08:33] Katie Wilson: Yeah, totally. I haven't actually studied in detail all of the slides you put together, but this is obviously telling that there is a pretty massive independent expenditure contributions here against Maren Costa. And you have to believe that that was a significant factor. I hope that maybe you, Crystal, or someone can speak to the relative weight of independent expenditures in the different City races because I haven't looked at that but I wonder to what extent that can help us to understand some of the results. But I think the spending against Maren was really significant. I will say this was one of the races that also surprised me. Partly because whereas we saw in a couple of other districts some of the more progressive labor unions actually lined up with the more moderate candidate, in this race labor - maybe not 100%, but was pretty strong for Maren and so it also surprised me to see this margin. The last thing I'll say, because I know we have a lot to get through, is that I'm really curious about what is so horrible about Rob Saka that all of his opponents in the primary came out for Maren, so perhaps we will get to learn that - maybe that's a silver lining. [00:09:40] Crystal Fincher: Hopefully we learn he can rise above that given he is going to be a councilmember. It will certainly be interesting to see what his prime agenda is. He's certainly talked a lot about public safety, police - a lot of public safety talk involved with a lot of different issue areas. So it's going to be really interesting to see what his priorities are as he begins to govern. I want to talk about Seattle City Council District 2. And this is one that saw a pretty tantalizing result - had us all on the edge of our seats. On Election Night, which is just a partial tally because we have vote by mail - those come in day after day, it takes us days to count them. We saw Tammy Morales overtake Tanya Woo after a few days of counting. This is a very, very close race. We can see here the breakdown of what the daily ballot returns were and how those changed over time. Robert, what did you see with this race, and why do you think Tammy was able to prevail when so many of the other progressive candidates were not? [00:10:54] Robert Cruickshank: This is not the first time Tammy Morales has been in a very close election in District 2. She ran for the seat the first time in 2015 against then-incumbent councilmember Bruce Harrell and narrowly lost by roughly 400 votes. She did get, of course, elected in 2019 and now re-elected here in 2023. I think part of the story here is incumbency does help. I think the fact that Morales has worked really hard to show her voters that she delivers in southeast Seattle also goes a really long way. Obviously there was frustration among a lot of voters in the Chinatown International District area - that shows up in the results so far - Tanya Woo did very well there. But in other parts of District 2 - Columbia City and points south - Morales held her own and did well. I think you've seen in the four years Morales has been in office, she's been a champion for workers, a champion for renters. She's fought very hard to tax Amazon, supported the JumpStart Tax. She's been very attentive to the needs of the district. When a number of people were struck and killed along MLK Boulevard there, Morales stepped up and met with people, fought hard and is continuing to fight hard at the City and with Sound Transit to make safety improvements. Morales is seen by a lot of people in southeast Seattle as someone who is attentive to the district, attentive to concerns, and responsive - along with being a progressive who's delivered results. So I think those are the things that insulated Tammy Morales from a more maybe conservative-moderate wave this year. Tanya Woo certainly ran, I think, a strong campaign - obviously a very close result. But I think a lesson here is that progressives who get in office and try very hard and very overtly to show their voters that they are working hard for them, that they share their values and are trying to deliver - that can go a really long way. [00:12:56] Crystal Fincher: I definitely agree with that. How did you see this, Andrew? [00:13:00] Andrew Villeneuve: I see Councilmember Morales as someone who is willing to do the work and that really matters. In a local campaign, doorbelling counts, organizing counts. I looked at Councilmember Morales' website while I was writing our election coverage last week and I was noticing how many of the pictures that she has are her with other people - and they're holding signs and look very excited. I look a lot at how do candidates present themselves and who do they surround themselves with. And there's something about these pictures that struck me as - it's not so conventional, it's very fresh. I thought that was a good image for her to put out to the electorate. This is a hard-working councilmember who's got a lot of supporters - a lot of grassroots support - focused on the needs of the neighborhood. Incumbency matters, as Robert said. I was looking at her 2019 results as well. In 2019 she had 60.47% of the vote in that contest. And that was a sharp change from 2015 when she was facing off against Bruce Harrell and lost by only a few hundred votes. So I think that that big victory four years ago was helpful in setting the stage for this closer election this year where it was a tougher environment - the district's changed and of course you had an opponent who was well funded and trying to get the seat. And I think a more credible, perhaps a better opponent - someone The Seattle Times and others could really rally around more than Mark Solomon from four years ago. So I think that's what made the race closer. But Councilmember Morales brought a lot of strength to this race, and you can see in the late ballots that that dominance was key. And that's why it's so important that that lead change occurred last week, because if Tammy was still behind this week it would be hard to pull it out. And we're seeing that in those other two races that we'll talk about later where things got really close but there's no lead change. [00:14:51] Crystal Fincher: What was your evaluation of this race, Katie? [00:14:54] Katie Wilson: I don't have a lot to add but I'll just say I think with a margin that small everything matters, right? And so, kudos to the folks who ran that campaign and who were out knocking on doors and making phone calls and sending texts - because with just a few hundred votes that makes a difference. Fewer than a thousand votes difference in that race would be looking more like the District 7 race and we'd all be singing a very different tune. And I will just say - the implications of that race - Tammy being theon council again is going to be super important for social housing, for the success of Initiative 135, because she's really been kind of a champion of that on council and now will be able to continue that work - that was one of the things looking at the initial results that was running through my mind is - oh gosh, who's gonna carry the standard for social housing? [00:15:54] Crystal Fincher: That's a great point. I also want to look at the spending in this race where Tanya Woo and independent expenditures in support of her and in opposition to Tammy Morales were substantial. And in this race, as in District 1 and a few others, we saw some very sharp and pointed criticisms coming through in mailers, in commercials. It was quite the direct voter messaging campaign. Do any of you think it went too far? Do you think it backfired at all? How did you evaluate that in this race? [00:16:38] Robert Cruickshank: I don't know that it -- obviously it didn't succeed. But again I agree with Katie that in every close - super close election like this, every little bit makes a difference. I think it's clear that it certainly helped Tanya get to a very near victory. It's entirely possible though that it also may have backfired in some ways. I think that generally speaking, voters want to hear from candidates positive things about why you should elect them. They don't want to hear a candidate delivering negative hits. Someone else delivers the negative hits - it shouldn't be the candidate themselves. So it's entirely possible that Tanya Woo maybe put a ceiling on herself by going personally directly negative. But then again just a couple of shifts here and there and we're talking about a Tanya Woo victory. [00:17:30] Crystal Fincher: Yeah, you raise a great point. In a race this close, everything matters. Been involved in close races before - you dissect every single little thing. Wonderful to be on the winning end, agonizing to be on the losing end of this - for the candidate and staff. As we look to the District 3 race, this was an interesting race because we had one of the most notorious active incumbents in Kshama Sawant, who had gotten a lot of ire from The Seattle Times, from some of the TV news - were not a fan of her. She was a Socialist, not a Democrat, and pointed that out fairly frequently. Was a lightning rod but you can't say she didn't represent her district. She was reelected. She withstood a recall attempt but she decided not to run for reelection, so we had Alex Hudson and Joy Hollingsworth competing to be a new representative in this district. What do you think this race was about, and why do you think we got the result that we did? We'll start with Andrew. [00:18:39] Andrew Villeneuve: So this is a race that we actually polled at NPI. We do as much polling as we can locally during odd numbered cycles, but it's tough because there's so many jurisdictions and some of them are too small to poll. But in this jurisdiction, there were enough voters that we could do a poll which was great. And in our poll we found a significant lead for Joy Hollingsworth. In the aggregate, which is a combination of a series of questions that we asked - Joy Hollingsworth got 52%, Alex Hudson got 28%, 16% said they were not sure, 3% didn't recall how they voted - that's the early voters, part of them. And 1% would not vote. So what we saw in the election was - of course, the late ballots have now come in - and what's interesting is Joy Hollingsworth's number is not very far off from the number she got in the poll. So basically it looks like the people who were planning to vote for Joy, or did vote for Joy already, did that. So they followed through - that's what they did. And it looks like Alex Hudson picked up most of the undecided voters and brought that race much closer. But Joy had this built-in lead that the poll showed was out there. Joy had done the work to build a majority coalition of voters in this election and our pollster did a good job modeling the election. They had to figure out who is going to turn out, and that's always a guess. They looked at 2019 turnout, 2017 turnout, 2021 turnout - tried to get a feel for who's that likely electorate going to be. And what we saw basically is the dynamic that was captured in the poll is what played out in the election. Joy had a majority and that majority was able to get Joy elected. Alex took the undecideds, the not sure folks, brought them in and made it a much closer race. But didn't do well enough in the late ballots to change the outcome, and that's despite District 3 being a very, very, very progressive district - a district that I think The Stranger has more influence in than other districts in the city. So I think it's really great that we were able to take a look at this race. I wish we could have done all 7 districts. But we have a poll write-up where we talked about what we heard from voters because we actually asked them - Why are you backing this candidate? We did a follow-up question. It was a ground breaking thing for us in a local poll to ask the why behind the vote. And people told us that Joy is from the district. People said she grew up in Seattle, she's genuinely invested in the community, not everyone with a political science degree knows what's best. She has extensive experience across a lot of relevant areas - greatly focused on public safety, had the mayor's endorsement, long Central area presence. So those are some of the comments that we heard. People who were supporting Alex said that she was an urbanist, she had a better set of plans. There were some really positive things people said about her. We didn't get a lot of negativity in the poll so people weren't really trashing the other candidate, but they were praising the one that they had decided to support. And I like to see that. I like to see that positive focus. So I think that's why we saw the result we did. Joy ran a really strong campaign, she connected with people. She was all over the place - I heard from District 3 voters saying, She doorbelled my home or she made herself accessible. I really liked that. And people just like to see someone from the Central District running for this council position. And my hat is off to Alex for putting together a great set of plans, running a strong campaign as well - it's just that in this election, Joy was her opponent and Joy was able to seal the deal with the voters. [00:21:59] Crystal Fincher: How did you see this, Katie? [00:22:03] Katie Wilson: I think Andrew gave a good rundown there. What I would have to add is this is one of those districts where some of the labor unions that you might think would line up with the person who is perceived as the more progressive candidate actually went for Joy. UFCW 3000 and Unite Here Local 8 both endorsed Joy and she got MLK Labor's endorsement. I think that probably mattered. I live in District 3 and I got in the mail an envelope, and when you open it there was a card from Unite Here Local 8 - pro-Joy. And so I think that for a lot of people who maybe are not in a hyperpolitical bubble, there was not a clear contrast between the two candidates in terms of who was the lefty pick and who was the more moderate pick. So yeah, I mean, and I think basically everything that Andrew said resonates with me as well. [00:23:02] Crystal Fincher: Robert, do you think that the contract - or contrast or lack of a contrast played a role in this race? [00:23:09] Robert Cruickshank: I absolutely do. I think there's an interesting column from Danny Westneat of all people in Seattle Times over the weekend, but what made it interesting is quoting a Seattle University professor who said he talked to his students and the students said - Yeah, they both seem progressive. They both seem pretty similar. And I think if you look at their campaign literature and their websites, that comes through. There's a longstanding strategy of a more moderate business-friendly candidate like Hollingsworth blurring those lines. I remember the 2013 election when Mike McGinn, the incumbent, narrowly lost to Ed Murray. And Murray ate into McGinn's base on Capitol Hill partly by blurring those lines. Jenny Durkan did a very similar strategy to Cary Moon in 2017. Blur the lines, make yourself seem progressive, make it seem like both are fine. A couple other things stand out as well. The Washington Community Alliance puts together this great general elections dashboard. And I was looking at the results so far, precinct that we have - not complete results, but so far from 2023 in District 3 - and comparing it to what we saw there in 2019. And something stood out to me immediately, and Andrew alluded to this. On Capitol Hill itself, Alex Hudson did really well, so did Kshama Sawant. In the northern part of the district - North Capitol Hill, Montlake, and anywhere along the water, Leschi, Madrona - Egan Orion in 2019, and Joy Hollingsworth did well in those areas. In the Central District, Kshama Sawant put up 60, 65, 70% in those precincts. In 2023, Joy Hollingsworth won most of those Central District precincts. That seems to be where the battle for District 3 was won by Joy Hollingsworth and lost by Alex Hudson. So I think that's a big part of it. I think the fact that Hollingsworth is from the community, is herself a woman of color, I think that resonated really strongly there. I think that those factors meant Alex Hudson had a real hill to climb, literally and figuratively, getting up there in District 3. And I don't think Alex was able to do it. You know, we at the Sierra Club endorsed Alex, but we interviewed all the candidates, and they were all really strong candidates there. I think ultimately, there's an interesting contrast with Sawant and Hudson that - I haven't figured out where I am on this, but it's interesting to think about. You know, Sawant won four elections in Seattle, the last three of which were in District 3 against huge corporate opposition. And one of the ways she prevailed was by mobilizing a strong base and by showing she delivers for her base. She delivers for workers, she delivers for renters - everybody knows that. And her base of activists from Socialist Alternative are out there aggressively getting votes. They did a great job of it. Unfortunately, Hudson is much more of a wonk candidate. She has extensive experience with housing and transit, knows local government inside and out. And when Sawant was in office, you'd hear a lot of progressives lament Sawant's approach, lament Sawant's attitude and style. And wish they had someone who was more of a wonk who'd work within City government - that's definitely Alex Hudson, but you gotta get elected. And what we see is that there's something to Sawant's approach - not that you have to agree with all of it - there's something to her approach to winning elections that I think progressives can learn from. And I think that - looking back, I think Hudson may have wished she could be more overtly progressive, especially when it comes to finding the things and finding the issues that motivate the base to show up. That's one of the only ways you would be able to overcome Hollingsworth's strength in that key battleground in the 3rd District, which is the Central District. [00:26:55] Crystal Fincher: Yeah, I think you've hit on something there. And I think it's something that we see in the Tammy Morales race, that we've seen from Kshama Sawant - that if you are a progressive, playing it safe, trying to not be that progressive - not saying that these candidates were overtly trying to not be progressive. But you have to show that you're willing to fight and willing to deliver. You have to show that there's some basis to believe that not only are you talking the talk, but you can also walk it. And I think this race could have benefited for more of that on the progressive end. But it's gonna be interesting to see because Kshama was unique in many ways, but lots of lessons to learn from her just epic ground game that she had race after race. And do have to hand it to Joy Hollingsworth, where I think - similar to Andrew and others - have heard anecdotally for quite some time that she has been out there knocking on doors, that she has been out there talking to community. And that is extremely important and only helps a candidate to be in contact with so many people in the community. So going to District 4 - which this is a race that still isn't called, still is too close to call for a lot of people. What do you see happening here? And what do you think is this dynamic happening in this district, Robert? [00:28:19] Robert Cruickshank: You know, I think this is another one where it is a very sharply divided district within itself, similar to District 3. You've got not just the U District - obviously is going to vote more progressive. So was most of Wallingford and areas around Roosevelt and even parts of Ravenna. But then once you get further north and further east towards the water, you get a bit more moderate, even more conservative. And once you're of course out in like Laurelhurst or Windermere, you're among the wealthy class. But Davis fought hard, fought very closely - nearly won. I don't know that there are enough remaining ballots as of here on Monday night to give Davis enough room to make that 300 vote gain that he needs. But he fought really close and really hard against a huge mountain of corporate money. This is one where I really have to wonder - if we saw 2019 levels of turnout, would we see a Davis victory? The results certainly suggest, especially as the later ballots came in, that might well be the case. Davis ran, I thought, what was a very strong campaign, certainly one that connected with a lot of people in the district. But so did Rivera. And I think this is a interesting test case for how did sort of The Seattle Times-Chamber of Commerce narrative play out? Was Davis able to really overcome that and tell his own narrative of where we should go in Seattle? It certainly seems like in a lot of these races, any progressive candidate faced a lot of headwinds from just a constant narrative that the city is unsafe, city's on the wrong track, it's the fault of progressives and the city council, we have to make a change. And that drumbeat was really loud and really constant. And as you see here on the slide, Davis was outspent significantly greater - nearly half a million dollars spent against him to defeat him by putting out that message. How do you overcome that? You've gotta try to build a base, you've gotta try to actually get out there and sell a strong progressive agenda. I think Davis did as much as he could, but it clearly wasn't enough. This is one race where, gosh, I would love to be able to see good polling after the fact and take a deep dive into what happened here. Because I think if you wanna find a candidate who isn't an incumbent, is a progressive, and who tried to win against all this money - Davis ran what I think a lot of us would have considered to be a smart campaign. But I'm sure there are things that were missed, mistakes were made - that I think are worth taking a closer look at once we have more data. [00:30:54] Crystal Fincher: Do you think it was possible to win this race given the headwinds, Katie? [00:31:02] Katie Wilson: Well, I mean, with a margin that small, you have to say yes. I mean, again, small things matter. But I mean, I guess I think what I would say here - and this is not really just about this race, but as we're going through these races district by district and picking out the little things about the candidates or the spending or whatever - I think it is important to keep in mind something that Robert alluded to, which is turnout. And Danny Westneat had this piece, which Robert mentioned, that really just laid out kind of like - not only is turnout way down from 2019, like double digits down, but it's young voters who didn't turn out. And I really have to think, I mean, I think that like if we had seen 2019 levels of turnout with that demography, this race would have turned out differently. I think it's even possible that Districts 1 and 3 could have turned out differently. I mean, the difference is so great in turnout and in who voted. And that is not just a Seattle thing. That's not a, so I mean, that was something that Westneat seemed to kind of emphasize the "Sawant effect" or something, but this is bigger than Seattle, right? This is like countywide, statewide - you look at the turnout numbers and turnout across the state is way, way lower than 2019. And it is young voters who would have voted strongly progressive who didn't turn out. So I think that's just a really significant thing to keep in mind as we kind of nitpick all of these races. Sorry, crying baby. [00:32:25] Crystal Fincher: We're doing baby duty and that happens and we're fine. Andrew, what did you think? [00:32:30] Andrew Villeneuve: Yeah, some great things have been said by Robert and Katie about this race. I was so impressed with Ron Davis as a candidate. I just found him extremely thoughtful. I'm like - why can't we have candidates like this in every city? Maritza Rivera also had some really interesting things in her campaign that I liked. But I think what was really striking for me is Rivera, if you go on her endorsements page, you'll see Bob Ferguson is the very first endorsement listed there. And that's really interesting. And not everyone can get an endorsement from Bob Ferguson. Maritza Rivera had one and made sure that people knew that she had that endorsement. Also, you see Mayor Harrell's endorsement there. The mayor's doing well in this election. His candidates are doing well, and I don't think that's a coincidence. And I also noticed Sara Nelson's endorsement there. Sara Nelson gets a lot of flak from folks in Seattle, especially on the left, perhaps deservedly so for some of the positions she's taking. But in our polling, she's actually got a pretty good approval rating relative to other members of the council. I say relative because these things are relative. So Sara Nelson is perceived better right now than other members of the council - and that includes Councilmember Sawant, who's leaving her district with a horrible, awful job performance rating, including from her own constituents. It's not just citywide. Our polling was very, very clear on that. People are not happy with her job performance. So she was able to get elected several times, she built an amazing coalition. But then that support has eroded away. And I think that's why she didn't seek re-election. I think she realized she was going to have some difficulty getting re-elected if she sought re-election. So exiting allows to avoid a defeat, which I think is a good strategy, because then you can go and take your experience in elected office and do something else. But I just thought Davis had a tremendous set of ideas. He engaged with groups that other candidates didn't, from what I heard. And what I really liked was, again, he had this thoughtful, urbanist-centered vision. It really appealed to me personally. If I was in District 4, I'd be like - wow, this is just really exciting vision for Seattle. And his voters' pamphlet statement just talked about how everyone deserves a home in Seattle. And the themes that I saw there were very powerful. And I'm a little surprised that he didn't quite have a stronger Election Night performance. I thought Rivera might lead, but to see him down by as much as he was, that wasn't quite what I thought we might see. And I don't do predictions, so I'm always willing to be open-minded and see what happens. But I was thinking that the race would be closer on Election Night, and then it would be possible for there to be a lead change by the end of the week if that were the case. But instead, Maritza Rivera has kept a lead throughout this count. So I think, unfortunately, Ron Davis is out of runway to turn this around. But he came really close. And I think he should definitely run for office again. [00:35:23] Crystal Fincher: Yeah, a lot of great ideas that we heard. Go ahead, Katie. [00:35:25] Katie Wilson: Sorry, just to add one thing to what I was saying before from the Westneat column. This is roughly 40,000 fewer Seattleites showed up for this election than in 2019. So if you look at that, we're talking about an average of 5,700 votes in each district that would have been added. And so you look at these margins, and that would have shifted several of these races. [00:35:47] Crystal Fincher: Yeah, I agree. And then I also-- I'm looking at this difference in spending. And the spending isn't just money. It's communication. It's the commercials that you see, it's the mailers that you get, it's the digital ads that you see. And those do move some voters. Are they going to close a 25-point deficit? No. But can they move a race 5, 10 points? Absolutely. And so as I'm looking at this, I'm looking at just how close this race is. And it seems to me that money definitely impacted this race, as did turnout, as did so many other things. But it just seems really hard to be able to go up against that amount of communication when you don't have it - to be outspent, to be out-communicated by that degree. And given that, I do think Ron Davis mounted a really, really good campaign for hopefully his first campaign and not his last, because he did contribute a lot of great policy ideas, concrete policy ideas, that I think would do the city good. Moving to District 5, where we saw ChrisTiana ObeySumner versus Cathy Moore. This race was pretty conclusive as of the first tally on Election Night. What was your evaluation of this, Andrew? [00:37:11] Andrew Villeneuve: Well, this was the one race I think that everyone could say - That's done - on Election Night. That's a done race. We can see where things are going. And of course, there has been a shift in the late ballots, but not enough of one to threaten Cathy Moore's position. So I guess what we saw is Cathy Moore had a campaign of enormous strength, resonated with the electorate. And we just didn't see the same from the other side. I mean, I know The Stranger made a very powerful case. But you look at the top two field, and there were other candidates - Nilu Jenks was running and didn't quite make it. But I feel like the fact that there wasn't a stronger vote for ObeySumner in the top two, that sort of set up the general election. I think you want to have as much support as you can get in the top two. And then you want to be able to run as strong of a general election campaign as you can. And I think that here, there might not have quite been the same resonance with the electorate for that candidacy. And I think that that's part of the issue - when you are having trouble connecting with voters for whatever reason, then you're going to see that kind of lopsided results. And sometimes there's nothing you can do about it because for whatever reason, you're just not clicking. But I heard from a lot of folks who-- I asked every District 5 voter, who are you voting for? And everybody basically told me Cathy Moore - that I talked to. And I ran out of people to ask to see if I could find any ObeySumner voters. But to me, that sort of spoke for people had talked to their neighbors, they had considered their choices, and they settled on Moore. And so that's where we were on Election Night. And of course, again, late ballots - we saw some change, but not a whole lot of change. And so again, I think hats off to Cathy Moore for running a campaign that brought together a lot of people, excited a lot of folks. And we'll see now how Cathy does on the council as Debora Juarez's successor. [00:39:16] Crystal Fincher: And Robert? [00:39:18] Robert Cruickshank: Yeah, I'm a District 5 resident - voted for ChrisTiana, but have had many conversations with Cathy Moore. And Cathy Moore is definitely not easy to pigeonhole as a corporate moderate. Cathy has, I think, some pretty strong progressive background and positions. This is an interesting district up here in District 5 too, that - people assume it's so far north that we're almost suburbs, and that's kind of true. But there are also large pockets of immigrant populations, people of color, low-income folks. And if you look at the map so far of the precincts - votes that have come in so far - ChrisTiana, they've only won a single precinct in Pinehurst, but they're pretty close in areas like Licton Springs, north Greenwood, Lake City. They're almost neck and neck with Cathy Moore in some of those areas - these are some of the denser parts of the district as well. Again, I don't think anyone's surprised that Cathy Moore prevailed by a fairly wide margin here. Again, given what Andrew pointed out in the primary, that that seemed foretold there. But I just wanna emphasize that Cathy Moore did not run the same race that maybe Rob Saka or Maritza Rivera or Bob Kettle or Pete Hanning ran. And I think that certainly helped. It's a district that four years ago, handily reelected Deborah Juarez over Ann Davison, who's of course now our city attorney. Which suggests that in District 5, there's definitely a lot of support for a left of center, but not too far left of center candidate. Well, again, we'll see what Cathy Moore does on the council. I think Cathy also ran a campaign that was good, but also kind of promises a lot of things to a lot of people. And the rubber will meet the road in the next few months on the council, especially as some important decisions come up around budget, around police contract, and around transportation levy. [00:41:17] Crystal Fincher: Now, moving on to District 6 - this is where we saw incumbent Councilmember Dan Strauss wind up overtaking and winning the race over Pete Hanning. How did you see this race, Andrew? [00:41:34] Andrew Villeneuve: So this was a race where we saw our first lead change, and Councilmember Strauss was fortunate in that he had the advantage of incumbency. He also, I think, had a district that perhaps, he felt like - okay, I can handle this redistricting, like I can handle some adjustments to the lines. I think he was well-prepared to face a slightly different electorate than what he faced in his last campaign. And he also was mindful of his public safety posture as he went into the campaign, realizing that - we're gonna talk about District 7 next - but realizing that it's important for people to perceive you on public safety as being someone that understands the issues that are out there in the community, which we know are significant. We know some people are concerned about property crime. We know some small business owners are very vocal about the issues they're going through, they're looking for more help from the city. And I think Councilmember Strauss was ready for that dynamic. I also think he made an effort to present himself as someone who's gotten things done. And he got not the most enthusiastic endorsement from The Stranger, but it didn't seem to hurt him too much. I mean, they sort of riffed on his "Ballard Dan" moniker. I went to his website and was reading about how he presented himself, and he's talking in his campaign bio about non-political things. And I think that's a really interesting and smart choice is to show yourself as not just a politician, but also a fellow community member, someone who has different interests. You're not just interested in politics - that's not the only thing you care about. And I think that that helped him connect with voters. I think it's very important for people to see who you are - that helps them identify with you. It's very important that people identify with you when they go to vote, because elections tend to turn on identity and trust more than anything else. Issues do matter, of course. And those of us who are very much in the wonkish space, we love people's issues, positions - we love to evaluate them. But I think a lot of voters are more in the mindset of - Do I want this person representing me in government? And they think about it at a very basic level. They don't think necessarily about people's issue positions. And they certainly don't have an Excel spreadsheet where they run a calculator to see whose position they're closest to. So I think that was one of the key things that I saw here was just, again, Strauss presenting himself as someone that folks could identify with and empathize with. And I also think Pete Hanning could have run a stronger campaign here - not as much resources on Hanning's side as I thought we might've seen, and that could have been a difference maker. Again, in a close race with a lead change, it's like just what we were talking about earlier - anything can make the difference. So we could talk about a lot of different factors, but what I saw was an incumbent who was interested in getting reelected and put in some of the work. And made sure that there were reasons for people to identify with him. And I think that we saw that worked out for him, and he was the first of the two incumbents to get that lead change on Thursday. So congratulations, Councilmember Strauss, on your reelection. [00:44:37] Crystal Fincher: How did you see this, Katie? [00:44:41] Katie Wilson: Yeah, I don't - sorry, I'm a little bit distracted. But yeah, I mean, I think that Councilmember Strauss definitely did somewhat of a pivot to the right, or just trying to kind of blow with the winds of his district and that paid off. And yeah, I'll pass it on to Robert. [00:45:02] Robert Cruickshank: Yeah, I think a couple of things stand out. Certainly the slide that's being displayed right now - notice there's no independent expenditure against Dan Strauss. Strauss clearly cozied up to the Chamber here, he cozied up to Mayor Harrell. So his blowing with the wind, which I think is an apt description, worked. It also worked when Dan put out mailers saying, I voted against defunding the police. Dan has been very active in trying to get encampments cleared at Ballard Commons Park and other areas in the neighborhood. So I think we who are progressive - who don't want to see a renewal of the War on Drugs, we don't feel comfortable when we see sweeps happening, we're not totally comfortable with this current mayor - have to do some reflection here. And the fact that Strauss took these positions that we who are progressive don't really like and prevailed with it - isn't great for us. And I think we've got to be honest about that and reflect on what that might mean, and how we pivot, and how we handle things differently. It doesn't mean we should abandon our core values. You never do that in politics, otherwise we should go home. But I think we got to take a look at this race and see why. Now, a couple other factors I want to point out. Again, Strauss is a incumbent and that helps. Also his district is fairly favorable. I think there's sometimes a reputation that like Ballard gets as being a bunch of cranky, conservative Scandinavians and it's just not. If you have a view of the water in District 6, you voted for Hanning. If you don't, you probably voted for Strauss - and that goes as far up as North Beach, North of 85th Street, which is pretty well off, parts of Crown Hill, pretty well off, lots of homeowners in Phinney Ridge and Greenwood, Ballard and Fremont all voting for Dan Strauss by pretty healthy margins. So I think the fact that that district - one that reelected Mike O'Brien in 2015, and I think would have reelected him in 2019 had O'Brien had the stomach for it - it is a favorable one. I think there's more opportunity there then Strauss was able to really make out of it. But again, this is a race where, press as we can point to things that didn't go our way, we didn't get the turnout we wanted, we had a lot of money spent against us, but someone like Dan Strauss who sort of blew with the wind, decided which way the wind was blowing, moved away from a lot of our positions and prevailed. So we have to be honest about that. [00:47:27] Crystal Fincher: Yeah, this race I thought was interesting because he did run away from his record basically and try to correct for that. It's really interesting because we saw two different approaches from two incumbents who both wound up successful. Tammy Morales, who is probably now the most progressive member remaining on the council - one of the most progressive before - showed that she was engaged and she did care. And I think maybe the key is really that - there has been this prevailing idea that progressives just don't care about crime or they wanna go easy on it. And one thing I think both Dan Strauss and Tammy Morales did was show that they cared very deeply and they were willing to stay engaged, stay involved, try and push through public safety, community safety initiatives that both of their districts had been calling for. And being engaged is what helped them. And really showing that they care and showing that they're working on the problem is what helped them - both of them - in those races, even though they have taken very different approaches and Tammy Morales stood by her record, fought hard for the district and a number of different things. So that was interesting for me to see - just the different approaches - but both looking like they were successful as long as they were engaged. [00:48:55] Shannon Cheng: You just listened to Part 1 of our 2023 Post-Election Roundtable that was originally aired live on Monday, November 13th. Audio for Part 2 will be running this Friday, so make sure to stay tuned. Full video from the event and a full text transcript of the show can be found on our website officialhacksandwonks.com. The producer of Hacks & Wonks is Shannon Cheng. You can find Hacks & Wonks on Twitter @HacksWonks, and you can follow Crystal @finchfrii, spelled F-I-N-C-H-F-R-I-I. You can catch Hacks & Wonks on iTunes, Spotify, or wherever else you get your podcasts - just type "Hacks and Wonks" into the search bar. Be sure to subscribe to get our Friday week-in-review shows and our Tuesday topical show delivered to your podcast feed. If you like us, leave us a review wherever you listen. You can also get a full transcript of this episode at officialhacksandwonks.com and in the podcast episode notes. Thank you for tuning in!

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Week in Review: November 10, 2023 - with Melissa Santos

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Play Episode Listen Later Nov 10, 2023 59:47

On this week-in-review, Crystal is joined by Seattle Axios reporter, Melissa Santos! Melissa and Crystal discuss how Election Night results in Washington state aren't conclusive and can change due to our mail-in ballot system, how four County election offices were evacuated and whether this might explain low turnout trends. Then they dive into where Seattle City Council election results currently stand and the impact that enormous spending by outside interests had on voter communication. Looking outside Seattle, more encouraging progressive results appear to be taking shape across the state in Tacoma, Bellingham, Spokane, Snohomish County, Bellevue, Bothell, and more! The show wraps up with reflection on why celebrated Seattle Police Department Detective Denise “Cookie” Bouldin suing the City for decades of racism and gender bias from SPD management and colleagues is yet another indication of internal police culture not matching their publicly declared values. As always, a full text transcript of the show is available below and at officialhacksandwonks.com. Find the host, Crystal Fincher, on Twitter at @finchfrii and find today's co-host, Melissa Santos at @MelissaSantos1. Melissa Santos Melissa Santos is one of two Seattle-based reporters for Axios. She has spent the past decade covering Washington politics and the Legislature, including five years covering the state Capitol for The News Tribune in Tacoma and three years for Crosscut, a nonprofit news website. She was a member of The Seattle Times editorial board from 2017 to 2019, where she wrote columns and opinion pieces focused on state government. Resources Digging into Seattle's Budget Process with Amy Sundberg and BJ Last of Solidarity Budget from Hacks & Wonks “4 election offices evacuated in Washington state; fentanyl found at 2” by Melissa Santos from Axios “Business-backed Seattle council candidates take early leads” by Melissa Santos from Axios “Seattle council incumbents still trail in latest election results” by Melissa Santos from Axios “Business-backed groups spend big on Seattle council races” by Melissa Santos from Axios “Tacoma to consider new tenant rights measure on Nov. 7 ballot” by Joseph O'Sullivan from Crosscut “Tacomans deciding on progressive renter protections” by Lauren Gallup from Northwest Public Broadcasting “The 4 biggest takeaways from election night results in Tacoma and Pierce County | Opinion” by Matt Driscoll from The News Tribune “Bellingham voters consider minimum-wage hike, tenant protections” by Joseph O'Sullivan from Crosscut “Lisa Brown leads incumbent Nadine Woodward in Spokane mayoral race” by Mai Hoang from Crosscut “Controversial Sheriff with Right-Wing Ties Faces Voters in Washington State” by Jessica Pishko from Bolts “Johnson defeats Fortney in sheriff's race, new ballot drop shows” by Jordan Hansen from Everett Herald “Pioneering Black detective sues SPD, alleging racism, gender discrimination” by Mike Carter from The Seattle Times Find stories that Crystal is reading here Listen on your favorite podcast app to all our episodes here Transcript [00:00:00] Crystal Fincher: Welcome to Hacks & Wonks. I'm Crystal Fincher, and I'm a political consultant and your host. On this show, we talk with policy wonks and political hacks to gather insight into local politics and policy in Washington state through the lens of those doing the work with behind-the-scenes perspectives on what's happening, why it's happening, and what you can do about it. Be sure to subscribe to the podcast to get the full versions of our Tuesday topical show and Friday week-in-review delivered to your podcast feed. If you like us, the most helpful thing you can do is leave a review wherever you listen to Hacks & Wonks. Full transcripts and resources referenced in the show are always available at officialhacksandwonks.com and in our episode notes. If you missed our Tuesday topical show, it was a special one. Our producer and special guest host, Shannon Cheng, chatted with Amy Sundberg and BJ Last from Solidarity Budget about currently ongoing City of Seattle budget process. The conversation ranged from the fight over the JumpStart Tax to why ShotSpotter is more egregious than you thought. This is the first show that I actually have not hosted on Hacks & Wonks and Shannon did a fantastic job. It's a really informative and interesting show, and I highly suggest you listen. Today, we're continuing our Friday week-in-review shows where we review the news of the week with a co-host. Welcome back to the program, friend of the show and today's co-host: Seattle Axios reporter, Melissa Santos. [00:01:41] Melissa Santos: Hi, Crystal. [00:01:43] Crystal Fincher: Well, good to have you back on this Friday following general election results in Washington state. We have a lot to talk about, a lot that's interesting. I think the first thing I wanna talk about is just the nature of elections and results. As a reminder to people - for so long, so many of us were used to going to a polling place, voting, getting election results on Election Night. We still get that from a lot of other places in the country. It does not work like that here in Washington - and particularly for the City of Seattle, some other, especially major metropolitan areas - where there's, you see differences in where different demographics typically vote in the timeline when ballots are out. What races look like on the first night can look very different than what the ultimate results show. How do you approach this? [00:02:39] Melissa Santos: Well, so I basically - especially in Seattle races - I try to put a caveat at the top of any story I write on Election Night or the next day, sometimes even Friday of election week saying, Races are known to swing by 10 or 12 points in Seattle - this could change. It will change. It could change dramatically, essentially. So that's, I think, what we're seeing here. I mean, as of right now, when we're actually recording - we don't have Thursday's results yet. So we only have a very limited batch of ballots, especially because of something else we're probably gonna talk about later - there was limited counting in some counties, including King County, yesterday and fewer ballots released because of a scare they had at the elections office. So we just don't have a lot of information. Election night - like half the ballots maybe are being reported, so that's just a ton of room for results to change. And we have seen that repeatedly in Seattle, especially when it comes to progressive candidates looking like they're down, and then - oh look, they won by four points, three points, two points. So this happens a lot. And that's just a good caveat to keep in mind as we're talking about election results the week of the election in Seattle. [00:03:49] Crystal Fincher: Yeah, and as you said, we are actually recording this on Thursday morning. Viewers will start to hear this on Friday, but we don't have many results - we might as well talk about it now. The reason why we have even fewer results than we thought, or fewer ballots counted, is that there were some wild things that happened at some elections offices yesterday. What happened? [00:04:10] Melissa Santos: So four county elections offices in Washington state, including in King County, received an unknown powder substance in envelopes that were delivered to the election office. And so the King County Elections office in Renton, that does all this counting, was evacuated for three hours the day after the election - in which counting was not happening because they had HazMat there, they had the Fire Department there, they had the police there checking to make sure this wasn't something super dangerous, that there wasn't a chemical attack, essentially, against the election offices. And in Spokane County, they got a similar thing and they actually didn't - I don't think they released results yesterday at all, actually, in Spokane. Or at least it was very delayed and limited. So in King County, they released many fewer ballots, and counted many fewer ballots, and reported fewer than they had expected to on Wednesday, the day after the election. And then also Skagit and Pierce County offices got mysterious packages. And two of them - in King County and Spokane, it was, there were traces of fentanyl. We're still waiting for more information, so there was some sort of fentanyl in there. Not clear about the other two - might've been baking powder in Tacoma, according to one report I saw, so. But in any case, this is a threat that people are sending stuff that is very threatening. I mean, everyone remembers it was around - Anthrax scares and this and that. So when you get in the envelope as a public servant like that - you're worried it could kill you, it could kill your colleagues, and then you're gonna not keep counting ballots probably. Or your coworkers across the building are gonna stop counting ballots - and that's what happened. [00:05:45] Crystal Fincher: Yeah, absolutely. And people are on heightened alert for a number of different reasons. These bring to mind some of the increased attacks that we've seen that seem to have anti-Semitic, anti-Arab, anti-Muslim bias. There have been envelopes of powder mailed to synagogues in our state. So this has a lot of people wondering - are these ties to election denialists? Is this someone with some other grievance? But people are on heightened alert about that. King County counted about half as many ballots yesterday as they originally intended to, so we have really abbreviated results. The other factor that is a challenge that is not standard - not what we normally see - is turnout is low, is trending really low. And weirdly, it was trending above where we were a couple of years ago until Election Day - 'cause we can track how many ballots are received each day, how that compares - so it was actually up by a few percentage points. But on Election Day, really, turnout seems to have cratered. We don't know why. Again, the results being released - it's so early, so we just may not have the full picture. Maybe people just voted in a really late flux and we don't know that yet. There's just a lot that we don't know. But right now, turnout seems to be trending pretty low in a different way than we've seen before, at least so far. So we're not sure what that means, who might not have turned out, is this gonna wind up low? We just have a lot that we still need to see, both in results and in just the ballots received, and what that means for turnout. So with that said, let's start off talking about the City of Seattle. We had several council races. And I guess thinking, going through the results - overall, the more moderate candidate was leading pretty significantly in a lot of cases on Election Night. Again, as we talked about earlier, several of these races are still within the bounds where it's possible these races could change. And the person who ultimately winds up winning could be different than the person currently leading in several of these races - if ballots trend how they traditionally trend in the city - there's been a few different folks who've done some public analysis of this. But right now in District 1, Rob Saka - this looks to be one of the races that looks pretty conclusive, that Rob Saka currently holds a pretty commanding lead over Maren Costa. In District 2, Tanya Woo is currently leading Tammy Morales. This is a closer race and one that is within the margin where we see late ballots overtake what the early results were. In District 3, Joy Hollingsworth - this seems like a pretty settled race - seems to have prevailed over Alex Hudson. District 4, we have Maritza Rivera leading Ron Davis. This is one that is at the margin of where races come back - if ballots trend in the same way as they had before, Ron could end up eking out a win. If they don't, maybe he comes up a little short, but definitely a race we anticipate tightening up. In District 5, Cathy Moore holds a pretty commanding lead - this looks like one where it's beyond the range of kind of the bounce-back of ballots over ChrisTiana ObeySumner. And in District 6 - [00:09:34] Melissa Santos: District 6 is Dan Strauss, and that is really, really close, with Dan Strauss and Pete Hanning. And we actually saw Strauss, who's an incumbent, and is the more leftward candidate in that race - I mean, of the candidates in that race. [00:09:47] Crystal Fincher: Of the candidates in that race. [00:09:49] Melissa Santos: Not really the most leftward councilmember that is on the ballot necessarily, but in this race he is the more progressive of the two. He was down two points on Election Night, but now it's less than one percentage point. And that's just with the limited ballots we saw on Wednesday. So that's an example of how much you can switch there - we saw about a percentage point gain in a very close race. So I suspect Dan Strauss will actually win his race and be reelected, but we will see. [00:10:18] Crystal Fincher: It would be shocking if he didn't wind up winning this. And in District 7, we have Andrew Lewis and Bob Kettle, with Bob Kettle currently in the lead over Andrew Lewis. This is another one where it is still within the range that this is too close to call. We need to see further results. And if again, ballots trend in the same way as they've trended - particularly in 2021, but also in 2019 - then Andrew Lewis could wind up winning. This week is gonna be interesting with results because we typically get a daily update at between 4p and 5p, depending on the county. And King County - it's typically 4 p.m. But Friday is a holiday, so we won't get updates on Friday. Today, Thursday, will be the last day of updates. And then the next day that we get an update on the vote totals will be Monday. So Monday will probably be a very conclusive day, a day that shows whether people are on track to make it, where a lot of the late ballots are going to be in the tally - because the counting continues over the weekend, even though they don't release the results until Monday. So we'll see what that is. But a lot of races that are currently too close to call, even though if you've seen some other media outlets, particularly some columnists - I think Danny Westneat had a column, that was like - Oh, the progressive era in Seattle is over or something like that - which I think certainly the early results are different than even earlier results that we've seen in prior races, different than even in the primary, I think we would say. So there is something afoot here, and there's certainly going to be a different council with one, so many new candidates. But there's gonna be a new composition on the council, certainly. But saying what that composition is going to be with so many of these races still in the air, I think it's premature to say at this time, and we'll still see. We just don't know about the turnout and don't wanna mislead people, have to rewrite headlines. I think you're one of the more responsible journalists when it comes to setting appropriate expectations and making sure you don't overstate what the results are saying. [00:12:45] Melissa Santos: I mean, I think the one thing you can say, that I got from Danny's column, that I can guarantee will be correct is you will not have Kshama Sawant on the council anymore. And she has been one of the sort of firebrands on the council, very - has strong views that she doesn't shy away from and doesn't - whatever dynamic that is on the council, some people don't like it, some people do like it - that she just says what she wants to do and doesn't kind of do as much backroom compromise sometimes on certain issues. That's gone. So you don't have a Socialist on the council anymore - that is happening - 'cause she didn't run for re-election. There wasn't a chance for her to lose. So either way, that was gonna be different. But a couple of the moderate candidates we were talking about, I'm not really sure which way they'll vote on some of the issues that typically define Seattle moderates. And for me, Cathy Moore comes to mind. She won by - I mean, you can say Cathy won at this point - it was about 40 points. So that is not going to be, that's not going to happen for ChrisTiana ObeySumner. But Cathy, during election interviews, was a lot more forthright actually about taxes, saying - I disagree with the business community actually, that we probably need more tax revenue. And so she was much more open on the campaign trail about the notion of taxing businesses to close the City's budget deficit. And this is one of those issues that typically defines sort of the Seattle centrist moderates, business-friendly candidates - is having a lot more reticence about taxing businesses. Usually the candidates won't say - Absolutely not under any circumstances. But they'll say - We need to do an audit. I'm not, I mean, some of them actually will say, I don't think we have a budget deficit - in the case of Bob Kettle, I think that was something he said regularly, despite what the revenue projections do say. But Cathy Moore was a lot more nuanced on that topic. And also on zoning, potentially, and being willing to have more dense zoning in certain areas. I'm not sure that she'll vote the way - it remains to be seen. People can say things on the campaign trail and do totally different things, so we'll see. But she was fairly consistent about being sort of more on the liberal side of certain issues in that respect. Joy Hollingsworth, who has, I think, pretty definitively come out ahead in District 3 - this is Sawant's district. You know, she's a really - she's just a really compelling personality too. I mean, and I'm not saying this in a negative way - you talk to Joy, you feel like she's listening. She's a good candidate on the campaign trail. I saw her canvassing a lot - like in person, a fair amount - 'cause I live in that district. And her campaign sent out a lot of communications. She had the benefit of independent money, which we will talk about soon, I think, as far as more outside spending benefiting her campaign. So there were more mailers sent out - not even necessarily by her campaign, but on her behalf. And I just don't know if she's a traditional candidate. And she would say this and has said this - When am I the centrist candidate? I'm a queer, cannabis-owning business owner, you know, who's Black, and I just don't, when am I like the right-wing candidate here? So I mean, maybe doesn't fit the profile of what people think of when you're talking about sort of centrist candidates. And again, has done a lot of work on cannabis equity and equity issues, I think, that also helped her relate to a lot of voters in her district. Well, Rob Saka, I think, is more - who I think is pretty clearly winning in District 1 - is probably the most traditional, sort of more business-backed candidate who's skeptical of taxes, skeptical of how the City's spending its money, and then also had a lot of big business backing on independent spending. And is sort of more - we need to hire more cops, more in the traditional line of what you're thinking of as a centrist candidate. And he is going to be replacing a more progressive councilmember in Lisa Herbold. But, you know, they basically have Saka in that mold, clearly. And then the other two races that are decided already, it's not totally clear that it's some - it's gonna be a, exactly what kind of shift it's gonna be. And in fact, Cathy Moore is replacing a more moderate on the council anyway. So a lot is still dependent on what - the results we still don't have. And also, one of the more progressive members on the council is Teresa Mosqueda, who is running for King County Council and is likely to ultimately win that race, and that's gonna be an appointment process, where - to replace her on the council. So who that is - you could end up with a fairly progressive council, potentially, in some respects. If all of these races switch to progressive suddenly in the late results, which certainly may not happen. But it's just a little premature on Election Night to necessarily say the council's going to be way less progressive than it was, I think, potentially. That's all. [00:17:40] Crystal Fincher: No, I completely agree with that. We've talked about on the show - if you know me personally, we have definitely talked about this in person - but painting, you know, the media narrative out there, that - Oh, it's the super progressive council, you know, who's always battling with the mayor, and we want a change of direction. I'm always asking, define what that direction is, because we did not have a progressive council. There were different people in different positions on the council - certainly had progressives on it, but a number of moderates on it. And in this change, as you said - in District 1, I think it's very fair to say that that moved in a more moderate direction. District 5, I think that's moving in a more progressive direction, everything on balance. [00:18:30] Melissa Santos: And if Ron Davis wins in District 4 - which that district has been super swingy in the past because it has - I think university students is a factor, sort of, I do think there's a late turnout surge there in a lot of years, in some years, maybe that's greater than some districts. If he wins, you're going to be replacing Alex Pedersen, who is one of the more - certainly centrist, some would say conservative - but center candidates, and so you'd have a much more liberal person in that respect on, I think, both taxes, on criminal justice, I think on also zoning, definitely zoning, Ron Davis is like the urbanist candidate - is kind of what he's known as, and having worked with FutureWise and these organizations and in advocacy, sort of behind-the-scenes roles. So yeah, that would be, kind of, undermine the narrative to me. If you replace Alex Pedersen with Ron Davis, I'm not sure the progressivism-is-gone narrative exactly will hold up, so that's - but again, we would need some big swings for these things to happen. I'm not trying to act like you're going to get all these progressives. It definitely was a good night for business-backed, sort of, more centrist candidates on Election Night. [00:19:42] Crystal Fincher: Yeah, absolutely, I agree with that. And I think if Maritza Rivera ends up doing that, that's basically a wash on what their representation does - that looks like they have continued with what they generally had. And didn't move in a more progressive direction, but certainly did not get more moderate or conservative than what was already there, I think. I think there are two buckets of candidates that we're looking at, as you alluded to before. I think that Rob Saka, if Bob Kettle were to wind up prevailing, if Maritza Rivera were to wind up prevailing - those, I think, are most firmly in the traditional moderate conservative, very skeptical of taxation, very supportive of carceral solutions, more punitive solutions, lots of talk about hiring and supporting police, different answers to different issues, often involving public safety elements. I think that's fair to say. I don't think most people would put Cathy Moore, Joy Hollingsworth in that same category. I think Tanya Woo is a bit of a toss-up. This is another race where, I think, next to Dan Strauss, the next most likely candidate of what looks the way ballots traditionally go, even with some wiggle room - Tammy Morales, the way ballots trend in Seattle, certainly has a path to finishing in the lead. There is definitely a difference between those two candidates, but I think Tanya Woo has certainly expressed some reservations for taxation, has certainly expressed her support for public safety solutions - Maybe she falls somewhere in the middle there. It seems like she's not as aggressive as some of the other candidates and their zeal for those solutions, but she has signaled that she's open to them. So I think that's a question mark if it goes the Tanya Woo route. But this is a race that is definitely too close to call at this point in time for the way Seattle ballots trend. So that's Seattle. Let's talk a little bit more about the money, which you have written about - basically, everybody wrote about. We have not seen spending of this magnitude in Seattle City Council races since the Amazon money bomb that we saw in 2019. What happened with outside money in this race and what impact do you think it had? [00:22:34] Melissa Santos: So originally in 2019, there was a big - originally, that's not that long ago, I understand, but in recent history of Seattle elections - the Chamber of Commerce had a PAC that was spending a lot on behalf of the business-preferred candidates. And Amazon gave a million dollars plus to that - a million of it right at October, I think, in 2019. And that kind of - especially, Sawant in her race, again, Socialist councilmember, was saying Amazon's trying to buy the election. And then there was a sense that left voters turned out citywide even to kind of object to that. There was one, something that I think a lot of observers thought happened that year. And that one might have helped fuel this surge of left-leaning voters after the initial vote count as well. And also, Trump was in office. There was a lot of sort of motivation, I think, of progressives to kind of vote and make themselves heard wherever they could during that era. Okay, so this year - your original question - this year, we didn't have a chamber PAC doing all of the money. It wasn't all relayed through this chamber PAC. It was different. There were all these little political action committees called Neighbors of this Neighborhood. It was Downtown Neighbors Committee, Elliott Bay Neighbors Committee, and then University District Neighbors Committee. So it sounds, you know, those innocuous, sweet-sounding PAC names, right? But they were all supporting the candidates that were preferred by the, I mean, the Chamber and the Downtown Seattle Association. And they spent a fair amount of money. I mean, in the - I don't think that I had all the receipts when I did the calculations on Sunday, so there's a few more that have come in since then. But I mean, it was $300,000 almost for Maritza Rivera. And when I say for, I mean, a lot of it was spent opposing Ron Davis, but all benefiting Maritza - either in direct support from these external groups that were saying, Vote for this person, or, you know, saying, Don't vote for this person, her opponent, the more left-leaning candidate in that race. So that's quite a bit of money for one race, one district race, you know, you're talking about. And then we saw that for support for Rob Soka as well. And they were some of the similar groups where - there's overlap in who is supporting these PACs, right? Landlords organizations, there were builders and construction and realty interests. And there were - the Realtors PAC actually gave separately to a few candidates like Tanya Woo and Bob - okay, I shouldn't say gave. Let me back up. The Realtors PAC, the National Realtors PAC, actually spent its own money separately from these Neighborhood groups to support Tanya Woo and Bob Kettle. And so you just saw that outside PAC money was coming in. And that was, you know, a lot more than the leftward union side spent this year by a significant margin to kind of help support these candidates. So, I mean, at the end you had $1.5 million almost spent and more than $1.1 million of that, maybe $1.2 million, was from the business sort of backed interest sort of pouring money from outside into these races, supporting their preferred candidates. [00:25:53] Crystal Fincher: So I think - one, something that gets missed or I've seen a lot of questions about - so people are like, Okay, there's a lot of money. Corporations have a lot of money. How does that impact races? What does that mean when it comes to these campaigns and when it comes to what voters see? [00:26:11] Melissa Santos: So what you're paying for is communication. What they are paying for is communication. They're paying for mailers that go to voters, they're paying for TV or radio ads in some cases - maybe not radio this year, but it's, you know, this is some of the things that independent expenditures pay for. Online ads - so reaching voters to tell them about the candidate. And this is what campaigns do. That's the whole point of a campaign. Except when you have someone from outside doing it also, it just really widens your impact as a candidate - even though they don't coordinate, they're not involved together - it still will help get your message out to more people if you have supporters doing this on your behalf and buying mailers. I mean, I live in District 3 and most of the mailers I got were from Joy Hollingsworth's campaign, but I did get another mailer from an independent expenditure committee. And this was one that also was like - You like weed, vote for Joy Hollingsworth. Literally, that's what it said. I wish I was not kidding. So, I mean, again, that's - again, muddying the who's progressive and who's not a little. I mean, the mailers contribute to that, but anyway. And I got one mailer from Alex Hudson's campaign. So it just was like 5-1 on the communications I got from Joy Hollingsworth just to my own house. And so that's just an example of - even though only one of them was independent spending, you know, you can have a lot more mailers come and reach someone on behalf of a candidate if you have this outside money paying for it. [00:27:37] Crystal Fincher: Yeah, and communication is really everything. I think, you know, most people know I do this kind of work during the day, this podcast is an extra thing, this is not the main thing that I do. But it really all comes down to communication. Like you talked about before, there are things that the campaign can do to directly communicate with voters - phone calls, canvassing is the most effective thing they can do. And if a candidate and their campaign is on the campaign trail doing that, that is certainly generally a really positive thing for their campaign and one of the most effective things that you can do to win votes. But Kshama Sawant is notorious and the DSA - people passionate about Kshama are notorious for mounting really formidable, substantial ground games where they are covering most of the district. Most candidates are not knocking on most of the doors in their district. They're knocking on, you know, a pretty small percentage of them. And even though to them and their supporters - they see the candidate talking all the time, attending events every night - you're only reaching 15, 20% of the people in the district probably. And so the other 80% of voters have not heard anything directly, have been busy living life. The thing that many candidates don't realize is that the hardest thing isn't getting them to understand that you're better than your opponent, especially for candidates who have not run for office before. The hardest thing to do is to let voters know that you exist overall. Most voters don't know that candidates exist. Most voters don't know that there's an election coming until they see the ballot arrive in their mailbox. People, like a lot of the people who listen to Hacks & Wonks - we're not the normal ones. We've talked about this before on this show. Most people do not pay attention to the news, to candidates, to elections as much as we do. That's really important to remember when it comes to this, because that spending - the type of communication, whether it's mail, the digital video ads that you see, cable TV ads, banner ads, text messages. One, that all costs money. And so having money enables you to do more of that. And getting that in front of voters is generally the most meaningful exposure that they have to candidates - that's how they're learning about a lot of them. So if they are bombarded with information from one candidate, they hear predominantly about one candidate - usually their communications talk about how wonderful the candidate is, all the wonderful things that they're saying or planning to do, or the version of that that they're spinning in that communication - that makes a big difference. And that's how people get to know who the candidates are. If someone isn't doing much of that, they can't win. That's kind of just a structural Campaign 101 thing. So again, talked about this on the show before - if you know me, we've definitely talked about this. Sometimes when people are making sweeping pronouncements about - This narrative clearly won the day and this is what voters are saying - that may be the case in a race where there's robust communication coming from all sides, where the amount of money spent is a lot closer with each other on both sides. But in these races where one candidate is outspent by hundreds of thousands of dollars and the communication that that equates to, you rarely see those candidates win in any circumstance, regardless whether the one outspending is moderate, conservative, progressive, what kind of message they have - if it's good or bad, it can be really mediocre, it can be pretty bad. If you spend and communicate that much and so much more than your opponent, that in and of itself usually is enough to win, which is why people talk about the influence of money and the communication that that buys being corrosive or toxic or such an issue, because that in and of itself is oftentimes enough to move enough voters to win the campaign. [00:31:57] Melissa Santos: And we should mention - Seattle has a Democracy Voucher system and I think all of the candidates, I think all of the candidates use Democracy Vouchers. Crystal can correct me if I'm wrong. But certainly some of the business backed ones receiving outside money also were limited - this limits their spending as a campaign, right? So the outside money takes on an even bigger role when each of the candidates can spend - I mean, gosh, the limit is, it starts at like $90,000, then it goes up if you all raise a lot of money. But you're limited, you're not spending more than $150,000, or $125,000, or something as a campaign. I forget the exact limits, but somewhere like around there or even lower. And then you have - so think about that - the campaign spending, we say $115,000 and really can't spend more. And then someone else is spending almost $300,000, right? So - separately - so you're having these, sometimes it's gonna be the majority of money in a race because the third party committees are not limited in how much they can raise and how much they can spend. So that's how you can get millions and millions of dollars. This year, it wasn't millions, but it was more than a million backing a certain slate of candidates. And that gets a big impact when you have fairly low-cost campaigns and everyone's limited to that to a certain degree. [00:33:12] Crystal Fincher: Yeah, absolutely. So I think that is the picture of Seattle races at this point in time. I think it is fair to say that even if a number of the candidates come back, I think it's an over-pronouncement to say that there was a broad shift in direction one way or another. But I think it's absolutely fair to say that no matter what the results end up being, they're not going to be celebrated by progressive candidates, that moderates are going to wind up happier than progressives are gonna wind up with these results - in the city of Seattle. But I wanna talk about elsewhere in the state because I think the broad picture in the state - even though Seattle's likely to dominate the media conversation - that the picture in the rest of the state was more positive for progressive people than it has been in quite some time, that we see trends moving further in a Democratic and progressive direction, particularly in purple and red cities in some of the many metro cities. So Seattle, the biggest city in the state there, moved and had their results. But looking at Tacoma, looking at Spokane - these are two cities that seem to have moved definitively to the left in the composition of their councils, in Spokane's case - including the mayoral race - and also with some ballot initiatives. So starting with Tacoma - what's happening in Tacoma? [00:34:47] Melissa Santos: Well, they do have a measure on the ballot that's about sort of renter protections, which actually looks like it might prevail. It was down a little bit on Election Night, but again, we don't have a lot of results from Pierce County yet, and it's super close right now. And given the way the ballots so far have sort of trended, even with this limited amount of ballots released, I suspect that this sort of measure to enact a lot more protections for renters against eviction - and I'm blanking a little on some of the details of it - but that's sort of a priority for more liberal voters and certainly policy makers. That looks like it may pass still, still uncertain. But you also - what I thought was interesting, you know - you had, I'm just making sure I did not, two days ago with my Tacoma results, but it looked like Jamika Scott was doing really well and likely to win her race in Tacoma. And Jamika has run for mayor before and she's sort of a known, you know, pretty serious policy person, I think, in Tacoma on advocating for ways of getting rid of systemic racism. I mean, getting rid of it would be difficult, obviously, but sort of ways to mitigate and kind of make lives better for people who traditionally have not benefited from our systems. And she was really active with, or I mean, leader of the Tacoma Action Collective, which has been a group that's been sort of protesting different institutions in Tacoma, as far as their treatment of Black people and treatment of people of color more broadly, I think, as well. But especially with police brutality. This is someone who has been kind of consistently saying, We need some change in our system. And she's being elected, and people like her message in Tacoma - enough of them - to really catapult her into office, it looks like. And so that's something that was interesting. We saw Olgy Diaz, who is an appointed councilmember - oh gosh, no, she won an election by now - has she-- [00:36:51] Crystal Fincher: No, she was appointed, and she's running for her first actual election now, following the appointment. And she just took the lead. She was narrowly down on Election Night. Again, the same caveats apply - that that Election Night is a partial tally. It is not a result. So on the initial tally, she was down just by a smidge. Now she is actually leading. And just with the way ballots trend, it looks like that lead will continue to grow. So you had the more progressive candidates, certainly, in both of those races prevail. I think interestingly, particularly in Jamika's race - Jamika was not endorsed by The News Tribune, which has been very consequential in endorsing folks. And despite that - and I think, as a credit to the work that Jamika has been doing in community for a while and the coalition that Jamika built - speaking directly to issues that are impacting so many people. And a lot of times speaking meaningfully to communities, as you said, that have not traditionally been served very well by government. And really inspiring a coalition to rally around her, to vote in support of her, to turn out for that. I think that was helpful. In the same way, the Tacoma for All tenant protection measure, which had a storied path to the ballot - the City of Tacoma was basically looking to put a competing, less impactful measure that did less than this initiative did - looked like that was motivated by some of the opposing forces who didn't wanna see this measure prevail. They ended up going to court over it and the process wound up being flawed. So this wound up being the only measure - the citizens' initiative - on the ballot. And that attracted a ton of outside spending - the realtors, a number of landlord organizations, developer organizations spent a lot - hundreds of thousands of dollars in opposition of this initiative. And for - one, to be as close as it is, given all that spending, is pretty miraculous and I think goes to show the depth of the problem and how extremely it is felt to have this much support. But it looks, based on the way that ballots traditionally trend, like it's on track to eventually take the lead and win. So this is not the only initiative - there are others across the state, including other tenant protection initiatives that are speaking to what's - the large percentage of renters in the state are facing the seeming imbalance between how landlords can technically treat tenants and how important it is to put more safeguards around. And I think generally it's not controversial to say that treating being a landlord like any other business is not good for society when we're talking about a basic need for people. And putting more protections around whether the timelines of being able to raise rent, how you can evict people, the kind of notice that's required, and assistance that may be required. If you are forcing someone to move out, the issue of economic evictions, or just putting someone out - not because they did anything, but just because they want to earn more money from that property - are things that people are willing to revisit across the state. And I think a lot of people can learn that lesson. The other thing, just - I, as someone who does this for a living, get really excited about - that we're seeing in Tacoma and play out elsewhere in the state, is that sometimes these initiatives come and I'm speaking as a consultant, so obviously this happens - it has a lot of good results sometimes - but this wasn't the result of consultants getting around, establishment party entities saying, We want to put an initiative on the ballot, what should it be? And deciding what that's going to be in rallying support. This was something that truly did come from the community. This was a response from people in the community to problems that people in the community were having. They got together, they made this happen, they knocked on doors and advocated for it. This was not funded by an outside source - anything like that. And I think those are wildly successful. I think we've also seen this with the Tukwila Raise the Wage initiative that was successful that the Transit Riders Union did - that kind of model, which oftentimes is a reaction to inaction sometimes by people in power, which is frustrating to a lot of people, not seeing the issues that they feel are most important being addressed. We're having another very viable path with municipal initiatives being initiated, not just by the same old players with money, but people in community learning how to advocate and move policy themselves. I think that's a really powerful thing. We're seeing that across the state and I think we're gonna see more of it. I think that's a positive thing. [00:42:24] Melissa Santos: Yeah, Bellingham looks poised to raise its minimum wage as a city. And they passed a measure that actually - they've been doing tenant protections as a city council, but I think that what they look on track to pass - I should say the minimum wage is leading, I should say. I guess I'd have to look just close at the results. But they're on track to pass something that requires landlords to help tenants relocate if they raise their rent by 8% or more. I mean, that's like a pretty - Bellingham is a fairly liberal city, a lot of college students from Western and all this. But that's a level, that's like sort of testing out new policies at a city level that I don't think we've - I don't think Seattle requires the landlords to do rent - well, anyway, it is kind of, I'm rambling now, but it is kind of some creative, interesting stuff happening in some of these cities that is very on the progressive edge. And Spokane's mayor looks like they're going to be replaced with a Democrat - Lisa Brown, who used to be the state Senate majority leader and has been working in Governor Inslee's administration as Commerce Director. And so that's a big change there too. And that is certain - I think that is a very clear contrast in candidates where you have some voters rebuking the sort of far-right ties potentially of the mayor. Crystal has probably been following this more than me, but there was a big controversy recently with the mayor of Spokane sort of engaging with Matt Shea, who is like - oh my God, I forget all of this. [00:43:56] Crystal Fincher: Domestic terrorist, an advocacy, an advocate of domestic terrorism, someone who was planning to partake himself. [00:44:02] Melissa Santos: Yeah - who, an investigation that was commissioned by the State Legislature when Matt Shea was a legislator found that he engaged in acts of domestic terrorism. The current mayor were kind of hobnobbing with that, became an issue in that race. And voters are saying, Let's try something different - it looks like in Spokane with a more Democratic mayor. So that is a different than maybe what progressives might be seeing in Seattle. You're seeing other cities have sort of different results. [00:44:33] Crystal Fincher: Yeah, absolutely. This was one where there's - in Seattle, it's on the centrist to progressive spectrum. This was a clear Democrat versus far-right Republican who did hobnob with Matt Shea, who attended - Matt Shea, who now is well-known as someone who was found to engage in domestic terrorism, to support a variety of far-right, extremist, insurrectionist type beliefs. Nadine Woodward appeared at one of his events, hugged him, seemed to be hobnobbing with his people. And even after that was palling around with Moms for Liberty - which are notoriously anti-LGBTQ, particularly anti-trans - candidates pushing for policy, pushing for book bans in school districts across the nation, basically. So there was a clear contrast here. These issues were front and center, and voters made a clear choice here and made the decision to change direction. And there're also - three of the four Democratic councilmembers are leading in Spokane. And so this is definitely moving in a more Democratic direction in Spokane, which is a really big deal. We saw similar in Tacoma. We were looking at a lot of suburbs - I mean, looking at the Eastside, just in King County - so many of those races. Now, Bellevue may have a more progressive council than Seattle. We've seen in a number of these cities, whether it be Bothell or others, where they have moved on affordable housing policy, transit and transportation, mobility policy in ways that Seattle has not. They seem to be outdoing Seattle when it comes to some of the implementation of progressive policy that lots of people have been asking for in the city of Seattle. Other cities have been moving beyond them and it seems like, in those cities, voters have responded well. There has been vigorous opposition to these, we hear reporting about pushback to expanding zoning and the types of housing that's able to be built in all areas basically. But those debates were had and it looks like in most of these situations where there were competitive candidates fielded, they prevailed. So I think that Seattle certainly looks one way. A lot of the state has really, really positive signals and directions. And as someone who works in elections, the map for what's possible in Washington state, I think, has expanded even more with this cycle. And there are some absolute blueprints to look at moving beyond to other cities, whether it's kind of party supported, establishment supported, well-funded efforts or more grassroots initiatives - that there are multiple routes now to passing policy that helps more people and especially the people who need the help most. So we will see what that is. Also in some pretty high profile races, like the Snohomish County Sheriff, where we had someone who billed themselves as a constitutional sheriff, who had said that they didn't plan on enforcing all of the laws, especially when it comes to gun legislation that we've passed, some gun control legislation - just some real extreme views. And voters picked the more moderate sheriff candidate there - certainly not revolutionizing what the traditional practice of public safety is among sheriffs, but I think voters definitely want to put more boundaries in place, and are worried about accountability, and really focusing on what makes people safer from all perspectives, and wanting to make sure people's rights are respected. And not necessarily feeling like violating people's rights is just a necessary price we have to pay to be safer as a community - that allowing that perhaps is part of what is making us more dangerous, what is contributing to some of the challenges in recruiting police officers. And addressing some of those systemic issues or at least promises of doing that from people are more convincing to voters in areas that have been comfortable voting for Republicans even - that they aren't just willing to just say, Do whatever you say you need to do regardless of whether it violates rights, or doesn't jive with the law, or whatever that is. So interesting results across the state certainly. Now with that, I want to talk about a couple of other things that we saw, including news. We saw news, we saw coverage before - I think particularly from PubliCola, from Notes from the Emerald City - about one of the most well-known officers in the Seattle Police Department suing the department. Detective Cookie Bouldin - suing the department saying that she has witnessed and experienced racism, gender discrimination over several years with the department. What do you see with this? [00:50:19] Melissa Santos: I mean, I don't think it's necessarily a surprise that over time, especially over decades, a woman of color, Black women in particular, may not have felt at home in the Seattle Police Department. This is something I believe she's raised before, now it's just there's a formal lawsuit. It's something that - it's not a huge surprise, but I think that it is a blow to the department to have someone so recognized as a leader and over time, to make these claims. It's kind of like when - not to change the subject to another thing, but when Ben Danielson, who worked at Seattle Children's, is a very respected Black pediatrician - is also suing Seattle Children's for discrimination and racism - maybe not discrimination, but discriminatory policies. And this has a huge impact when you have someone that you've held up as sort of an example of your best, in some ways, as a department or as an agency or as a hospital. And who is sort of someone you've said - This is someone who shows how we are including communities, who has been working on these issues. And then they say - Actually, there's been a lot of problems and there's been discrimination and racism that I've encountered in unacceptable ways. It's a huge blow to the police department, Seattle Children's. These are things that really are not good for the - not just the image of the police department, but because - they point to real problems. I'm not saying this is just an optics issue or something, but it signals that maybe what you've been saying publicly isn't what's happening internally, and it isn't what's happening privately, or how people are experiencing your actual policies and your actual operation. So that's not great. And I know for the police department - and I know that Chief Adrian Diaz has been really vocal about stamping out racism in the department. I mean, it's something he talks about a lot. But this indicates that there's been problems for a long time, at least in the minds of one of their really esteemed long-time officers in the Seattle Police Department. And I don't know that one chief talking about stamping out racism and trying to talk about culture change can - I don't know that the boat shifts that fast, right? So if you're pointing to deeper issues that have been - for decades, someone who's been there for decades, or was there for decades - gosh, I mean, it kind of, it raises questions about how much is still persisting of this and then how quickly it can change if it still is persisting. [00:53:11] Crystal Fincher: Yeah, I mean, I think lots of people aren't surprised to hear that it is persisting, given a number of the things that we've seen coming out - whether it's the video of the SPOG Vice-President mocking the value of the life of a pedestrian that was killed, Jaahnavi Kandula, that was killed by a police officer speeding without lights and sirens on on the way to a call, whether it's the tombstone that they saw, whether it's just a number of the incidents that have resulted in complaints against several officers, consistently against a consistent group of officers, it seems, in several situations. And it's particularly notable just because Detective Cookie, as she's known by so many, has really been such a PR boon for the department, really is a face of the department. When people talk about community policing, when they talk about building relationships with community, when they talk about - Hey, there should be officers that really care, really get to know people, look out for people - a lot of them are directly thinking about Cookie Bouldin. They're directly thinking about things that they've seen her do in community. There's a park named after her. She's known for almost mentoring people, working, getting kids involved with chess - really someone who, I think, regardless of where you stand on the institution of policing where people would say, even with people that disagree, but if you're like Detective Cookie - She's okay, I've seen her help, I've seen her care. Certainly what I think a lot of people would want police to aspire to be, would want the role to aspire to be in a best case scenario. And for her to say - Yeah, well, this institution certainly, in Seattle, is one that is racist, is discriminatory, and has harmed people like me, people who it's held up as paragons and examples of what the job really is and how it can be done in the community - is troubling. We've seen this happen several times before in other departments - not with, I think, officers as publicly visible and known as Detective Cookie. But certainly a lot of discrimination suits - particularly from Black officers, other officers of color - saying that there have been systemic issues that they have been the victim of. Or even off-duty incidents where people have not recognized that they were officers and just saw a person of color and treated them in a different way than they were supposed to. So we'll see how this turns out, but certainly a stain, another stain on the department. I don't think anyone can say this is coming - this is just grievance, or sour grapes, or someone who just hates the institution of policing and is using anything to just tear down police, or who isn't supportive of policing overall. This is someone who has kind of built their life and they're living on that, is known for doing that and seemingly cared about that, yet went through all this. And maybe because they cared, endured through all of it - don't know the details there, but it is challenging. And I think one of the things that came out of the debates and the campaigns, the conversations that people had is really a reckoning with - maybe this is a big problem for recruiting. Maybe it's not the money that has been thrown at them that we've tried to use, that now even police officers are saying this is not a problem about money. People are talking about - it's not an attractive job. Maybe is it actually what's happening within departments the part that's not attractive and not external reaction to it. I hope that whoever winds up being elected on the council contends with this in a serious way. I think no matter what the view is on police, and I think there's a range of them within the candidates who are currently in the lead and even those who are not. But I do think this needs to be taken seriously. And I think even if you look at polling of Seattle residents - their views on public safety and policing are more nuanced than some of the like flat, simple - either you back the blue, you support cops, or you don't. Think people are, I think it's fair to say that at least most voters are generally supportive of having police respond when they call 911, but they want that to be an effective response. They want it to be a constitutional response that does keep everybody safe, and respect everybody, and build trust in the community. And we're just seeing too many things that are not that. And with that, I think that we have come to a close today. Thank you for listening to Hacks & Wonks on this Friday, November 10th, 2023. The producer of Hacks & Wonks, and this past week's guest co-host, is the incredible Dr. Shannon Cheng. Our insightful co-host today was Seattle Axios reporter, Melissa Santos, who does a wonderful job reporting on all things political and beyond. You can find Melissa on Twitter @MelissaSantos1. You can follow Hacks & Wonks on Twitter @HacksWonks. You can find me on all platforms, basically, as @finchfrii - that's two I's at the end. You can catch Hacks & Wonks on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, wherever you get your podcasts - just type "Hacks and Wonks" into the search bar. Be sure to subscribe to the podcast to get the full versions of our Friday week-in-review shows and our Tuesday topical show delivered to your podcast feed. If you like us, please leave a review wherever you listen. You can also get a full transcript of this episode and links to the resources referenced in the show at officialhacksandwonks.com and in the podcast episode notes. Thanks for tuning in - talk to you next time.

god tv amazon spotify black donald trump business washington pr online elections seattle lgbtq western vote republicans muslims democrats moms campaign senate commerce hacks democratic capitol pac election day corporations chamber neighborhood neighbors washington state arab races landlords socialists wage tacoma viewers spokane spd legislature semitic strauss election night eastside axios bolts bellevue bellingham anthrax week in review fire departments dsa seattle times state legislatures emerald city saka pacs jay inslee hazmat maritza renton king county seattle children bothell pierce county shotspotter seattle city council snohomish county lisa brown seattle police department crosscut kshama sawant ron davis mike carter andrew lewis skagit sawant fortney matt shea news tribune kshama jamika wonks commerce director melissa santos spokane county matt driscoll cathy moore king county council alex hudson snohomish county sheriff downtown seattle association everett herald teresa mosqueda tammy morales jordan hansen jaahnavi kandula tacomans

KUOW District Dash: Seattle City Council D5

Soundside

Play Episode Listen Later Oct 18, 2023 37:14

Former judge Cathy Moore and equity consultant ChrisTiana ObeySumner clash over police funding, drug law in race for North Seattle's District 5.

10-17 H1: Revisiting Geno Smith's Play & Puck Sounds Off

Cliff and Puck

Play Episode Listen Later Oct 17, 2023 43:18 Transcription Available

Puck and Kidd are holding down the fort! The fellas revisit their conversation surrounding Geno Smith as he's had a rough start, is he on the same level as a Jared Goff, or are we overreacting to Geno's play? Last week District 5 Seattle City Council candidates ChrisTiana ObeySumner and Cathy Moore at our monthly meeting to talk about their thoughts on how to make better use of “Jackson” Park Golf Course, and Puck shares his thoughts on this.

puck geno jared goff kidd geno smith seattle city council cathy moore

Week in Review: October 13, 2023 - with Robert Cruickshank

Share Whatcha Learned: Journeys in Instructional Design

Play Episode Listen Later Oct 13, 2023 50:42

On this week-in-review, Crystal is joined by Chair of Sierra Club Seattle, long time communications and political strategist, Robert Cruickshank! Robert fills Crystal in on dismaying news about Seattle Public Schools - how the district provoked parent fury by removing teachers and splitting classes after they screwed up enrollment projections, as well as their proposal for an austerity plan that includes school closures and anti-union financial policies. They then switch gears to discuss the conservative National Association of Realtors pouring money into the Seattle City Council races, Sara Nelson's penchant for campaign stunts rather than governing, and right-wingers using high gas prices to take aim at carbon pricing. As always, a full text transcript of the show is available below and at officialhacksandwonks.com. Find the host, Crystal Fincher, on Twitter at @finchfrii and find today's co-host, Robert Cruickshank, at @cruickshank. Resources “ChrisTiana ObeySumner, Candidate for Seattle City Council District 5” from Hacks & Wonks “Pete Hanning, Candidate for Seattle City Council District 6” from Hacks & Wonks “A ‘routine' reconfiguration of Seattle schools brings tears, concerns” by Claire Bryan from The Seattle Times “‘Please don't break our hearts,' Seattle parents, teachers protest widespread classroom shuffles” by Sami West from KUOW “Seattle parents raise concerns over classroom size miscalculations by school district” by Denise Whitaker from KOMO “‘The board needs to make this right'; Parents concerned over SPS restructuring” by Dave Detling from Fox 13 “Seattle Public Schools Unveil Plans for Sweeping Cuts and Lasting Austerity” by Robert Cruickshank from The Urbanist “National realtors group drops $659k in Seattle, Spokane elections” by Josh Cohen from Crosscut “Burien Mayor Sees No Issue With Distribution of Homeless People's Private Info, Council Member Blames Her Colleague for Fentanyl Deaths” from PubliCola “Will high gas prices derail WA's climate policy?” by Conrad Swanson from The Seattle Times “Don't let the oil industry gaslight us about high prices at the pump” by Leah Missik for The Seattle Times Find stories that Crystal is reading here Listen on your favorite podcast app to all our episodes here Transcript [00:00:00] Crystal Fincher: Welcome to Hacks & Wonks. I'm Crystal Fincher, and I'm a political consultant and your host. On this show, we talk with policy wonks and political hacks to gather insight into local politics and policy in Washington State through the lens of those doing the work with behind-the-scenes perspectives on what's happening, why it's happening, and what you can do about it. Be sure to subscribe to the podcast to get the full versions of our Tuesday topical show and Friday week-in-review delivered to your podcast feed. If you like us, the most helpful thing you can do is leave a review wherever you listen to Hacks & Wonks. Full transcripts and resources referenced in the show are always available at officialhacksandwonks.com and in our episode notes. If you missed this week's topical shows, we continued our series of Seattle City Council candidate interviews. All 14 candidates for 7 positions were invited, and we had in-depth conversations with many of them. This week, we presented District 5 candidate, ChrisTiana ObeySumner, and District 6 candidate, Pete Hanning. We did not talk with their opponents - Cathy Moore in D5 cancelled and Dan Strauss in D6 declined. Have a listen and stay tuned over the coming weeks - we hope these interviews will help you better understand who these candidates are and inform their choices for the November 7th general election. Today, we're continuing our Friday week-in-review shows where we review the news of the week with a co-host. Welcome back to the program, friend of the show, and today's co-host: Chair of Sierra Club Seattle, longtime communications and political strategist, Robert Cruickshank. [00:01:46] Robert Cruickshank: Hey - thanks for having me back again, Crystal. [00:01:48] Crystal Fincher: Hey, absolutely - thanks for being back. Well, there's a lot of news this week - a lot about everything. We're going to start off by talking about Seattle Public Schools and them really provoking parent fury, once again, by removing teachers and splitting up classes after the district screwed up enrollment projections. What's going on here? [00:02:11] Robert Cruickshank: Yeah, there was a board meeting last night that was packed with parents from across Seattle, and huge media turnout - all four TV stations were there, The Seattle Times was there, KUOW was there - covering this. And what happened is - over the summer, the school district administrators told principals at schools different ratios and rules and projections for enrollments they had to use in determining how many teachers they would have and how many students they could have to a teacher. And there are rules coming from the state about needing to have small class sizes at elementary schools - it's a good thing, we want that. And so the principals went forth with what the district told them, made the assignments, school began in early September - everything's going great. Then all of a sudden, at the beginning of October, just a week ago, the district realized - oops, they screwed up the calculation. And that if they don't fix it, they could lose a $3.6 million grant from the state. Now the state Office of the Superintendent of Public Instruction has said that Seattle's actually fine - we don't see an issue yet - but the district claims that they needed to take proactive steps. And so the district did - rather than say, Okay, here's some money to bring on additional teachers so we don't have to remove teachers from schools, so we don't have to take kids away from their classroom a month into the year - the district instead said, No, we're not gonna spend any extra money, we're just gonna move everyone around at 40 different schools, remove some teachers from the classroom entirely, create a bunch of split classes where a bunch of third graders now are gonna go into a room with a bunch of second graders, for example. And parents are furious, and they should be. I can give you a personal story. I have a fourth grader at Adams Elementary in Ballard, and he was in kindergarten when the pandemic hit and schools closed. So he lost half of kindergarten, and then first grade was mostly online. By the time he and his classmates get to second grade, they had any number of problems in the classroom for the full year. Second grade was a disaster for my kid, who had a ton of behavioral issues, and a lot of other kids in the class. Get to third grade, and his teacher at Adams Elementary, Ms. Windus, is excellent and she puts in a ton of work with these kids to get them back on track - helping them get back not just academically, but socially, emotionally. Third grade was great - not just for my kid, but for all the others in the class. Fourth grade's been going great so far. Well, because of these district-mandated cuts, the school has to get rid of Ms. Windus who's like this excellent teacher. And last night at the board meeting, we heard similar stories from across the city, including some really gut-wrenching stories from Southeast Seattle - Orca K-8 and Dunlap Elementaries - teachers of color, parents of color coming up and saying, Look, for the first time in years, I feel like there are teachers who get my kid and you're gonna remove them? One teacher got up and said, Tell me which student I should kick out of my class - the one who is homeless, the one who doesn't get enough to eat, the one who has behavioral issues that I've been able to help correct, the one who didn't think they could learn how to read but now they can? People were furious and rightly so, because what is happening here is the district is trying to make kids pay the price for an adult screw-up, rather than the district figuring out how to make this right without disrupting classrooms in the middle of the year. They've just said - Eh, you all can deal with it, kids can suffer the consequences. And a lot of the kids are ones - like I said earlier, not just like mine - who suffered through the pandemic and all that disruption - but necessary disruption, to be honest - because of the public health needs. But now you wanna make sure that you've got stability for these kids, that once they're bonded to a teacher in a good classroom they stay there - that's the thing they need - is stability. And this district just doesn't care. There are deeper issues, which we should talk about in a moment, but what you saw last night was an outpouring of anger and frustration at a district administration that didn't care, and a school board that just kind of sat there and didn't really make any promises to fix it. [00:06:20] Crystal Fincher: Well, and this seems to be a continuing problem, particularly with that feedback of not feeling like the district is as invested in the success of kids as a primary objective, and not really being responsive to the feedback that parents have. Does this feel like this is a continuation of this issue? [00:06:41] Robert Cruickshank: It's exactly it. The district has made it very clear that they don't care about public feedback - they don't believe that they should be answerable to the public. They don't think that the needs of students is a priority - you see in the media coverage and in the superintendent's words last night - that financial responsibility is their top priority. Well, that sounds pretty neoliberal. This is - let's put money first ahead of the needs of kids. There were a number of teachers who were there last night - and parents said similar things - who were like, We're in the richest city in the richest country in the history of the world with some of the wealthiest billionaires here, some of the largest companies here. Surely we can figure out how to solve this by working with the Legislature to tax the rich rather than making kids pay the price. The point I made last night at the board meeting is - Even if we can't get legislative money right now because they're not in session, why don't we take money from something else, like Central Office? We should be taking money away from administrator salaries - and they can do with less - rather than decide the first way to take money is to take out of the classroom. [00:07:51] Crystal Fincher: Well, and I guess that's a question that I have, that I've heard asked - what are the actual remedies here? Is this a situation where there are no good options or are there, is there a way to move forward without creating this type of disruption? [00:08:05] Robert Cruickshank: So Seattle's kids are stuck between two bad actors. On the one hand, the school district, which is deeply mismanaged. And a number of candidates for the board, like Debbie Carlsen, and a number of parents last night have been calling for an independent forensic audit of the school - of the district - and its spending. I've heard similar things from legislators who say - Hey, we're giving the district money, we don't know where it goes. So an independent audit and management reforms are necessary. On the other hand, our kids are also being hurt by the State Legislature and a Democratic majority that has not made it a priority to fund our public schools. So what do you do in the meantime? Like I said, I think the answer has to be for the district to figure out - where can they pull money from right now? If you need to lay off administrators, highly-paid assistant superintendents or something in the middle of the year, do it. These folks make a fair amount of money - you save teachers here and there. Parents have also raised questions about the new calculations that are being used to determine which schools lose teachers. In fact, a number of schools - including the one my kid attends - have seen enrollment go up. So this isn't a case of declining enrollment causing problems. At some of these schools, they've been adding kids back, which is great - you want to see that - and now they're getting punished for it. So you've got to take a look at - do we need to make mid-year cuts in the Central Office to free up money? Do we need to have some independent auditors come in and figure out what's going wrong? District administrators and most board members don't seem to want to do any of that, even though kids are paying the price. [00:09:34] Crystal Fincher: And I guess that leads me into a question about the long-term finances and outlook of the district, which is troubling. They're looking at deficits, as are many districts in the state, and we've talked about that before. Seattle Public Schools is proposing an austerity plan. What does that mean, and what kind of impact will that have? [00:09:57] Robert Cruickshank: Yeah, so to be clear, districts across the state are facing financial problems because of the Legislature. In fact, there are at least three districts north of Everett that are under financial monitoring by the Office of the Superintendent of Public Instruction. So the question is - how do you respond to this? What Seattle Public Schools is proposing, and this came up last night after parents had vented their anger - the board went on to talk about a new financial policy that they're proposing, which is essentially permanent austerity. It would involve locking the district in at a budget level that is $200 million below where it was at last spring. They would have multi-year budget planning - an idea that was initially introduced to the State Legislature by Republicans - which would mean that you have a low baseline and you have very strict rules about how you can add money back. So if we succeed in getting the Legislature to pass a wealth tax, for example, and more money comes to the public schools, this financial policy would make it very hard for the district to go back and add because they could say - Oh, well, this isn't in our four-year fiscal plan, we don't know where we can put this money. There are also some interesting parts of the policy - and this came up for heated debate last night among board members - that are pretty obviously anti-union. I had an article at the Urbanist yesterday about this - and there are provisions that are clearly trying to undo the Seattle Education Association's gains in the contract last year during the strike. And in fact, one board member, Chandra Hampson - very neoliberal board member - openly said, Well, maybe we should look at reopening the collective bargaining agreement. - which a lot of people's eyes went wide, and jaws dropped, and made it clear we can't really do that. Teachers were there last night also to protest against this. There are other provisions in there which seem designed to hold down teacher salaries - it's all pretty neoliberal austerity-type stuff. And what's interesting to me is the contrast to what's going on at City Hall. I think a lot of our listeners probably saw an op-ed in The Seattle Times from about two weeks ago, by Rachel Smith of the Chamber of Commerce and Jon Scholes of the Downtown Seattle Association, saying that City Hall shouldn't raise taxes on corporations and the rich. Instead, you need to cut your spending and just focus on outcomes. And now you're seeing some of the conservative candidates, like Maritza Rivera and others, saying that same thing on the campaign trail now. Well, Seattle Public Schools is about to adopt that exact strategy - of slashing spending, saying - Oh, we're focusing on outcomes, even though the effects on kids are clearly devastating. What this is leading up to - and this is starting to get discussed among parents last night at the board meeting - the district has said for months now they want to close a bunch of schools in the district next year. And if you think moving a couple of kids around and teachers around in the middle of October is disruptive, wait until you close an entire school. The effect of school closures is devastating on kids. People may remember 10 years ago in Chicago when Rahm Emanuel closed 50 schools there - it was devastating for the community. Research made it extremely clear that kids whose schools were closed did more poorly academically than kids whose schools remained open. I mentioned that to the board and the superintendent last night - we'll see if they paid any attention to it. But it's clear that the school district is on a trajectory where they are embracing huge cuts - they want to spend less on our kids, regardless of the consequences. And it's gonna take parents rising up against that here in the district, and also us going to Olympia and making sure the Democratic majority there finally takes its paramount duty responsibility under the Constitution seriously and fully funds our schools. [00:13:38] Crystal Fincher: If the Legislature doesn't, is the district gonna have much of a choice but to close these schools? [00:13:45] Robert Cruickshank: They do. I think what is happening is the district initially said earlier this year that they needed to close schools to save money. But in articles that have come out since, district leaders have been saying - Well, actually, it's not really about money. There is a article in The Seattle Times in late August where they quoted the superintendent, Brent Jones, who said - We're not gonna see any savings from closing schools next year when there's a $100 million budget deficit, we might see savings two to five years out. The district closed schools in the late 2000s, only to learn a few years later that they had completely missed their enrollment projections - and by the early 2010s, they had to spend $50 to $60 million to reopen schools they had just closed a few years earlier. So it's not clear that closing schools is gonna help them. Finally, there's the issue of - if you've been moving kids around and making clear that their needs aren't as important as meeting a couple of financial projections in the middle of school year and then you close their schools, parents aren't gonna sit for that. A lot of them are just gonna walk away - they might move to a suburban district, they may put their kids in some private school. So closing schools sets in motion potentially a spiral of declining enrollment, which means less money coming to the school district. [00:15:05] Crystal Fincher: Now, it seems like that's a problem that they're destined to run into again, with as volatile as enrollment can be - but it does seem to be cyclical. There are lots of times - oh, enrollment is just down. Well, it doesn't ever seem to just stay down. It doesn't ever seem to just stay up. So it seems like the decision of opening and closing schools - and the tremendous expense that comes with opening and closing schools, in addition to the disruption that comes from it - is an extreme response to something that we know is likely to be, has always been a temporary condition. Has this been discussed at all from the board level? Have they responded to that? [00:15:50] Robert Cruickshank: Not really. And I think what you saw last night and with this current issue of the class sizes and allocations in the elementary schools, it's not clear that the district really has a handle on an ability to project enrollment at all. Ultimately, there's no need for the school district to do anything just yet. The legislative session begins in January. Typically, a school district does not approve its budget until late in the spring or even early in the summer. The Legislature was very close to passing a wealth tax last year - there were 43 out of 58 Democrats in the House who co-sponsored the wealth tax bill, certainly more would have voted for it. 20 of 29 state senators voted for the wealth tax. And significantly, there's been major change in the state Senate Democratic caucus - the previous chair of the Senate Ways and Means Committee, Christine Rolfes, a Democrat from Bainbridge Island, did not give the wealth tax a vote. She begrudgingly held a hearing on it in the 2023 session, but wouldn't bring it up for a vote - has blocked efforts to add more funding for our schools. Well, she left the Legislature over the summer to become a Kitsap County Commissioner. Her replacement as chair of the Ways and Means Committee, which handles all the budget bills for the Senate, is June Robinson from Everett - much more progressive. She was a leader in getting the capital gains tax done. The new vice-chair of the Senate Ways and Means Committee is Seattle's own Joe Nguyen from West Seattle, who is a champion of various wealth taxes - and has said he wants to fight to fund our schools. So I think there are real opportunities for our schools and for families in Olympia in January - we need to fight for those. We also need to make sure that the district doesn't prematurely embrace an austerity plan that will hurt our kids even further. [00:17:34] Crystal Fincher: Absolutely. We'll definitely keep an eye on this. And thank you for being so steadfast and following this - and advocating for not only your kid, but all of the kids in the district. I wanna talk about investment in Seattle City Council races - these campaigns are running hot and heavy right now, less than a month until Election Day, ballots are going to be mailed next week. So we have a lot that's happening and a lot of outside spending is beginning to show itself, including a very large investment from the National Association of Realtors. What are they doing? [00:18:13] Robert Cruickshank: So the National Association of Realtors has dumped about a quarter of a million dollars into campaigns to try to elect Tanya Woo in District 2, Joy Hollingsworth in District 3, Maritza Rivera in District 4, Bob Kettle in District 7. And there's been some good discussion online about this - well, why would the National Association of Realtors support candidates who are less friendly to building new housing in Seattle? And some speculation is that - oh, they wanna have less supply of housing so the price of housing stays high. That might be part of it. But if folks have been paying attention to either the National Association of Realtors or their Washington state arm, the nut of this is they're a right-wing conservative organization. They hate taxes. The fight for the capital gains tax in State Legislature involved strong, determined, long-term opposition from the realtors - they were some of the biggest opponents of a capital gains tax to fund our schools. The National Association of Realtors is in fact mired in scandal right now. Redfin, Seattle-based Redfin, recently left the National Association of Realtors because there are a series of sexual harassment allegations, antitrust lawsuits against the National Association of Realtors. Similar spending has come in in some of these races in Seattle City Council as well, for the same candidates, from the Master Builders. And so again, people wondering why - people like Ron Davis or Alex Hudson are really strong supporters of building more housing. So is Andrew Lewis. But again, this is just conservative politics - they don't want higher taxes. These people who run these organizations are Sara Nelson types - law and order, crackdown on crime, darn the consequences, and by the way, don't raise taxes. That's what this is really about. In fact, they're willing to undermine their stated goals of building more housing, selling more homes in order to achieve their real objective, which is right-wing ideologies. [00:20:18] Crystal Fincher: Yeah, this is a troubling trend, unfortunately. We have seen realtors engage in elections in Washington across the state in several previous cycles - and some very controversially. And to your point, usually they have been seen in these candidate races recently, engaging in ways that are very inflammatory, that are targeting candidates that are not conservative - usually running against conservatives - where issues such as taxes are on the ballot, but then being willing to use a number of social wedge issues to intervene here. So this is quite a significant investment in these races that they're making - not only Seattle City Council races, there is also a Spokane race - they have engaged in Spokane in this similar way before in prior cycles. In fact, I'm recalling one from 2021 right now - I think with Councilmember Zack Zappone out there. So it is not shocking to see them engage in this way, but once again, we're seeing the influence of big money in these elections. And this is something that Seattle has had a very negative reaction to before in these races. And so do you think this is gonna see the kind of reaction that we saw like in 2017 - when Amazon was so influential in spending money in those races? [00:21:44] Robert Cruickshank: I don't know. I would like to think so, but I'm not sure. Amazon is the colossus of big corporations, especially here in Seattle. And everyone knows throughout the 2010s that Amazon grew dramatically, the city filled up with people working at Amazon - most of them are good progressive people who don't share the company's politics. But there's a sense that Amazon was distorting the way Seattle was growing and that Amazon was a bad corporate actor - in fact, the Biden administration just sued them over antitrust allegations a few weeks back. So everyone knows Amazon. Everyone knows Amazon is a villain - at least the corporate leadership. The National Association of Realtors and Master Builders are not nearly as well-known. They are right-wing interests, but the narrative isn't the same. It's interesting to me that Amazon is not playing overtly and publicly in these elections - I think they learned their lesson from 2019 when it blew up in their face. They're probably happy to see that burden, especially the financial burden, taken up by the Realtors and the Master Builders. But I think ultimately people are gonna wonder why all this money is coming in. Seattle is a city that supports clean elections - it's a city that pioneered the Democracy Voucher. It's a city that if we could, if the US Supreme Court would allow it, we'd probably ban all of these super PACs and corporate contributions - we can't because of federal rulings at the Supreme Court level. So I think while the Realtors and the Builders have a lower profile than Amazon, I think there is a chance the public will see this massive spending and think - Eh, I don't know if I like that. Seattle voters, especially those in the middle - that 20% of the electorate in the middle that can swing back and forth between a more conservative and a more progressive candidate - they don't like powerful, wealthy, private and corporate business interests telling them how to vote. [00:23:40] Crystal Fincher: Yeah, it'll be interesting - in my opinion - to see how this shakes out because this is not a situation like Amazon or where the Chamber essentially overplayed their hand and saying, Well, we're just gonna buy these elections. And you're right - Seattle typically doesn't have a - doesn't respond well to that. So I think in this situation, to your point, it is different in that we don't see the concentration of that spending coming from one source, but I think we are seeing it kind of trickling in from these different sources. And it'll be interesting to see at the end of the day what that amount of spending winds up being and how influential that is. Money is influential in politics, unfortunately. And Seattle has taken steps to try and equalize the playing field, allow more access to people running to be credible candidates - especially with the Democracy Voucher program - but there still is not a cap on spending in any kind of way when it comes to independent expenditures. And these big corporate-focused organizations who are spending in these races - know and understand that and aren't afraid to use it. And are feeling the heat right now because they're seeing popular sentiment - we keep seeing these polls of people in Seattle that they keep trying to explain away, but this is where the people are at. So this is really their recourse and they're fighting against the majority of people being in support of things like a wealth tax, like a capital gains tax, like an income tax, really. And so they're freaking out behind the scenes, realistically, and this is the manifestation of that. This is how they feel they can fight back - in these independent expenditures from corporate entities in these elections. So it's a dynamic that they used to feel much more comfortable, I think, in knowing that - hey, especially citywide elections, these elections, we're gonna be able to get our person in. We know that we can spend enough to get them into the general and we can control the narrative. We know that a lot of times, the Times editorial board has a similar narrative to their interests - that that will carry the day. But between elections being districted now in Seattle, which that's a relatively recent development, and some more candidates having access to get on the ballot now, and that just the demographics and the impacts of income inequality and everything that we see flow from that being so present in our communities today - people are looking at that differently than they did, say, 10 years ago. So this is gonna be really interesting to see how this shakes out. [00:26:32] Robert Cruickshank: I think that's right. And I think that the big spending matters - it helps drive a narrative and a conversation, but it has to resonate with people. And as you're explaining this, my mind immediately went back to Green Jacket Lady. If you remember from a couple of weeks ago, Fox News came to Seattle and tried to show that - oh, people are really worried about public safety - and they got a totally different response, including a woman in a green jacket who said, What are you talking about? Like, I don't feel unsafe in the city at all. You saw somebody using drugs from the safety of your car and you're scared? And that's a real response from real Seattleite voters. All this fear-mongering that The Seattle Times, and these corporate interests, and Sara Nelson and her crew are trying to stoke doesn't resonate. And if you look at the election outcomes from the primary, a lot of those candidates who were trying to run on those fears - they were trailing their more progressive opponents. We'll see what happens - ballots are in the mail next week - I don't wanna take anything for granted. At the same time, there's a substantial number of voters in Seattle who do not buy that narrative at all. They want smart solutions - doesn't mean they are totally happy with open public drug use, they're not concerned about break-ins - they are. But they also want smart solutions to those and they're not gonna be fear-mongered into actually not doing anything - they're not gonna be fear-mongered into supporting right-wing candidates as a result. [00:28:02] Crystal Fincher: Yeah, and I think you're absolutely right about that. I think there's a misconception - it's just like, Well, some people just aren't concerned - but the majority of people are concerned. I think almost everybody is very concerned and unhappy with what they see out there - unhappy with what I see out there. Do I want people sleeping on the streets? Do I want people battling addiction and behavioral health issues that there's no one there to address? Absolutely not. But I think the misread is that - therefore we need to continue doing the same things that we've been talking about, for a decade really, and seeing things get worse while we do that. I think people have grown impatient with doing the same thing and getting the same failed result. And wanting meaningful investment in behavioral health treatment and addiction treatment, in housing, right - and really meaningfully solving these problems. And it seems like the issue here is that we have a number of candidates - candidates on one side - who seem like they want to continue largely with the status quo. And that status quo has been kind of a carceral focus - well, we can jail people, we can sweep them - but not doing the things that we know have been successful to really solve these problems in the longterm and not just move people from one area to another, have people go just in this revolving door in and out of jail - because jail can't address the problems that they're ultimately dealing with. I think people right now are saying - I'm fed up with this, but I actually want someone who will do something different that has a chance to fix this. [00:29:41] Robert Cruickshank: That's exactly right. Polls continue to show several things consistently - Yes, the public is concerned about homelessness. Yes, the public is concerned about public safety. That doesn't mean they're concerned about it in the ways the right-wingers are, as you just explained. Those polls also show the public wants an alternative to armed policing - that is extremely popular across polls since 2020 - and they also want to tax the rich to fund it. That is incredibly strong, and that shows up in all the polls as well. And so these candidates who oppose those things are trying to stoke the fears and concerns, and the progressive candidates have to be smart about this - you don't dismiss public concerns, you explain why your answer is better. And that does resonate - that is resonating across the campaign trail, you see it at town halls, you see it when candidates are at the doors - their message gets a good response. [00:30:32] Crystal Fincher: Absolutely, and this reminds me of an ad that I saw this morning that is really - for Seattle - a really inflammatory ad. And it was an ad from Bob Kettle, who is the candidate running against Andrew Lewis in Seattle's District 7, which covers the downtown area. And it's Bob Kettle and one of his big supporters, Sara Nelson - the most conservative member on the city council, I think most would say. And in this ad, Bob basically says - Hey, I'm running because of crime, and because this problem has gotten bad, and we need to crack down, basically. And Sara Nelson explicitly saying - Hey, Andrew Lewis didn't vote for my drug bill, and he is responsible for the deaths of people from fentanyl overdose, which is a wild accusation - for a couple of reasons. One, Andrew actually ultimately ended up voting for that bill. Two, just to say that not cracking down on a carceral solution is responsible for people's deaths - flies in the face of data, flies in the face of all available evidence that we know and that we have here, especially since incarceration has proven to be extremely ineffective. And risk after incarceration of overdose is the highest there - because people haven't been using for a while, their tolerance has gone down, but they're going back into the same environment they were with no additional tools of support - and are most likely to overdose in that situation. What do you think of an accusation like this? [00:32:12] Robert Cruickshank: I think it's absurd. And it shows the lengths to which - not just Bob Kettle, but Sara Nelson in particular, will go to try to defeat progressives. 'Cause that's what Sara Nelson's really about - you watch her on the council - she's not a data-driven elected official at all. Her positions are often inconsistent and certainly inconsistent with data. But what she really wants to do is defeat progressives - defeat progressive candidates and progressive ideas. And it's kind of shocking - you and I both worked in the McGinn administration 10 years ago, and Sara Nelson was a lead staffer for then-Council President Richard Conlin. And at the time, my interactions with Sara Nelson were great. She seemed - I don't know about progressive necessarily, but certainly left of center - really forward thinking, interested in sustainability, really smart, knowledgeable, thoughtful staffer. Somewhere in the 10 years since, she made a hard right turn. Now, a lot of people have done that, especially in the late 2010s in reaction to movements for Black lives and efforts to reform police. And as the city becomes more progressive, there's a certain type of Seattleite react really negatively to that. A small business owner like Sara Nelson, who owns Fremont Brewing, certainly seems to be one of those. And the City Councilmember Sara Nelson - a totally different animal from the Council staffer Sara Nelson we saw 10 years ago - is primarily driven by a desire to beat progressives. And here she sees an opportunity not to solve the problem of fentanyl addiction, not to solve a problem of public safety, but to beat an enemy. And in order to do that, she's willing to go to just absurd lengths. To accuse Andrew Lewis of being personally responsible for the death of drug addicts is a really awful thing to say about one of your own colleagues. But Sara Nelson thinks she can get away with it because again, she's clearly uninterested in having good relations with someone who's highly likely to get reelected. If Andrew Lewis wins, she's gonna have to work with him. She doesn't seem to care about any of that - she's not interested in building a strong relationship with a colleague. She's willing to just, you know, scorch the earth to try to get him defeated. Now there is a type of voter in Seattle who will respond to that, but it's not a majority of the electorate by any means - certainly in District 7, it's not the majority. [00:34:27] Crystal Fincher: Yeah, it definitely doesn't appear to be the majority there. And this is not the first time that we have seen this come from Sara Nelson, or candidates that Sara Nelson supports. We saw a media stunt earlier in the cycle - it was about a month ago - where she was with the District 2 candidate there and in a really cynical response and really tried to turn it into a photo-op, talking about crime or public safety, something like that, saying - Where is Tammy Morales? Well, Tammy Morales was literally doing her job that the taxpayers pay her for - she was at a meeting of the city council where they were discussing the Transportation Plan - a meeting that Sara Nelson wasn't at, that she used as a stunt to call out her colleague actually doing the work that they're paid to do, that Sara Nelson wasn't doing. So it's just like - it seems like Sara Nelson is uninterested in the governing part of the job, which is the job, but very interested in these stunts and this inflammatory rhetoric and running against councilmembers, really regardless of ideology, but that disagree with her, right? Because I don't think many people are - you know, would say Tammy Morales and Andrew Lewis are the same on every issue. I think it's fair to say most people consider Tammy Morales to be more progressive than Andrew Lewis, not that Andrew Lewis is not progressive. But it's - in that situation, it's just like - what are you even talking about? And are you working with these colleagues? Are you engaging with data? Are you working towards a solution? Are you just trying to inflame people with rhetoric, and these stunts, and going on conservative talk radio and doing this? And now we see this really inflammatory ad land. It just seems like Sara Nelson is really uninterested in governing. [00:36:17] Robert Cruickshank: That's exactly right. And, you know, again, I think of Green Jacket Lady and Fox News because those are stunts that the national Republicans are really good at. You see it in Congress, right - the fight over the speakership - it's all about stunts to win the news cycle and defeat their opponents. Sara Nelson is engaging in the exact same stuff. She doesn't govern, she's not interested in data, very lightly interested in policy - it's all about stunts. That's all she knows how to do, that's all she really cares about because that's how she thinks she wins her actual objective, which is to defeat anyone she thinks as being progressive. We'll see what happens - like I said, there is a group of voters in Seattle that responds well to that. I don't think it's a majority of voters, even in District 7, but a lot of this comes down to turnout. We have elections here in Seattle in odd years - a lot of cities across the country have been moving their local elections to even-numbered years to make sure that more voters are participating in the process of choosing who represents them in City Hall. Seattle hasn't gone down that path yet - I think we should. We all know that there is much higher turnout in even-year elections in Seattle than odd-year elections. So this is not going to be so much a question of - can Sara Nelson convince more progressive Seattleites to turn on Andrew Lewis, and are more progressive Seattleites gonna show up and vote? [00:37:38] Crystal Fincher: Yeah, and it's challenging. The one thing that the people who love stunts - traditionally conservatives, Republicans - have done well for years is really, for their audience, connecting every single policy to a politician, to an issue at the ballot box. And really over the year, over the years in between these elections, really saying - This is the fault of this person. It was Kshama Sawant for a while while she was on the council, now they're trying to find a new person that they can blame this on. But that seems to be the MO there - it's the fault of this person - and they're constantly hearing that in their media ecosystems. It's not the same on the left - we don't talk about issues to that degree. Now there's more facts involved in a lot of these discussions than those - kind of in those right echo chambers - but still the connection isn't constantly being made. So when it comes time for people to turn out in these elections, you have a group that - based on, again, a lot of data that does not turn out to be true - that is missing tons of context, but they're eager to get voting. Which is why we see kind of in - because we do voting by mail - we can see those really eager voters, those getting their ballots in immediately, skew more conservative - they're ready to vote. Where people on the more progressive side need more information to vote - the communication does make a difference, which is part of the reason why you see spending on communication and them throwing so much money in there because they know that is influential and impactful in today's political world. So the job is really for progressives to communicate about the stakes of this election, to communicate and share with your friends and family. There's a lot of people online - I am a chronically online person also - but it's like, I've seen people over the years kind of focus on advocacy online and skip their friends, their cousins, their family, all the people that they're surrounded with in their lives, people you talk to at work. Those are the people who most need to hear from you - Hey, you voting? You voting for this person? 'Cause like these policies that we've talked about, this issue that I know makes you upset, that I know you're frustrated about is really at stake in this election, especially in local elections that don't get the kind of national attention that our federal elections do. So I am just impressing upon everybody listening to make sure you talk about how important these local city council races are to people in your lives - and whether it's school board, city council - all of these positions are critically important. And it takes you getting engaged with people in your life to get the kind of turnout to win these elections. [00:40:34] Robert Cruickshank: That's exactly right. I remember in 2019 - during that city council election that Amazon was trying to buy - being on the bus going downtown from my home in Greenwood, and just getting my phone out and going through my list of contacts - in text, Facebook Messenger, whatever it was - whatever the last communication I had with them, I went to that medium and sent them a message saying, Hey, have you voted yet? You got your ballot in? Here's a deadline, here's the nearest dropbox. And I was actually surprised the number of people who hadn't yet voted and were thankful for the reminder - and these are often people who are politically aware and engaged. So it makes a huge difference to talk to your networks, your friends, your family, your neighbors. Those are some of the people you can be the most influential with, and it is worth taking the time to do that when ballots arrive next week. [00:41:25] Crystal Fincher: Absolutely. I wanna talk about something incredibly important that is happening right now that seems to consistently fly under the radar, but is tremendously impactful for all of our lives. And this situation taking shape - in that right-wingers really are trying to use gas prices to take aim at carbon pricing, especially here in our state. What's happening with this? [00:41:51] Robert Cruickshank: Yeah, so over the course of 2023, as gas prices rise - and they're rising across the country for many reasons, which we'll talk about in a moment - there's been a clear effort here in Washington State to blame that on the Climate Commitment Act, which the Legislature adopted in 2021, which creates a carbon pricing system. And has been raising more than a billion dollars a year to fund important projects to reduce carbon emissions. Their arguments are - and you see this in The Seattle Times all the time - that, Oh my gosh, gas prices in Washington are some of the nation's highest because we passed the Climate Commitment Act. This is not true. We all knew that going into this, passing the Climate Commitment Act could, as it did in California, add maybe five, seven cents a gallon to the price of gas - which would be dwarfed and has been by global trends. Gas prices are sky high right now in part because of demand for driving, in part because of oil company shenanigans with how they manage refineries to try to keep the price high. And in particular, the number one reason why gas prices are high is because of OPEC, geopolitics, and the Saudi government deliberately cutting production to try to squeeze Joe Biden to get what they want out of him or to help elect Trump. This has all been reported in the news, this is no secret. And yet these right-wingers - backed by the Western States Petroleum Association, the oil company lobbying arm - continue to try to put out a media narrative, and you saw it again in The Seattle Times over the weekend, trying to blame the Climate Commitment Act for high gas prices. This is not an idle threat. Tim Eyman has been defanged - he's gone bankrupt, he's pretty much out of the initiative business - but there are new people trying to take his place. Guy named Brian Heywood has raised a whole bunch of money to try and qualify six right-wing ballot initiatives for the state ballot in 2024 - one of which would repeal the capital gains tax, another which would repeal the Climate Commitment Act. And so that's what the backstory is here - there is a effort backed by the right-wing to try to go after Washington State's effort to tackle the climate crisis. I think voters understand if you explain to them that - No, this is not why our gas prices are high. We can get rid of the Climate Commitment Act tomorrow and you're still gonna pay $5.50 a gallon for gas. We need to do other things to address transportation costs, including spending billions of dollars a year to give people the opportunity to get around their community without having to burn fossil fuel - that's what people want - that's our goal as environmentalists is not to make people pay a lot of money. Our goal is to give people alternatives that are affordable - that's a story, a message we can win with, but we have to fight a lot of oil company money and The Seattle Times, which is not as interested in telling the story. I will say a colleague of mine at the Sierra Club, Leah Missik, who also works for Climate Solutions, had an excellent op-ed - I think we can link it in the show notes - in the Seattle Times of all places over the summer, really just debunking all these arguments against the Climate Commitment Act, pointing out that the real reasons why gas prices are high, and pointing out that the oil companies are behind all of this. [00:45:00] Crystal Fincher: Absolutely. And it's no secret - I have had my issues with the Climate Commitment Act, but one thing that is clear is that the revenue from the Climate Commitment Act is absolutely critical in addressing our infrastructure, and making the kinds of changes - and having the chance to make those changes in a just and equitable way - in order to make this transition to a clean energy future, to reduce fossil fuel emissions. And this is not an option that we have, right? We have to get this done. And the opportunity for progress, right, is here. And we're talking about the elimination of that opportunity for something that everyone but climate deniers understand is absolutely critical and necessary. And we're really seeing that element getting engaged here in this fight against the Climate Commitment Act - this is a chance for progress right here, and we need to move forward with this and several other things, right? But just blaming that for gas prices is completely disingenuous - it flies counter to facts. And it's always rich to me that people who are engaging in this conversation for gas prices, which absolutely do impact people's budgets and eat into their discretionary income if they have any, but that pales in comparison to the cost of housing, to the cost of childcare, to even the increasing cost of groceries, right? These things that we don't hear these conservative elements get engaged with in any kind of way, but something that they feel that they can use as a wedge issue here is one that we're seeing. So it's just very cynical - it is really unfortunate that they're not engaging in good faith with this. And I think we see most of the time voters reject these kinds of efforts, but it really is going to take a continued effort to explain that - No, this isn't the fault of gas prices and repealing the Climate Commitment Act isn't gonna do anything with gas prices, which by all accounts are going to get more volatile as we go on with time. So we need to stand up alternatives to just needing to purchase gas constantly all the time - whether it's through EVs, investing in transit, investing in safe, walkable, bikeable communities - we shouldn't force people to burn gas to earn a living and to build a life. [00:47:33] Robert Cruickshank: I was talking with my wife about this and remembering in the 1970s, late 1970s, when Carter was president and there was another energy crisis. And Carter was trying to invest in getting us off of oil. Reagan becomes president, says - No, no, no, no, no. We're just gonna double down on oil and fossil fuels. For the 40 years since, anytime we have an opportunity to try to get off of dependence on fossil fuels, this country finds a way to not do it. And the only outcome has been gas prices get more and more expensive and we have no alternative but to pay it. Those of us who live in Seattle have some option for not having to pay for gas to drive - you can walk, you can bike more easily, you can take transit, more and more people have electric cars but those are expensive. But if you live outside Seattle, you have virtually no ability to get around, to get to school, to get to work, to get to shopping without paying for gas. It shouldn't have to be that way, and there are groups, environmentalists, who have been trying to fix this for decades. And we keep running into the same problems - oil companies like to make money off of this, they don't care about the consequences as long as the money keeps rolling in. We finally got a Climate Commitment Act. And as you say, it's not perfect. In fact, Sierra Club was neutral on it because of concerns about where the money would go. But we also believe that that can be fixed in a legislative process and certainly wouldn't support a repeal. And so this is where we can move forward and make sure this is done correctly. Or we just quit again, as we have every time for the last 45 years, and then we'll be complaining the gas prices are at $7 a gallon, $8 a gallon. We know that that's coming if we don't act now to give people the option to stop having to buy gas, stop having to spend so much money, and keep more of that money in their pocket and get around the communities sustainably. [00:49:25] Crystal Fincher: Absolutely. And with that, we thank you for listening to Hacks & Wonks on this Friday, October 13th, 2023. The producer of Hacks & Wonks is Shannon Cheng. Our insightful co-host today was Chair of Sierra Club Seattle, longtime communications and political strategist, Robert Cruickshank. You can find Robert on Twitter @cruickshank. You can follow Hacks & Wonks on Twitter @HacksWonks. You can find me on Twitter and most other platforms - Robert also on other platforms - I'm @finchfrii with two I's at the end. You can catch Hacks & Wonks on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, wherever you get your podcasts - just type "Hacks and Wonks" into the search bar - I love using Overcast for mine. Be sure to subscribe to the podcast to get the full versions of our Friday week-in-review shows and our Tuesday topical shows delivered to your podcast feed. If you like us, leave a review wherever you listen. You can also get a full transcript of this episode and links to the resources referenced in the show at officialhacksandwonks.com and in the podcast episode notes. Thanks for tuning in - talk to you next time.

tv amazon spotify california money black donald trump chicago house washington research parents ms office joe biden seattle congress supreme court republicans teachers democrats council senate commerce hacks fox news democratic constitution wa candidate gas election day national association realtors similar chamber washington state saudi polls superintendents builders us supreme court evs greenwood city hall spokane legislature ballard opec week in review seattle times state legislatures sierra club pacs redfin climate solutions homeless people master builders rahm emanuel means committee sps mcginn public instruction bainbridge island rachel smith d6 cruickshank west seattle urbanist josh cohen seattle city council d5 kuow seattleites sara nelson seattle public schools kshama sawant ron davis senate democratic andrew lewis central office windus brent jones wonks fremont brewing cathy moore tim eyman climate commitment act alex hudson downtown seattle association tammy morales adams elementary seattle city council district

S2 E3 Building Cross-Functional Partnerships with Kate Parker

Play Episode Listen Later Aug 29, 2023 25:47

On this episode, Kate shares some tips and tricks on building successful cross-functional partnerships. She has a wealth of experience in L&D and brings many perspectives to the conversation. Connect with Kate here on LinkedIn. Explore some of the resources that Kate shared in today's episode: Cathy Moore's Partner from the Start toolkit Cathy Moore's Scenario Design toolkit All views expressed in this episode are my own and do not represent the opinions of any entity whatsoever with which I have been, am now, or will be affiliated. Music: https://www.purple-planet.com.

music cross partner explore partnership functional kate parker cathy moore

Hacks & Wonks 2023 Post-Primary Roundtable Part 1

Play Episode Listen Later Aug 15, 2023 54:08

For this Tuesday show, we present Part 1 of the Hacks & Wonks 2023 Post-Primary Roundtable which was live-streamed on August 8, 2023 with special guests - journalists Daniel Beekman, Guy Oron, and Melissa Santos. In Part 1, the panel breaks down primary election results for the crowded Seattle City Council races in Districts 1 through 5 - looking at how vote shares, campaign finances, redistricting, candidate quality, endorsements, and more played a part in who came out as the top two. Stay tuned for Part 2 of the roundtable releasing this Friday for more election analysis! As always, a full text transcript of the show is available below and at officialhacksandwonks.com. You can follow Hacks & Wonks on Twitter at @HacksWonks. Find the host, Crystal Fincher on Twitter at @finchfrii and find today's special guests, Daniel Beekman at @DBeekman, Guy Oron at @GuyOron, and Melissa Santos at @MelissaSantos1. Resources Hacks & Wonks 2023 Post-Primary Roundtable Livestream | August 8th, 2023 Transcript [00:00:00] Shannon Cheng: Welcome to Hacks & Wonks. I'm Shannon Cheng, Producer for the show. You're listening to Part 1 of our 2023 Post-Primary Roundtable that was originally aired live on Tuesday, August 8th. Audio for Part 2 will be running this Friday, so make sure you stay tuned. Full video from the event and a full text transcript of the show can be found on our website officialhacksandwonks.com. Thank you for tuning in! [00:00:37] Crystal Fincher: Hello everyone - good evening. Welcome to the Hacks & Wonks Post-Primary Roundtable. I'm Crystal Fincher, I'm a political consultant and host of the Hacks & Wonks podcast and radio show. And today I'm thrilled to be joined by three of my favorite hacks and wonks - local reporters - to break down what happened in last week's primary election. We're excited to be able to livestream this roundtable on Twitter, Facebook and YouTube. Additionally, we are recording this roundtable for broadcast on KODX and KVRU radio, podcast, and it will be available with a full text transcript on officialhacksandwonks.com. Our esteemed panelists for the evening are: Politics and Communities reporter for The Seattle Times, Daniel Beekman. Staff Reporter for Real Change, covering local news, labor, policing, the environment, criminal legal issues and politics, Guy Oron. And Seattle Axios reporter, Melissa Santos. Welcome everyone. So I think we will get started talking about Seattle and all of these races for Seattle City Council. This is a year where we had some redistricted council districts in Seattle - we had a number of incumbents decide not to seek reelection, and a few who did - and some really interesting results. So I think we'll start in District 1, which is in the West Seattle area, where we see a result of Maren Costa with the lead - currently at 33.16% - and the second person getting through the primary, Rob Saka, with 24% here. So I guess just starting out - how are these candidates positioned, and what do you think this primary says about the state of the district and the state of this race going into the general? Starting with Daniel - what are your thoughts here? [00:02:47] Daniel Beekman: Oh, yeah, good questions - I'm interested to hear what the other folks have to say. I guess the one thing that strikes me about the race is that, like in - I think - every other race of the seven districts, we're going into the general election with a candidate who was endorsed by The Stranger's editorial board and one endorsed by The Seattle Times editorial board - which operates separately from our newsroom. And that's pretty typical for Seattle City Council elections. And maybe even without those endorsements, this race and others would have ended up the way they did - but I think that's something to note in this race and others. The other thing that struck me about this race is two pretty interesting candidates, background-wise - especially to some extent in Seattle politics with Costa. Doesn't really fit the - if there's a typical sort of Seattle candidate, especially in the left lane - the progressive, more progressive lane. I don't know if she fits quite into that. She doesn't come from a - she hasn't worked at the City Council, she doesn't come from the County or State Labor Council, she hasn't been steeped in local Democratic legislative district politics or anything like that, I don't think. She's from the tech world and was an activist in that world. So I don't know - I found that interesting, I don't know if that's a major takeaway - but it's something in that race that I think will be interesting to watch going forward. [00:04:41] Crystal Fincher: Go ahead, Melissa. What did you think? [00:04:42] Melissa Santos: I will be curious. It's really hard in a race where there's - what, we have eight candidates here again, or was it actually nine, eight in this one as well - to predict how the votes that the candidates didn't get will shake out. I'm really curious to see where Phil Tavel's votes go because - he ran last time too - and again, more one of the more business-friendly candidates in this race. And I'm just not sure that there'll be a one-for-one accounting for those votes, necessarily, when you come into November. Theoretically, those votes would go to the more central lane candidate, who is Rob Saka. But I don't know that that math is a direct line when there's a lot of time between here and November. And also, they're just - sometimes people are really attracted to someone's personal story in these races, right? We're focused as reporters and commentators sometimes on - who's the moderate, who's the lefty, or whatever. And sometimes I don't know that voters always are. Maybe there's one particular idea they had, that they talked about at the door, that people were into or a percentage were into. And there's also progressive candidates here that had some votes that are not making it to the primary, so I just don't know - I have zero idea how the votes for the non-winning candidates will shake out. [00:06:06] Crystal Fincher: What do you think, Guy? [00:06:08] Guy Oron: Yeah, I think to start - with all these Seattle races, I think the biggest message is that most people didn't vote. 64% of folks didn't vote in these elections. And it'll be interesting to see where those people land in the general. It did seem like a very competitive race - all these City Council races - but especially the open ones. And I think Maren was able to really use her credentials as an activist to get a lot of support among progressives, and while the more right-of-center lane was a little more split between Phil and Rob Saka. And it'll be interesting to see how it measures up. I think right-leaning candidates won just about 50%, compared to progressive ones that won about 45%. I was doing some rough arithmetic earlier - it is pretty narrow margin. It'll be interesting to see how it goes. [00:07:18] Crystal Fincher: Yeah, this is a race where it looks like this is going to be a competitive race in the general election. We did see an interesting role that donors played in this race where there were some substantial fundraising numbers from a number of candidates, even several who didn't make it through. I think there were a few who eclipsed $50,000 who did not make it through the general election. And then you have the two that did make it through raising a considerable amount of money, in addition to an independent expenditure on behalf of Rob Saka that made some news - for a Trump-supporting donor included in there and certainly more business-aligned candidate there. How do you see the role of donors and money and the way that the primary election shaped up, and what do you think that says about the general election? - starting with you, Guy. [00:08:15] Guy Oron: It'll be interesting to see. I think with Democracy Vouchers, it really changes the game and allows people who don't rely on corporate donations to run. And I think that gives Costa an edge there to fight at least an even battle. It'll be interesting to see if this election is more like 2019, where corporate donations sparked a big backlash, or more like 2021 when they got folks like Davison over the line. [00:08:49] Melissa Santos: The independent expenditures, I think, will be interesting to watch because theoretically the Democracy Vouchers do even the playing field. But once you get all that independent expenditure money in there, it's not limited in the same way. So I do think we'll see this huge flood of outside money going forward. And I am watching how - whether that kind of undermines the intent of the Democracy Voucher program. We've had a few years now where we've watched how this plays out. But particularly this year, I'm looking at that because I just think there will be a lot of outside money. And there already has been in this race in particular - maybe not a lot yet, but more than in other races, of city council races - and that can tip the scales. But like Guy said, there has been backlash before. We certainly saw that with the $1 million Amazon donation to the Chamber's PAC that kind of seemed to have that kind of resurgence of the progressive candidates in protest a few years ago. [00:09:53] Daniel Beekman: Yeah, I think it would be right to expect big outside spending in this race and some of the other races that look like they could be very competitive - that seems very likely. And one of the sort of quirks of this race in terms of spending in the primary was that there were some candidates - as you mentioned Crystal - like Stephen Brown got under 10%, spent money or raised quite a bit of money. But a fair chunk of that, I think - just looking, $34,000 or something like that was from himself, I believe. So that kind of tips the scales sometimes, or it can be confusing looking at the overall totals. But yeah, this is one of those races where I would be surprised if there wasn't a lot of independent spending in the general election. [00:10:52] Melissa Santos: You're saying bagels can't buy a City Council seat, Dan? Is that what you're saying? [00:10:57] Daniel Beekman: I'm just saying that this City - what was it? The mailer - This City deserves better bagels? [00:11:05] Melissa Santos: Bagels. Yeah, maybe that wasn't effective - maybe a different audience, maybe next cycle. [00:11:11] Crystal Fincher: Yeah, it's going to be interesting to see. And another race where sometimes people just have a ton of money and they think - I have a ton of money, I can loan myself money, donate to the campaign. But more often than not, we see those predominantly self-funders not necessarily finishing all that well. It actually does take the support of people in the community and those donations are basically a measure of support from people. And that seems to be important in overall results. I do want to talk about District 2 now, which includes the Rainier Valley, southeast Seattle. And that is where incumbent Tammy Morales is facing Tanya Woo, who will be proceeding through to the primary. And this is one of those races where in Seattle we see numbers shift from Election Night to others - this certainly was no exception, a race that shifted. And as we stand now, Tammy Morales - over 52% of the vote here, 52.26%. Tanya Woo with 42.58%, so about a 10-point spread. This is one of the races where people were wondering if there was going to be a backlash to the council that showed up. Lots of talk going in about - Oh, the council may not be popular or have high approval ratings. I've noted several times, similar to Congressional approval numbers, those don't really have much bearing to individual Congressional results. Here to individual city council results, this is seemingly a strong finish for Tammy Morales as an incumbent here. How did you see this race, Guy? [00:12:52] Guy Oron: Yeah, I think initially on Election Night - oftentimes media covers it as a definitive - especially not local media, but national media. It did seem close, but the fact that Tammy Morales won by 10% - got over 50% - that's huge for her. And I think it will be very, very hard for Tanya Woo to unseat her at this point. And it shows that Morales has a lot of support from a lot of the district. And so, especially considering the fact that Harrell went really hard supporting Woo and it looks like that didn't work out too well for him. [00:13:36] Crystal Fincher: Do you agree, Daniel? [00:13:38] Daniel Beekman: Yeah, I think to an extent. Definitely the race swung a lot - I think more than any other from Election Night to now - although other races did also have a leftward swing with the later ballots. It looks like to stand any kind of a chance, Tanya Woo will have to - she's a first-time candidate and raise her game, her candidate game, in the next couple months. And also it will be interesting to see - what I was looking for on Election Night - will that race be close enough for the people who fund those independent expenditures to decide that they want to get in? I don't know, but maybe they weren't necessarily expecting her to - Woo to come out on top, but maybe they're looking at - Well, is it close enough to make it worth our while to spend? And if I was her, I wouldn't want to hear the race described like that. But I think it's just reality as people are looking in from the outside and they're making decisions about where their money is best, would best be spent. So it'll be interesting to see if - what calculation those folks make - whether people think it was close enough to be worth pouring money in or not. [00:15:13] Melissa Santos: Because remember - this was one of the least crowded races. It was just Tanya Woo, Tammy Morales, and then Margaret Elisabeth who got less than 5% of the vote. So it's not one of those sort of mystery, how did the vote split situations as much. This one is more likely to be pretty predictive of the general election. And yeah, there's only so much money to spend - even though we talk about tons of money in politics, people don't want to just throw it at nothing. And I don't think it's a lost cause - I think Tanya Woo has a chance - it doesn't look as good as it did on the night of the election for her. [00:15:47] Crystal Fincher: Yeah, absolutely. This - to your point, Melissa - more than the others, I think - one, could be viewed through the lens of, Is this a referendum on Tammy Morales and/or the council? And also, this is one where it does pretty much reflect what the race is going to be in the general election. I don't think we've seen a situation before, barring a massive scandal, where an incumbent has finished with over 52% of the vote and lost. To your point, those trying to figure out - there are a number of open seats, there are certainly seats that some people want to pick up - Is it worth spending in those and this one? - is going to be part of the calculation that people make. But this is a harder one - it's hard to see incumbents losing in this kind of a position. How do you see the general election shaping up here, Daniel? [00:16:49] Daniel Beekman: I think we know what kind of a race Tammy Morales is likely to run because she's - I think she's run similar races to some extent, when she won her seat and then the race before that when she nearly unseated Bruce Harrell. So I think we know what that's going to look like. I think the question is more how Tanya Woo is going to try to make up the vote she didn't get or gain in the general - what that looks like, whether that means leaning into her, more into her sort of community work in the CID [Chinatown International District] , or if it means hammering on a particular issue like public safety or something like that. So I think that's - I don't know - but that's what I would be looking for is where this sort of question lies. But, yeah, I think it's - incumbents don't get knocked off very often. I was trying to think - I probably should have just looked it up, but I was trying to think before this about when's the last time the Seattle City Council incumbent was unseated and I was thinking about Jean Godden losing in the 2015 primary in a crowded race. But I think I could be totally spacing on a more recent one. But that seems like, in my mind, the most recent one and that's eight years ago now. [00:18:21] Crystal Fincher: Go ahead, Melissa. [00:18:22] Melissa Santos: I have a barking dog, so I'm trying to spare everyone from that. But yeah - now that I think about it - I was thinking - time is flat to me at this point, but Richard Conlin was a couple years before that. So what you're saying may be very well the most recent. We haven't seen a lot of incumbents go down and have those dramatic flips recently. It has happened, but not super recently. I will say - for Morales, since Sawant is leaving the council, she is, I think, the most - in this traditional lens of going back to who's left and who's center, right? Morales is the sort of furthest left member I think we have up for election this year. So the fact that she did get pretty good results in the primary, it suggests to me that there might not be this huge, huge upswell of being fed up with far-left City Council politics. There's certainly things people are unhappy with - we've seen polling that says people want more action on stuff - housing, homelessness. People want action. They want things to change, but they don't - necessarily voting out the most liberal candidates at this point. [00:19:31] Crystal Fincher: Yeah, I think that's a really good point. And I think, I've talked about it before in other places, but sometimes we hear about polling a lot and it's - Well, people are unhappy. And that's a reflection on people being unhappy with City councilmembers and approval ratings are low. And I think there are a lot of people who are unhappy with the state of things today, but I think sometimes we make assumptions about why that is and assume that that automatically means that they're unhappy with their councilmember. And that's not necessarily the case. I think that this is yet another example of that, where we need to go further and ask - Okay, so you're not happy with the state of things. Is it because - when it comes to public safety, do you want a more punitive and carceral approach, or do you want more intervention and community violence intervention and more addressing root causes? And I think if you look at the people on the ground in Seattle, they do want to do more to address some of the systemic issues that we have, to address some of the root causes, get more to prevention instead of trying to respond to so much after the fact. And I think that these results - almost in this race more than others - where there was a direct contrast between the two and a direct policy difference between the two. And we saw voters basically affirm that the direction Tammy Morales is heading is one that they're, that most are happy with. And especially in a lower turnout primary election, in an off-year, this is where you would expect unhappiness to really materialize if there was a desire to - kick all the bums out, that saying for people who are elected, but that didn't seem to materialize with two of the three incumbents finishing over 50%. And the third with the plurality of the vote there. How do you think this moves forward with that, Guy? [00:21:37] Guy Oron: Yeah, I do think it's a vindication for some of the people who were in the Solidarity Budget coalition, who are supporting decriminalization and defund, that maybe they see that one of the councilmembers that stood by their side got over 50%. I think they'll be reassured by that. I do think Tanya Woo got a lot of support in the CID and was able to really voice to that neighborhood that has been ignored a lot in the media by policymakers - or used as tokens, but not actually given proper seat at the table. So I think even if Morales wins the general election, that'll be something on the top of her priorities - is to better address the CID. And I think that was something that Woo was able to bring, even if she doesn't win in the general. [00:22:36] Crystal Fincher: Absolutely. Go ahead, Daniel. [00:22:39] Daniel Beekman: Oh, I was just going to say - and there's also sort of the differences district-to-district and candidate-to-candidate where - definitely Tammy Morales had a, looks like a strong result. On the other hand, you saw Dan Strauss trying to distance himself from some of his pro-defund advocacy from back in 2020 - I think I saw a mailer. And so whether he's right or not, he's obviously a little bit concerned about some of that coming back to bite him with voters in his district, so there's some differences district to district as well. [00:23:24] Crystal Fincher: Yeah, I agree with that. Another district - District 3, where Councilmember Kshama Sawant will not be seeking reelection, so this is for the person who will succeed Councilmember Sawant. And so in this race, we have the two making it through - Joy Hollingsworth with 36.89% right now and Alex Hudson being the second, making it through with 36.52%. Another very crowded race - this is a very close result, maybe the closest result. And two very different candidates than the current incumbent. What do you think this says about the district, and what do you think this says about the race? - starting with Melissa. [00:24:12] Melissa Santos: It is really close - you're less than a percentage point between these candidates now that we've seen the results shake out. And it is another situation where you have Joy Hollingsworth being the Seattle Times Editorial Board-endorsed candidate - not the newsroom, but the editorial board - and Alex Hudson being the Stranger-endorsed candidate up against one another. However, it's interesting to me because Alex Hudson is then - would be in the camp of being this more progressive candidate, right? - which in certain ways, she is. She's a long-time transit advocate and is - I remember, one time, her doing a video of confronting Tim Eyman, the anti-tax initiative pusher. And so she's done those sorts of things, but she's also someone who's worked a little bit more within the establishment than - certainly than Sawant, for instance - lobbying, building coalitions. So we're not seeing, and this has been said a lot about this race and I'm not the only one to say it, but we're not seeing anyone who wants to burn the barn down here in this race in the same way. We're not seeing a Socialist candidate in the same way even, and I'm actually - I haven't talked to these candidates as much as Dan and Guy probably have, but I actually think they're closer together on some issues than maybe it appears from those divergent endorsements. And I think some of that is likely to come to light during the general election, and it's possible that their positions don't as neatly line up necessarily with this sort of pro-business and labor/left activism, although in some ways they do. [00:25:45] Crystal Fincher: Do you agree, Guy? [00:25:48] Guy Oron: I definitely agree that it's a huge change from Kshama Sawant and either one of the candidates won't be Socialists. And so I think that'll be something for Seattle left to think about - how do you build momentum for a more broad base, long-term institutional victory - to get five council seats at least instead of just one. And that's - they have to go to the drawing board and think about that long-term. But in terms of Hudson and Hollingsworth, I think Hudson started off a little slow, but managed to snag some important endorsements - and that's credit to her and her long-time presence in the policy world in Seattle. And I think Hollingsworth also is a very compelling candidate - I've seen her at so many different events in the community. She really shows up - for example, when Nurturing Roots was closing back in March, not even in her district, but she was the only candidate to show up and show support. So I think that's credit to her and really cultivating her base in the CD [Central District] . And I definitely think it will be a tight race. Progressives did - all the progressive candidates together did win about 4 or 5% more than the more moderate candidates, so it'll be interesting to see if Hollingsworth can manage to build a coalition of moderate liberals and especially in the CD, turn out folks who aren't voting just to get over the line. [00:27:30] Crystal Fincher: Do you agree, Daniel? [00:27:32] Daniel Beekman: Yeah, I guess this is a race where Bruce Harrell has endorsed Joy Hollingsworth, right? So it'll be interesting to see what kind of impact that has, if any, that can be discerned - Mayor Bruce Harrell. Alex Hudson has a varied background, but coming out of the Transportation Choices Coalition - which is transit advocacy but labor-aligned - and in the world of the big players in Seattle politics and been a policy and politician factory. Rob Johnson, a councilmember, was the Executive Director there. And Jessyn Farrell, former state lawmaker, and other people - so it's been churning out folks into government, so that's interesting. But I think Melissa and Guy covered a lot of this, so I don't have a whole lot to add. I had noticed just on social media a little bit - and I should say that I'm not, I should shout out my coworker Sarah Grace Taylor, who's been doing a lot of the coverage of the City Council races this year for us rather than myself, so I'm not the expert - but just on observing on social media, I feel like I've seen a little bit of different emphases in how the two candidates are positioning themselves. Joy Hollingsworth trying to emphasize her community ties. And Alex Hudson - I just saw on the way over to do this - talking up transit as an issue. Obviously because she's - that's some of her background. But also she must think it will play well with voters saying - in that district that's pretty transit reliant. [00:29:32] Melissa Santos: In theory, Joy Hollingsworth would be the candidate who's newer to politics - in theory - if you look at them. However, Joy is coming from a family of sort of political legacies in a way as well. Her grandmother Dorothy was the first African American woman elected to the Seattle School Board - and I think that's part of her community story a little bit that Joy is playing up - being from the Central District, being part of the legacy of people making change and pushing forward, which is interesting since she's the more establishment candidate endorsed by the mayor. But that's why the dynamics of this race are a little interesting to me. Because the narrative is not as clean as what we've looked at - races in the past where it's, again, lefty versus more business friendly Democrat kind of races in Seattle. [00:30:26] Crystal Fincher: Yeah, I think that's spot on. And this is a district where there's a Socialist as an incumbent. This is arguably the most left district in the city that doesn't quite have a candidate that speaks to that far left end that Kshama Sawant does. And I do agree that there are potentially a number of overlaps or places where the policy differences may not be as clear from the very beginning. So I think this is going to be a race where it's going to be important to examine where the candidates stand. It's going to be important to understand where the differences are and to really understand what they're bringing in terms of - not just votes, but where they're willing to lead and push, perhaps, the council. What are going to be their signature issues? And what are going to be the issues where they may just be an additional vote? I think that there's a lot that people still don't know, and this is going to be one of the most interesting districts for trying to ferret out what those differences and contrasts are. Also notice that fundraising in this race - again, a lot of money raised throughout the district. This is a race - we saw the result being very close - also the amount raised, both raising about $94,000 there. And so this is another race where both seem to have a lot of fundraising capacity. Is this going to be a race where outside entities get involved? And I also think those outside entities are going to be listening for cues from each of those candidates. Who do funders see as their ally on the council? Who does labor see as a stronger ally on the council? I think that there's still more that they're figuring out here. And those donations, those types of donors and those endorsements, are also going to do a lot of speaking for these candidates about where they stand and how they're likely to govern. [00:32:26] Melissa Santos: I was surprised that - based on just fundraising - that Alex Cooley didn't do a little bit better because they raised $95,000 as well. I don't know if any of you can explain what happened there, because I expected a better showing for that amount of money - I thought, I don't know - just looking from the outside at it. [00:32:42] Daniel Beekman: Yeah, I didn't follow it close enough to know - was it mostly Democracy Vouchers? [00:32:46] Melissa Santos: Yes, must be. Yeah, it's a mystery to me. [00:32:50] Guy Oron: He was the only candidate to run on a platform of only taking Democracy Vouchers and he didn't accept private donations, which I think is an interesting platform and could prove compelling if you think about - I'm not beholden to any interests, only the people. But I think his ground game was strong, but he didn't have a lot of institutional support from people like The Stranger, and so that's why he fell short. [00:33:22] Daniel Beekman: Yeah, and to pick up on something that you mentioned when you introduced the race, Crystal - it's interesting to think about - Sawant won her seat in 2013, so 10 years ago. And to think about how much District 3 - those neighborhoods, like Capitol Hill and the CD, have changed in the last 10 years. And think about is that why we didn't get someone with Kshama Sawant's politics in this race? Or is it because people are tired of her personally and that's soured them? But they narrowly voted down a recall just recently, so they're not that sick of it. I don't know, I find that interesting to ponder on whether the fact that there are two very unlike-Sawant candidates and two non-Socialist candidates going into the general election has anything to do with her or not, has anything to do with changes in the electorate or not. I don't have the answer, but I'm intrigued by that question. [00:34:37] Crystal Fincher: I don't have the answer to that one either, but I do think this is a race where endorsements mattered a lot because it was hard, just on the face, to see some of the automatic differences between the candidates in a way that you can in some of the other districts perhaps. And so this is another one where we talk about the importance of The Times and The Stranger endorsements and that certainly carried through here, in people looking at The Stranger as a cue to see who is considered to be the most progressive. Lots of times people are doing the same thing with The Times on the other side, if they want a more moderate presence on the council. And so I think those endorsements really mattered - in this race in particular - but in several of them overall. Also want to talk about the District 4 election. Now this is a district where - we talk about change over the last 10 years - this is certainly a district where I think recent results that we're seeing there reflect an evolution of the district and a change in this district. And so both with redistricting here and in this race, probably one of the cleanest lines between what is considered traditionally someone in the progressive lane and those traditionally in a moderate to conservative lane. How did you see this race shaping up, Guy? [00:35:59] Guy Oron: Yeah, I think it echoes the last 2019 elections, but now Ron P. Davis is number one instead of Alex Pedersen, so that's a good sign for him. And he is the strongest non-incumbent candidate in Seattle, winning 45% of the vote. It does seem like, with more development and just growing density, there are changing demographics. So it could be an opportunity for a pretty dramatic swing towards the left in this district. But still, the more moderate conservative candidates won about 55% of the vote together - Wilson and Maritza Rivera. So it'll be very competitive, and I think it all relies on if Ron can turn out all the students to vote for him who tend to lean more progressive. [00:37:04] Crystal Fincher: How do you see this race, Melissa? [00:37:07] Melissa Santos: Theoretically, it would make sense to add together those sort of more centrist candidates and say - Oh, they got 55% - and I don't disagree with doing that, Guy. The thing that was weird to me is - and I wish I had in front of me at the moment - but there was a mailer that went out and Crystal, you saw this and I just think Dan, you also probably saw this - but where it didn't, it seemed like Wilson was going after Rivera, who was closer to him politically, than he was going after Davis. And there were checkmarks and it's like Davis got more checks being aligned with Wilson than Maritza Rivera did on this particular advertisement and mailer. And I don't know if that kind of communication is going to then make some people think that Davis is more aligned - people who voted for Wilson - if they're going to think, go forward thinking Davis is more their guy than Rivera. Or there's a lot of election communication still yet to happen, so I guess all of that can be reset. But it seemed like that was one of the primary communication that's happening in that district. And it may have disrupted the dynamic in a way of the sort of candidates and saying - Oh yeah, this is now my candidate since mine got knocked out since they're the most similar. And so I'm not sure how that will carry out forward going with this election into the general. [00:38:23] Daniel Beekman: Yeah, that's interesting - whether that mailer will stick in anyone's mind and sour them on Rivera when they might not otherwise be. I think probably what Ken Wilson was going for there was just looking and assuming that - Well, Ron Davis is getting through, it's between me and Maritza Rivera about who's getting through on the other lane, and so let's see if I can make that happen without - like we were talking about - one of these newspaper endorsements. And it didn't work as much as he needed to, at least. Yeah, District 4 is interesting. Shaun Scott ran - I think running as a Democratic Socialist to some extent in 2019 - ran Alex Pedersen really close in District 4 in that year. And I guess my sort of what I'll be watching for in this one is how Ron Davis moves forward - whether he tries to draw really sharp contrast between himself and Maritza Rivera and he thinks that's the key, or if he tries to tack to the center a bit to try to win over some of those maybe slightly more moderate voters or Ken Wilson voters in some way. And I'll just tell a sort of funny story. I went out on Election Day to do some just person-on-the-street voter reporting. And it was funny because I was in District 4 and District 5 for a while talking to voters. And I had two voters - one was this sort of like older boomer, typical Seattle boomer voter, and to some extent - whatever that is. And I said - What are you thinking about? And most of the people I talked to didn't have some sort of mega-narrative about the Seattle election cycle, like we're going to throw out the lefties or we're going to do this. It was more - they're kind of grasping at straws a bit in my little unscientific sample size. But this somewhat older voter said - Well, I care about trees and I went to this tree protest in Wedgwood for Luma the cedar tree. And Ken Wilson was there and he seemed to care, so I'm voting for him - that's a big reason. And then I talked to a voter - more lefty-seeming voter in her 20s, I think - elsewhere, I think in the U district. And they said - Well, I care about climate change and I went to this protest for the cedar tree. And Ron Davis was there, so I'm voting for him. So I don't know if that means anything, but it just goes to show - yeah, so it will be interesting to see, does Ron Davis lean into the tree protest? Or does he lean into let's densify and tax big business? [00:41:30] Crystal Fincher: Yeah, this is going to be interesting. And those anecdotes are always so interesting, and I think underscores just from the inside-a-campaign candidate perspective - three quarters of the job, three quarters of the work is in showing up, whether it's on someone's doorstep, whether it's at an event. People want to see that you're actively engaged in the community and in the issues that they care about. So I would just encourage all of the candidates to do that. And the more you can talk to regular voters, the better. But this is an interesting race here. This is another race where we also saw an independent expenditure on behalf of, or in favor of, Maritza Rivera here. And it is an interesting race where - I don't know that this race, these votes consolidate cleanly pre-mailer in the way that they would expect. On top of that, this is a district that, a similar district, just last year elected Darya Farivar. And you think that the general election electorate is going to look more similar to what we saw in an even-year election then - that certainly is more progressive than that district and that area has been for a while. So are we seeing a shift in the preferences of a district? Are we seeing a shift in the issues that are concerning people? Certainly housing affordability is a major issue throughout all of Seattle, but also playing out in this district where I think the previous calculus and assumption was that this is a district full of NIMBYs and they seem to be voting in the opposite direction now. So this is going to be a really interesting race to pay attention to and one that may attract a lot of outside money because there are clearer lanes with a moderate in the race seemingly and a progressive - and looking to really pick up the seat for one or the other. Also want to talk about the District 5 race, which is another interesting, exciting race and was a pretty close race. So we have Cathy Moore here - close overall, especially for the second and third place finisher here - so Cathy Moore finishing with 32.26% of the vote, ChrisTiana ObeySumner - they're finishing with 21.38% of the vote here. How did you see this vote shaping up in the primary? Nilu Jenks is finishing currently in third place, just outside of making it through the primary. Guy, how did you see this developing? [00:44:19] Guy Oron: Yeah, I think the District 5 race was by far the most fractured and we had, I think, tied for the most amount of candidates. And so people - I think a lot of people voted for their first choice and I think ChrisTiana was able to be a sort of dark horse and come out on top. I think a lot of people were expecting Nilu Jenks to win, and so now those voters will have to decide whether they prefer Moore or ChrisTiana - and I think that will decide which way the district goes. But I think North Seattle is not usually thought of as a progressive stronghold, but I think it is surprisingly pretty progressive in terms of where people are voting. And I think people have all sorts of politics, like chaotic politics, where they support trees and density - and how do you reconcile those two, and I think that's up to the candidates to show that they're more well-spoken and have a stronger vision about integrating these various contradictions. [00:45:32] Crystal Fincher: What do you think, Melissa? [00:45:34] Melissa Santos: I was just reviewing some of the candidates' sort of statements and where they're coming from - it does encapsulate to me a little bit - you have Cathy Moore talking about public safety. All the candidates are talking about safety and should be talking about public safety probably, but she's coming at - literally in her voter guide statement says - I'm the pragmatic solution - very much very focused on capturing that center lane, people who might want to see a little bit more timely police response is a huge part of her platform. And again, everyone wants the cops to probably, I think, to respond to emergencies probably. I don't think there's too many people saying - well, okay, I retract my statement. It's a very complicated issue, actually. But I mean emphasizing that - as opposed to emphasizing housing and upstream solutions to homelessness, which is where ChrisTiana was doing with her statements. I just think we have a lot of contrast between people talking about housing, to be honest - housing, housing, housing on one side and then people talk about public safety sometimes when you get - in the more traditional races where you get those center lane candidates. And housing is a message that's resonating with people. People, I think, want housing to be a thing. And again, for instance, we had this Social Housing measure pass earlier this year and I think that kind of - Tammy Morales, again, who is leading in her race and getting good, has really been supportive of that social housing measure and finding money to actually implement it. And as far as District - back to District 5 - I think ChrisTiana ObeySumner is also talking about those sorts of things more so than cops and hiring more police, and I think that there's people who want to hear them talk about that. And there certainly were other candidates in this race talking about different solutions to some of the sort of agreed upon crisis we see - maybe homelessness and housing - but I think those sort of holistic solutions, people are listening to that in an interesting way in some of these races. And this is an example of that to me. [00:47:48] Crystal Fincher: Yeah, this is a race where I think there was a broader range of viewpoints represented in this race across the spectrum that we see in Seattle. There was Tye Reed also in this race, who was very involved in the Social Housing initiative and that passing, and taking up a left mantle. But a number of progressive candidates - I think, yet again, this was another race where people were trying to figure out who was most aligned with their beliefs and that may have been not as easy as some people would have thought at first glance. And so another race where I think the endorsements from The Times and The Stranger were once again consequential. But I also think this is one where - a lot of times, I think we underestimate sometimes just individual candidate attributes, individual candidate performance, how people are connecting. And especially with how close this race was, particularly between the second and third place finishers - ChrisTiana ObeySumner and Nilu Jenks - I think ChrisTiana did a more effective job at clearly articulating where they stood on issues. And that was more of a challenge for Nilu Jenks, where some people left with some impressions based on what they said and they said things that gave other impressions to people. And so voters trying to reconcile who these candidates are and what kind of votes to expect, endorsing organizations trying to ferret out what kind of votes should they expect from these - I think that this is an example of being clear about where you stand is helpful in getting through to establishment people, getting through to voters, and making the kinds of connections that get you through to the general election. What do you think, Daniel? [00:49:50] Daniel Beekman: I was going to say - yeah, I don't have a lot to add, I don't think, about these particular two candidates. But I spent some time on Election Day - again, my very unscientific sample size, by the Lake City Library and a lot of people were talking about homelessness and people were talking about public drug use. And it will be interesting to see how these candidates navigate some issues like that. I do think that the questions about prosecuting people for using drugs in public - that has been in the headlines recently at City Hall, so that will likely in this race and others be something that is talked about. But Guy mentioned Darya Farivar's - or maybe you did, Crystal, or both of you - that election that she ran and won last year. And I would think that candidates in both District 4 and District 5 might want to be looking at that - and some of it is just about a candidate and their personality and what they have going for them. But if you're a smart candidate in those districts, you're looking at that race and - what did she do? And also just reminded me that - in terms of sort of some changes politically - is that on issues like criminal justice or the legal system, on issues around housing - both zoning, which is traditionally very much a city issue, but also on funding affordable housing - it seems like there are more of those conversations and more action happening in Olympia than there was some years ago. And I don't know if that sort of makes some of these City races feel a little bit less urgent for folks, but it's something that's occurred to me where - some years ago when there was just nothing happening in the State Legislature, when people are looking for help or for change, it made City elections that much more high stakes, but maybe that's been changing a little bit. [00:51:58] Crystal Fincher: Yeah, and I also think this is an interesting race just because of the expanded representation that could potentially be coming to the Council - non-binary person, disabled BIPOC person - and that kind of representation being really important. We're seeing so many other members of the community deal with challenges and access issues related to that, that some lived experience could be very enlightening and helpful in crafting solutions that meet the needs of everyone in the City. So I'll be interested to see that explored throughout the general election. And just figuring out, once again, where these candidates stand on issues. There's going to be a lot that the City Council is going to be dealing with over the next several years. And so I hope that there really is an attempt to figure out where the candidates stand and what solutions they feel - not just that they're willing to vote for, but that they're really willing to lean on and try and craft solutions with their colleagues on this for. [00:53:06] Shannon Cheng: You just listened to Part 1 of our 2023 Post-Primary Roundtable that was originally aired live on Tuesday, August 8th. Audio for Part 2 will be running this Friday, so make sure to stay tuned. Full video from the event and a full text transcript of the show can be found on our website officialhacksandwonks.com. The producer of Hacks & Wonks is Shannon Cheng. You can find Hacks & Wonks on Twitter @HacksWonks, and you can follow Crystal @finchfrii, spelled F-I-N-C-H-F-R-I-I. You can catch Hacks & Wonks on iTunes, Spotify, or wherever else you get your podcasts - just type "Hacks and Wonks" into the search bar. Be sure to subscribe to get our Friday almost-live shows and our Tuesday topical show delivered to your podcast feed. If you like us, leave us a review wherever you listen. You can also get a full transcript of this episode at officialhacksandwonks.com and in the podcast episode notes. Thank you for tuning in!

Week in Review: August 4, 2023 - with Robert Cruickshank

Play Episode Listen Later Aug 4, 2023 60:11

On this week-in-review, Crystal is joined by Chair of Sierra Club Seattle, long time communications and political strategist, Robert Cruickshank! They run through results from Tuesday's primary election for Seattle City Council, Seattle School Board & King County Council, and then take a look at Tacoma City Council, Spokane City elections, and the recall of gubernatorial candidate Semi Bird from the Richland School Board. The show concludes with reflection on the influence of editorial boards and their endorsements, particularly those of The Stranger. As always, a full text transcript of the show is available below and at officialhacksandwonks.com. Find the host, Crystal Fincher, on Twitter at @finchfrii and find today's co-host, Robert Cruickshank, at @cruickshank. Resources “RE-AIR: The Big Waterfront Bamboozle with Mike McGinn and Robert Cruickshank” from Hacks & Wonks “Backlash to City Council incumbents doesn't materialize in primary” by Melissa Santos from Axios “Seattle Public Schools primary election results 2023” by Dahlia Bazzaz and Monica Velez from The Seattle Times “3 things we learned from the Pierce County primary, from council races to tax measures” by Adam Lynn from The News Tribune “Voters favor recall of gubernatorial candidate Semi Bird from school board” by Jerry Cornfield from Washington State Standard Find stories that Crystal is reading here Transcript [00:00:00] Crystal Fincher: Welcome to Hacks & Wonks. I'm Crystal Fincher, and I'm a political consultant and your host. On this show, we talk with policy wonks and political hacks to gather insight into local politics and policy in Washington state through the lens of those doing the work with behind-the-scenes perspectives on what's happening, why it's happening, and what you can do about it. Be sure to subscribe to the podcast to get the full versions of our Tuesday topical show and our Friday week-in-review delivered to your podcast feed. If you like us, the most helpful thing you can do is leave a review wherever you listen to Hacks & Wonks. Full transcripts and resources referenced in the show are always available at officialhacksandwonks.com and in our episode notes. If you missed our Tuesday topical show, we re-aired an episode highlighting how the leaders we choose make consequential decisions that affect us all. Check out my conversation with Mike McGinn and Robert Cruickshank about how the SR 99 tunnel and today's Seattle waterfront came about. Today, we're continuing our Friday week-in-review shows where we review the news of the week with a co-host. Welcome back to the program, friend of the show and today's co-host: Chair of Sierra Club Seattle, long time communications and political strategist, Robert Cruickshank. Hey! [00:01:26] Robert Cruickshank: Thank you for having me on again, Crystal - excited to talk about election results this week. [00:01:30] Crystal Fincher: Yes, and we have a number to talk about. These have been very eagerly awaited results - lots of candidates and contenders, especially with the Seattle City Council elections - 45 candidates all whittled down now to two in each race going into the general election. We should probably go through the results here - District 1 and going through - what did we see and what did you think? [00:01:58] Robert Cruickshank: There are some trends you'll see as we look through these races and it's good to start district by district. And in West Seattle, in District 1, one of the trends you see is that some of the establishment candidates, the candidates Bruce Harrell's side, is really putting kind of anemic performances. You look at Rob Saka in West Seattle, who's barely ahead of Phil Tavel who's run for office several times before. And Maren Costa, the much more progressive candidate, labor candidate - is the one of the two women who was fired by Amazon for doing climate organizing before the pandemic - so she's a strong climate champion, Stranger-endorsed candidate. Maren Costa is in the low 30s and will probably go higher as more ballots come in this week. But Rob Saka is one of the two candidates who benefited from a independent expenditure by right-wing billionaires and corporate donors. The reason they targeted him in this race and Maritza Rivera in District 4, which we'll talk about in a moment, is they knew that those two candidates were struggling and needed that huge influx of cash to help convince voters to support them and not - maybe in this case - Phil Tavel over Maren Costa. So Rob Saka at 25% or so right now - it's not really a strong showing. Maren Costa in the low 30s - your progressive candidate, you'd like to be a little bit higher - she's in a great position right now. And one of the things you're seeing in this race - and you will see in the others - is in addition to the fact that the establishment candidates did worse than expected, in addition to incumbents doing well, you're also starting to see that a number of progressive candidates are surviving this supposed backlash that never actually happened. If you talk to or listen to Brandi Kruse, or watch KOMO, or read some of the more unhinged Seattle Times editorials, you would have assumed that coming into this election, there's going to be a massive backlash favoring genuinely right-wing candidates who really want to just crack down on crime, crack down on homelessness - that just didn't happen. What I see in District 1, and you'll see in all these other races, is a reversion to pre-pandemic politics between corporate centrists and progressive candidates. That's where you're starting to see the things shake out - you're not having right-wing candidates like Ann Davison getting traction. And candidates on the left, there weren't very many of them this year - had a little bit of traction, we'll see, in District 5, but otherwise it wasn't really a factor. So I think you're coming back to pre-pandemic politics where a progressive candidate like Maren Costa can do well in West Seattle. If you remember in 2015, when we first went to districts, the race in West Seattle was very close - Lisa Herbold only won by about 30 votes. Looking at the numbers in District 1 so far, I would not be surprised to see a very close race between Maren Costa and Rob Saka, but Rob Saka is not the strong candidate that his backers expected. And Maren Costa has a lot of momentum and energy behind her - in West Seattle, you're seeing voters responding to the message that she's giving. [00:05:06] Crystal Fincher: Yeah, I would agree with that. I also found it surprising to see how anemic the performance by some of those establishment moderate candidates - not only did they need that conservative PAC money to get through, but they were leading in fundraising by quite a significant bit - Rob Saka was far ahead of others in terms of fundraising, we saw the same in some other districts. So it was really interesting - it's hard to finish poorly in a primary or to not run away with the lead, really, in a primary when you have a significant fundraising lead - especially when you have additional money coming in. Seattle voters are starting to get a little wiser - still the challenge is there - but starting to get a little wiser at looking at whose donors are there and do those donors indicate how they're going to vote? Looks like in the history of Seattle politics - maybe drawing some conclusions on that. I think there are interesting conversations about the, whether this is a change election or stay the course election, whether people want something different or the same. And I think that's a more complicated answer than just change or different. One, we don't have a uniform city council. There's a range of positions and perspectives on the council, so to try and characterize it as "this progressive council" isn't necessarily correct. And now we're going to have a lot of turnover, we're going to see what this new composition is going to be, but it's hard to characterize that. And then you have the mayor on the other side - who is definitely a moderate, not a progressive there - and so the mayor is still dictating a lot of the policy in the city. Even some things that have been funded by the council, direction that has been moved has not been taken action on by the mayor. Saying that you want to stay the course really feels like a more moderate course these days, especially when looking at the approaches to public safety with a lot of criminalization of poverty - when you talk about homelessness and the outsize focus on sweeps, instead of trying to house people and connect them to services consistently. So that whole conversation is always interesting to me and feels a little bit reductive, a little too simplistic for what is actually going on. But we should probably talk about some of the other races, too. What did you see in District 2 with Tammy Morales and Tanya Woo, along with kind of an also-ran - another candidate who I don't think topped 5% - but that is a closer race than some of the others appear to be on their face, although there were a lot fewer candidates in this race. [00:07:34] Robert Cruickshank: Again, we can think back to 2015 where Tammy Morales nearly beat the incumbent Bruce Harrell, losing by a little less than 500 votes. She won by a larger margin when the seat was open after Harrell stepped down in 2019. A lot of the sort of conventional wisdom from the establishment class is that Morales was in real trouble, but she's hovering around 50% right now. Tanya Woo's close - it'll be a close election in the fall, but you have to say that Morales has the advantage here. Incumbency does matter. We need to look at the maps, but I know that there's been a lot of frustration in the Chinatown International District with Morales and with City Hall more generally, but the rest of District 2 seems to still have confidence in Tammy Morales' leadership, and still willing to send her back to City Hall for a second term. The exception to that was in noticing that the closer I get to Lake Washington, the Tanya Woo signs pop up a lot more. The closer I get to Rainier and MLK, more Tammy Morales signs. That's a typical split in terms of the electorate in the South End, and I think it favors Morales. She's done a great job on a lot of issues facing the community, she's been there for the community. Tanya Woo is running a strong campaign - Woo is not a right-wing candidate, Woo is much more of a center-left candidate who is really close to the Harrell administration. And again, it'll be a close race. If you're looking for a backlash, if you're looking for a rejection of a progressive city council, you are not seeing it in District 2. Morales, I think, has the advantage here going into November. [00:09:01] Crystal Fincher: I would agree. Now, District 3, coming on the heels of our announced departure of Councilmember Kshama Sawant from the council, there's going to be a new councilmember here. This is an open-seat race. We see Joy Hollingsworth and Alex Hudson making it through to the general election. What's your take on this? [00:09:22] Robert Cruickshank: Joy Hollingsworth has probably hit her ceiling - she's pulling around 40% right now. If you look back - ever since we went to districts in 2015, obviously being on the ballot changes the dynamics - you can get some pretty liberal people who are - I don't know if I like the socialism, 'cause they could get close. And so there's at least, you would assume, 40 to 45% for a more centrist candidate even in District 3, but not much beyond that. And what you're seeing is that as more ballots come in, Alex Hudson's numbers are growing, and there are quite a few other really good candidates in that race who also split the progressive vote. Hudson will almost certainly unite that progressive vote. I think very few of those voters are going to go from someone like Andrew Ashiofu or Ry Armstrong or Alex Cooley over to Joy Hollingsworth - a few might. But I think Alex Hudson is going to have the advantage here going in to the November election as well. [00:10:15] Crystal Fincher: This is an interesting race. There are eight candidates in this race, one - so very, very crowded race - number of progressive candidates in here. So there definitely was some splitting going on. This is a bit different than some of the open seat races that we see where oftentimes there is a candidate who feels like they're carrying on the same direction or philosophy or policy stance as the incumbent, but the incumbent decided not to go anymore. And so there're oftentimes as well, the choice of maintaining the same kind of policy direction or going different. I don't think that's the case here. And also to your point that Kshama Sawant not being in this race - yes, some people see the socialism in question, but Kshama had the ability to motivate a whole entire squad of volunteers that blanketed that district. And so looking at the absolutely impressive ground game - we've talked about it before on the program - lots to learn from for Democrats looking at that and others at how to expand the electorate and really get people to turn out to vote is something that Kshama and her campaign did extremely well. There's a different dynamic here, and it's going to be interesting to see if one of these candidates can motivate and galvanize younger people to a degree that comes close to what Kshama did. It looks like that was not the case in the primary, probably - we're still fairly early in the returns, but turnout looks concerning, especially among younger people here. So the entire dynamic of that race in that district just feels a lot more different than some of the other ones. And so this is going to be an interesting one to follow. [00:11:50] Robert Cruickshank: I agree - you're right to point to Sawant's just political genius. Sawant is one of the most effective candidates, campaigners, and politicians we see in the City in a long, long time. She has a really strong ability to speak to a broad progressive base in Capitol Hill. And in District 3, she speaks well to renters and people who are lower wage workers - they know she has their back. Her campaign operation is one of the best the City has had. Talking to people who live in District 3 - they would report every time Sawant's on the ballot, they had Sawant organizers at their doors almost every day until they turned in their ballots. They got the work done. They were really good at that. And that is a infrastructure that is unique to Sawant. Sawant always wanted to turn that into a movement, into an organization - was never quite able to. And so none of the other candidates have built that yet. As you point out with turnout, they're going to need to. Alex Hudson, looking like the more progressive candidate in this race, is going to have to figure out how to build something close to what Sawant had without having the sort of once-in-a-generation political charisma and skills that Sawant had. Now, Hudson is a great candidate. Hudson has a lot of experience at City Hall, knows the policy well. But to actually win the election, they're gonna have to figure out how to build some of that momentum and movement going for her to make sure that she wins. My guess is Hudson probably gets around 53% in November, but she's gonna have to work hard for it. [00:13:19] Crystal Fincher: Yeah, she's gonna have to work hard for it. I will say a couple things. One, just on legacy, I guess, moving forward - absolutely galvanized the public. I have seen several people say - Out of everyone, I know that I can count on Sawant to represent my interests. That's important. If you have a voter saying that, they are a loyal voter - unless you do something completely out of character, they're gonna be there for you like you've been there for them. There are questions about how well Sawant worked with her colleagues. There's ongoing debate about leading on an issue and pushing for progress versus how much to try and work with, potentially compromise with colleagues. And Sawant was not one who led with compromise. And that is something that a lot of people admired. I've said over and over again that a lot of times, especially speaking with more moderate people, they seem to always view Sawant's election as a fluke almost - Oh, some other condition, some other thing helped Sawant get in and that's the only reason why - which I think is why you saw so much energy around the recall elections and her re-elections. But she represents that district - there is no getting around - the people voted for her on purpose. She's a good example of looking at some people in some positions and saying - Hey, just move forward. Obviously $15 an hour minimum wage started in SeaTac, but then Kshama certainly picked up that mantle for Seattle and said - We need to get this done. Probably without her very direct and overt support for that, $15 an hour does not happen in Seattle when it did, how it did. If you follow me online, I often ask for mail or feedback from people in different districts. And I will say I had a couple people in District 3 who consistently showed me the mail that they receive - a couple of them in some harder to find places, harder to canvass places who don't get many canvassers - even with Sawant, they definitely did, but not as much as some of the other ones. Alex Hudson's campaign team made it there to drop off lit, made it there to knock on some doors. So that was encouraging. I'm always a big fan of candidates getting on those doors, talking to their constituents, their neighbors directly. Alex Hudson did a better job of that in the primary. And so hopefully that is something that can be built on and expanded upon. Want to talk about District 4, which is another interesting result. We had, in this race, a different dynamic where there was one clear progressive candidate and then a number of different shades of moderate to conservative candidates. This race even featured a self-described climate skeptic - just a number of different perspectives on the center to the right. And here we had Ron Davis with a pretty strong finish, considering the split in this race - we're sitting right about 42% right now - and as we record this on Thursday morning. And then Ken Wilson not making it through the primary, Maritza Rivera making it through - both of those fundraised pretty significantly. Maritza, another recipient of some PAC support. So looking at this race, how do you see the primary? And then how do you see the general shaping up between Ron Davis and Maritza Rivera? [00:16:31] Robert Cruickshank: The corporate PAC for Rivera was key because I think there's recognition that without it, Ken Wilson probably would have come in second. Wilson had a strong base of support - he raised, I think, the most Democracy Vouchers in the city, Ron Davis quickly caught up. Wilson had a genuine popular base of support among the NIMBYs and right wingers in District 4, which there are many. That's why you needed the right wing billionaires and corporate CEOs to come in and help drag Rivera up into second place. Going into the fall, I wanna acknowledge that there are people out there who take a more skeptical view of what this means for progressives - like Erica Barnett, for example - arguing that this isn't actually that great for progressives, they're getting into the upper 30s, low 40s, but things could unite against them in the fall. And we can look back at 2021 and say - Yeah, that's what happened in the mayor's race. I was looking at the numbers earlier this morning. After all is said and done in the August 2021 primary, Bruce Harrell had 34%, Lorena González had 32%. It looked like it was a real horse race. It turned out that was almost González's ceiling - she got, obviously, a little bit more than that, closer to 40%, but not quite. And Harrell scooped up almost everything else. I don't think that's gonna happen in District 4 and I don't think it's gonna happen elsewhere. For a few reasons - one, I think the mayor's race is a unique animal - citywide. I also think 2021 was a difficult moment for progressives in Seattle - they hadn't quite figured out how to handle this backlash to defund, concerns about crime and homelessness. Candidates are starting to figure that out a lot better. So Ron Davis is a very smart campaigner. He has really sensible answers on the issues that resonate even with more older conservative voters. He's got a real upside. I also think there are a non-zero number of Ken Wilson voters who might go over to Ron. Ken sent out a really interesting mailer in the last week of the election with a bunch of check marks about different positions - designed to contrast Ken with Rivera, but a lot of the check marks are for Ron as well. And what Ken's campaign was saying is that Rivera is the insider - she's been inside City Hall for several years, corporate backing, establishment backing. Ron doesn't have that. And I think a lot of Wilson voters will see in Ron someone who's also not of the establishment. I wouldn't want to overstate that, but a wider electorate in the fall, Davis getting a few votes here and there from Wilson - he's got a shot at winning. [00:18:58] Crystal Fincher: That's a really important point. And the way these votes consolidate is probably going to matter in this race - looking at how they stack up, this is going to be a competitive race. This is not one where the primary winner is automatically going to be the general election winner. Overall, looking at just how this district has trended over the past decade - the district is unquestionably moving left, which is really interesting. This is one of the districts that had been reliably moderate to conservative for a long time. That's not the case - we would not have seen even over about 42% right now - this result would not have happened half a decade back. This is just a different place. I think that is what's informed some of the odd policy choices of people like Gerry Pollet, who has received a lot of backlash, but I think he was counting on the composition of the district as it used to be and not as it is today. There were rumors of him potentially getting in the city council race - there weren't rumors, they were confirmed, I think, by someone close to him. Looking at it, he no longer really fits the district or provided a contrast that people felt comfortable moving to to support a candidacy. So it's going to be also interesting to see how things progress with him after considering and not deciding to do local stuff and going there. But this will be an interesting race. This is going to be one where we might see more of a focus and highlighting on the role of these donors, the role of the corporate support, how close Maritza is to the current administration. If people want a change, that really doesn't seem to include Maritza at all. She would be the last person you'd vote for if you wanted a change. So this is going to be a really interesting race to follow. [00:20:45] Robert Cruickshank: Yeah, and it's an interesting race also because it is a chance for progressives to pick up a seat on the City Council. The assumption, as we talked about going into this election from the conventional wisdom centrist pundit classes, that progressives are going to get dealt a pretty harsh blow here - these results suggest that's not necessarily going to happen. And in fact - Ron running a really strong campaign - he could flip that seat for progressives. He's a really sensible candidate for that district as well. He's a dad in his early forties. He's run a small business. He's been active in his neighborhood association. He knows the district well. He's a really good fit there. A lot of those voters, as you've said, are not much more overtly conservative, Pollet, Alex Pedersen types. They're there, clearly. But a lot of younger families are going to be there - ready to vote in November. And of course, in November, which you don't have in August, is a UW student body that is on campus - that's something that is in Ron's back pocket that can really give him a significant boost in the November election. [00:21:48] Crystal Fincher: Absolutely agree. We could change when we have this primary. We could change how we have this primary, frankly, and change our style of voting. We can move to even-year elections as the county has done and has voted to do. Why are we voting in August when people are away for the summer, when younger people are gone? [00:22:09] Robert Cruickshank: Yeah, to move up to where I live in District 5 - talking about what happened here - those changes would have made a huge difference. Ranked choice voting here would have gone a long way because we had quite an interesting field that didn't necessarily match what you see elsewhere. There isn't an obvious centrist-Harrell candidate. Cathy Moore seems closest to that, but she's also not the City Hall insider. Cathy is a much more traditionally liberal candidate, someone who sits between progressive and center - got around 30-something percent of the vote, not a huge showing. There were a number of progressive to genuinely left-wing candidates up here in the far northern reaches of Seattle, which 10 years ago is considered one of the most conservative parts of the city. We're seeing that's not necessarily the case - you have Tye Reed, who jumped in almost at the end of filing, presenting a very left-wing perspective. Christiana ObeySumner jumping in - they present a also-left perspective and appear to be the second place candidate - backed by, of course, a Stranger endorsement - narrowly edging out Nilu Jenks, who is a much more traditional progressive candidate running strong on climate issues. Nilu's campaign fell just short. I know that a lot of Nilu supporters are really frustrated at the way the Stranger handled this race. It is an example of where a ranked choice system, or having this in an even-numbered year, or having the primary at another time rather than at the dead of summer, could have produced a really interesting and fruitful conversation between these different candidates and campaigns about what it means to be progressive, especially up here in a part of the city that is often overlooked or neglected. I know the South End really has a pretty significant, legitimate beef on that front - but so does Lake City, so does Broadview, so does the far northern reaches of Aurora Avenue once you get past Green Lake. So it's gonna be interesting to see how this plays out here. I don't think that the race between Moore and ObeySumner is going to resemble races in other parts of the city. They're much more interesting and unpredictable candidates. [00:24:05] Crystal Fincher: It's too close to officially call right now, as of pre-drop on Thursday - we have Christiana ObeySumner at 22.1% and Nilu Jenks at 19%. It's hard to see this shift change. It's hard - as I'm looking at it, what I bet - that Christiana's the one that makes it through, I'd say that's likely. Would I say it's absolutely conclusive, we don't need to consider any more drops? No. But odds are, with the way that votes typically shake out, that this isn't going to change radically. There are a few different left candidates. It's not like there's consolidation to just one candidate. And because Christiana also got The Stranger endorsement, which a lot of late voters are relying more heavily on - they already don't have a formed opinion - so it's hard to see the vote shifting away from Christiana. As we look at this race in District 6, which does have an incumbent, Dan Strauss, who is over 50% - 50.7% right now, followed by Pete Hanning at 30%. This is another one where the moderates didn't seem to get a great bang for their buck. [00:25:17] Robert Cruickshank: And this is a race where it's clear that - one, the power of incumbency still matters. And two, the supposed backlash to the progressive city council is overstated. Dan Strauss getting above 50% is a big deal. He voted, I think, once for defunding the police in the summer of 2020, and then fairly quickly walked that back. But that didn't stop his opponents from sending a bunch of mailers to houses in District 6, explaining that Dan Strauss had voted to defund the police. That doesn't appear to have hurt him at all. The fact you have Pete Hanning, who is head of the Fremont Chamber of Commerce, small business guy - you would think that he would be a ideal candidate for that part of the city. It turns out he's not. He's languishing there at 30%. Strauss is above 50% before even more progressive ballot drops happen on Thursday afternoon and Friday afternoon in the dead of August summer. We're learning a couple things here - not just the power of incumbency, not just the fact the right wing backlash doesn't exist - we're also learning that Ballard and Fremont are more progressive than people assumed. It'll be interesting to see the map of where these votes come in. The Magnolia portions of the district, anything on the water, on the Sound, probably voted for Hanning or other candidates like that. Where the population base is - in Ballard, up to Greenwood, Fremont - I bet they're probably voting for Dan Strauss. And I think it is a endorsement of Strauss's attempt to straddle the fence. He gets a lot of criticism, I think justifiably so, for the way he flip-flops often. But appears to be working for Dan Strauss. Progressives have a bit of work cut out for us. I posted about this on Twitter - got a lot of people responding to me that Strauss is not a progressive. I would agree with that, but he's willing to listen to and vote for progressives if we organize him correctly. So I see it as an opportunity here. And also just the fact that the right-wing backlash didn't show up in this district at all is, I think, a big win. And I think it's a significant sign going forward that progressives have more of an opportunity than we thought. This race in particular reminds me of 2022. At the state level and especially the federal level - going into the November election, there was a lot of concern, worry, even predictions of doom that the Democrats were just gonna get wiped out. That didn't happen at the state level. In fact, Democrats picked up seats. At the federal level, barring a meltdown of the Democratic Party in New York State, Democrats could have held onto the House. They did hold onto the Senate. And I think you're seeing something similar here - that this assumption, I think, especially from the establishment media and that pundit class that - Oh, this is a center-right country, maybe a centrist city - it's not true. There is more support for a progressive agenda in the city, and in this country than is assumed. I think progressives need to internalize that and realize we have real opportunities here to move forward. And if we're making sure that we're listening to what voters are saying and bringing them along with us. [00:28:09] Crystal Fincher: That's a really important point. A lot of times people talk about - People are dissatisfied with the council, people think things are on the wrong track. Sometimes we use things like progressive and moderate - these broad labels - as a shorthand for policy. If you look at policy in practice in Seattle, it's hard to call a lot of it progressive on the issues that have been plaguing Seattle the most - on public safety, on homelessness, on issues of inequality. Policy has not been what progressives would call progressive. Moderates love to call things progressive. Moderates are extremely emotionally invested in being called progressive. And what we've seen is policy passed by those moderates with messaging calling it progressive - we've seen sweep after sweep after sweep, hot spot-focused policing, which doesn't seem to accomplish much in the longterm. And so when we just ask - Are you satisfied? And someone says - No. Somehow it's always characterized as - Well, people don't like progressive policy and they want something different. Or we're characterizing the council as progressive, which is not a clean label for that council - it's a lot more varied than that. And saying - Clearly, they want more moderate policy. And that's not true, especially in the City of Seattle - some people want to go to actual progressive policy and are thinking that - Okay, I hear this rhetoric, but I'm not seeing it in practice. I want what they talked about. I want what they're selling. That's also why you see so many candidates - who people who aren't moderate would call moderate, who progressives would call moderate - mirroring progressive messaging. Even though they're getting support from some really right-wing people, some people who traditionally support Republicans, are very opposed to taxation. Still, if you look at their mailers, if you look at different things - I'm a progressive champion. I believe in progressive policy. Sara Nelson ran on police reform. And you can see she was more aligned with her donors and different things - that's a lesson that Seattle is starting to learn. But just because there are some progressives on the council, a couple of progressives on the council, just because there's a label calling it that by people who most do not consider to be progressives - that's just a messaging trick. You have to follow up on that question - Why are you dissatisfied? Those answers are a lot more interesting and a lot more informative about why people are voting the way they are and why the reception to different councilmembers is the way that it is. [00:30:36] Robert Cruickshank: That's right. And I think it is going to be interesting to see who actually makes it onto the council because the fence sitters - we talked about one, Dan Strauss, we'll talk about the other, Andrew Lewis, in a moment. If there are other genuine progressives on the City Council - if we get people like Ron Davis and Maren Costa and Tammy Morales reelected, Alex Hudson elected - it becomes easier to pull those fence sitters in the direction of more progressive policy. We got to get them reelected. And this is where - you look at our last district here, District 7 - Andrew Lewis is ahead. He's in the low to mid 40% range. We'll see what happens over the next two ballot drops where he lands in the primary. It's good, it's not as strong as Dan Strauss. But Lewis, I think, understands what he needs to do to win and will do things that lead him down policy paths that progressives don't like. We saw this on Monday where - he signaled he would do this at the vote in June and he did - stood with Bruce Harrell to agree on a plan to pass the ordinance criminalizing drug possession in Seattle, incorporating the recently passed state law. And I'm not a fan of that ordinance, not a fan of that state law. I'm also not shocked at all that it played out here exactly the way it played out in the Legislature. Progressives and progressive-ish candidates and electeds said No, voted it down the first time. It came back. They won a few concessions, more money - but I think as Erica Barnett has pointed out, it's not new money. They won promises of diversion first, but they're promises - it's all going to be overseen by Ann Davison - we'll see what happens here. This is an example of Andrew Lewis trying to straddle the fence. And there's a political logic to that. Lewis won a very close race over former SPD chief Jim Pugel in 2019. It looks like he'll be up against Bob Kettle this year, who I think is running - clearly the strongest candidate of the people chasing Andrew Lewis, not surprised that Olga Sagan didn't really pan out - she got 14%, which is nothing to sneeze at. But again, the right-wing backlash is not real. We'll see what Andrew Lewis winds up doing. Lewis is someone who is clearly susceptible to being pressured by progressives - that's a good thing. I think those of us who are genuine progressives would love to see someone who's more progressive in that seat. We're not going to get that this year. It's not going to happen, nor in the District 6 seat. Most progressives I've talked to understand that and recognize that our interests are better served by the reelection of Dan Strauss and Andrew Lewis than by just abandoning them. Because sometimes you have to work with the electeds you've got - I think that's where it stands in those two districts. Lewis has a higher hill to climb than Strauss, but it's doable. We'll see how that plays out in the fall. [00:33:16] Crystal Fincher: Yep, I agree with that. I also want to talk about the school board races, which you have talked about, written about. How did you see this playing out? [00:33:24] Robert Cruickshank: It's interesting. The power of incumbency matters. There were two races on the ballot where there were genuine contests. District 1, which covers far northern Seattle - almost overlaps District 5 in the City Council - it'd be nice if these numbers matched. This is where Liza Rankin, the incumbent, is hovering around 60% of the vote - that's partly because she got the backing of The Stranger, it's also partly because she's the incumbent. It's also partly because - while there's a lot of discontent among parents in Seattle about the way the district is being run, that hasn't crystallized into any real organizing momentum yet. Rankin's main challenger, Debbie Carlsen, who is LGBTQ, has a LGBTQ family, has done a lot of work as an educator and nonprofit leader - Debbie's one of these candidates who files for school board during filing week - that is pretty common thing to happen and it takes you a little bit of time to get your feet underneath you as a candidate. Debbie's done that over the course of July, but a lot of the endorsement meetings were held in early June when she was still figuring it out - probably didn't give the greatest Stranger interview and is unusually closely allied with the current majority of the school board. Even if The Stranger had endorsed Debbie, Liza probably comes out well ahead. It's partly, again, the power of incumbency and the fact that a lot of voters just don't really know much about what's happening with the schools. That could change in a matter of weeks if the district does, as is expected, announce a list of schools they intend to close. That's the sort of thing that gets people's attention real quick. Similarly, you look over at District 3 where there's an opening - District 3 School Board overlaps District 4 City Council, so we're talking now about northeastern Seattle, Laurelhurst, Bryant, Ravenna, part of Wedgwood. That's a place where three really interesting candidates - Evan Briggs, who seems to have the most support so far at 38%, backing of The Stranger, backed by the incumbent majority in the school board. Ben Gitenstein, who's an interesting guy - running as a protest candidate, but has smart background in finance and understanding how districts work, backing of The Stranger - he's at 33%. Christie Robertson, I think, really ran a strong campaign - having the backing of Seattle Student Union, Seattle Education Association, MLK Labor, didn't get either of the newspaper endorsements, and I think that's why she's in a very close third place. That's a disappointment there, because I think she ran the best campaign she could, but coming in a close third. I thought she was the best candidate of the bunch. But August, where a lot of parents aren't paying attention - their kids are in camps or a lot of them are traveling. August also being a time of not great turnout. And people just don't know much about the schools - school board gets less coverage these days than it used to even seven, eight years ago. We'll see what happens in the fall if school closures are put on the table, with schools being named - that changes everything immediately. Now, it's also possible the school district recognizes this and wanting to protect their allies on the school board may punt that until after the election, which will merely infuriate everybody further. We'll see what happens in the fall. This is one of those where you see a 20% approval rating of the school district, but incumbency is a powerful thing. [00:36:31] Crystal Fincher: Incumbency is an extremely powerful thing. And one thing that we did not see in the King County Council races on the ballot was any incumbent in the race. There were two open seat races on the primary ballot. What was your take on those? [00:36:46] Robert Cruickshank: Unsurprisingly, Teresa Mosqueda doing very well in the District 8 seat - that's West Seattle, Vashon Island area. She's a great campaigner and is well-liked and well-respected. She won the city council race by 20 points in 2021, while Lorena González went down to defeat and Davison and Sara Nelson won. It's a clear fact that Mosqueda knows what she's doing - she connects well with the voters and she has a really strong record. Mosqueda has got a real clear advantage going into the fall. The District 4 seat for King County Council - we're talking about northwestern Seattle from roughly Queen Anne, Magnolia, up towards Ballard, Fremont, Greenwood - that's an open seat with a set of three very progressive candidates. Jorge Barón who's hovering around 50%, will be the clear front runner going into the fall. Sarah Reyneveld, who's at 30%. And then Becka Johnson Poppe, who had 20%. And that's gonna be interesting. Jorge, again, the clear front runner, but it's not a done deal by any stretch of the imagination. You had the other two candidates splitting the vote. I think Sarah has a really good shot of scooping up a lot of people who voted for Becka and that could be a very close race too. And I think this is one where - when you have two good progressives in a race, you want to see a good contest. You want to see them push each other to be better. You want to see them fight hard on key issues like who's gonna save Metro? The school district is talking about closing schools - Metro's talking about deleting routes. In a city this wealthy, that is this supportive of transit, that is this interested in doing climate action - for King County to be deleting routes is a huge problem. We need to be expanding the number of routes we have, the frequency on those routes. And so whoever of those candidates can really speak to the issues of transit in particular could have a real advantage going into November. [00:38:22] Crystal Fincher: I completely agree with that. The existing routes that are left is falling through the floor. I know people are calling them "ghost buses" just because of not showing up. People have bought cars that they can barely afford. But what they can afford even less is to not get to work on time, to lose the only source of income. They have to do better with Metro. I'm looking forward to that being discussed often and robustly in the general election. [00:38:49] Robert Cruickshank: We need to name it. Dow Constantine, King County Executive, is falling down at his job on transit. For most of the 2010s, he was seen as a leader on transit - he did good work to get ST3 on the ballot and approved for Sound Transit, he did good work getting more funding for Metro. But here in the 2020s, it's a different story. He has not provided the leadership or presence that we need to save these bus routes, to address their reliability concerns. This is unacceptable, right? For people to be going out and buying cars - we can't trust the bus system. In a city where we had more of our commuters riding buses than any other big city in America before the pandemic. Obviously the pandemic shakes things up - there are challenges recruiting and retaining operators, but it has to be a top priority for the King County Executive and right now it doesn't look like it is. And this city, this region, can't survive without strong transit. Our climate goals are never going to be met - transportation is the number one source of carbon emissions in our city and in our state. And that's why these King County Council races matter because we are not seeing the leadership we need to be seeing from the top. It's going to have to come from the County Council instead. [00:39:53] Crystal Fincher: Yeah, I agree with that. Both the executive and the council - because they had done the work to set it up, were just - Great, it's on autopilot and it runs. But there were signs of these shortages before the pandemic and the pandemic made it worse. And on the police side - Oh my goodness, there are shortages for police, we need to give bonuses, we need to give retention bonuses and recruitment bonuses and are doing everything we can - just a laser focus on these. I think a lot of people have noticed the lack of focus on so many shortages in so many other areas. From the school board perspective, the transportation situation, the bus drivers, a shortage there - just in so many areas, not having that kind of focus. This race in particular - speaking with a number of the candidates, they did say that they believe that we should be treating some of these other labor shortages with urgency and that we should consider the same kinds of bonuses - for example, transit drivers - that they have for sheriff's deputies, which I think would help. There needs to be active and involved management there - that's something that the council overall as a body needs to do a better job with. I hope this new injection of members with this election brings that about, helps to influence the other members. And I'm looking forward to a robust debate. The other thing about the Teresa Mosqueda and Sofia Aragon race that I thought was interesting was Teresa Mosqueda knew that helping renters, that helping small business owners, that helping people get affordable housing was an absolute critical need for Seattle. Even though at the time the conservative business interests were very opposed - they'll remain opposed, and that's an issue in this general election, that's motivating a lot of the conservative money in the race - she did it. It took a lot of know-how, it took a lot of budget smarts. And then ran on it. It's one of the most popular pieces of policy that has passed in Seattle in the past decade - it bailed the City out of this last budget cycle through the shortfall. Thank goodness that passed. Her ability to run on that and her expertise absolutely benefited her. On the flip side, Sofia Aragon, who's currently the mayor of Burien, who we've talked about before on this, is going through really a crisis in government. Recently there's another kind of letter of chastisement correcting errors in the record from the mayor and the deputy mayor in Burien, yet again, from the King County Regional Homelessness Authority. This is another candidate where their voter guide statement and their communication - defund has clearly failed. That's where people are at - people are tired of hearing people complain and just that reactionary backlash, and are looking for people who are engaged, and what's really going to help. What is really going to solve this issue? And what they really have not seen recently, especially with the mayor of Burien, is engagement and policy and solutions that will help. That hurt Sofia - for someone who is a mayor in a city that has a significant population in the district to perform so poorly. And someone who arguably is - certainly in Burien - better known than Teresa Mosqueda. That gamble just failed. Hopefully that's a reminder to stop the infighting, stop the one-upmanship focus thing there, the clique-iness that has happened there with the majority on that council, and to get to work just to focus on solving the problems that the people have. In Burien, there's money on the table that they can take to help that they're refusing - and we're going to pass another camping ban. And people want actual solutions, not just rhetoric and - We're going to drive them out of town. That's not where people are at, even in the suburbs. [00:43:21] Robert Cruickshank: I agree. It reminds me a lot of the LA mayor's race last year between Karen Bass and Rick Caruso, where Caruso's wealthy developer was betting that there'd be a huge backlash to visible homelessness and that he could ride that to defeat Karen Bass. And Karen Bass, being much smarter and a much better politician, understood no. Voters want to see solutions. They want to see candidates step forward and offer reasonable answers that are going to treat people who are in crisis humanely - 'cause that's what we should be doing anyway - and that will actually going to solve the problem. And I think that's what you're seeing in King County Council District 8 - Teresa Mosqueda comes along. Everyone knows she's reasonable, sensible, committed to the solutions, and wanting to get this done. Sofia Aragon is just grandstanding. There's not a path to victory, even in King County Council District 8, for right-wing grandstanding. Those results show that really clearly. [00:44:12] Crystal Fincher: I agree. Other results from around the region that I thought were interesting were the Tacoma City Council races. Looking at the Olgy Diaz race - Olgy making it through, I think that was expected - she is going through the general election, didn't have a primary, but in a strong position. Particularly looking at the results of the race with Jamika Scott making it through to the general election against a more conservative challenger. And an incumbent in that race getting 70% of the vote. This is a situation where, again, lots of people were prepared in Tacoma - it's not Seattle, there's absolutely going to be a backlash. They have had lots of conversations and consternation, like so many other cities, about how to address homelessness, how to address poverty, how to address public safety - a lot of controversies within that police department and reform that has been needed. How did you see these races in Tacoma? [00:45:08] Robert Cruickshank: They are really interesting examples of the same phenomenon we're seeing in Seattle. I know that Tacoma is different from Seattle - don't want anyone listening in Tacoma to think that we're implying they're the same. There are some similar trends. We are seeing in Jamika Scott's strong showing here in the primaries that there is a appetite in Tacoma for genuine, real, deeply progressive change. You're also seeing that some of the backlash politics aren't necessarily succeeding in Tacoma either. Another place that we're seeing interesting things play out is Spokane - we're just having a mayoral race this year. The incumbent Nadine Woodward is very much one of these - crack down on crime, crack down on homelessness, really picking fights with the state over visible homelessness. But Lisa Brown, former state senator, former head of the State Senate in the 2000s, is pretty much neck and in a really good position to knock off the incumbent mayor. Lisa Brown running - again, is a much more reasonable, not necessarily progressive candidate. I wouldn't say Lisa Brown's progressive, but much more traditional liberal candidate who wants to come in with sensible solutions. You're seeing all over the place - the right wing backlash is not necessarily either showing up, or performing very well, to polls. [00:46:15] Crystal Fincher: This is a situation where sometimes, especially in Seattle, we get very focused on progressive and moderate, progressive and conservative. I think because of where journalism has ended up and because The Times and Stranger are such consequential endorsements - and they typically are in a moderate, in a progressive lane - that influences how we look at and categorize things in policy. We're looking across the board in the state at every level of government - especially public safety, issues of poverty, issues of homelessness, being something that every jurisdiction has to manage. There are evidence-based solutions, and there are ones that aren't. It happens to be that the evidence-based solutions are usually those ones espoused by progressives. And the ones that are not, like doubling down on the War on Drugs, doubling down on so many things that have already failed - sweep after sweep, that just moves the problem and makes it worse and doesn't do anything to solve homelessness - that those are just failed solutions, that the data just isn't there. And so I think what we're seeing work in a lot of different cities - and usually what I focus on - is talk about the issue, talk about the solution. The label doesn't really matter to the average person on the ground. We're in politics, we talk about it a lot. The average voter is just sick and tired of hearing a lot of rhetoric and not seeing things change. They just want someone who will do something that has a shot at fixing the problem after doing the same thing over and over again and not getting great results. Even if a progressive is talking about - Hey, we need a Housing First model. That doesn't mean housing only model, but housing is necessary for those other things that may also be necessary - whether it's behavioral health assistance, whether it's assistance with substance use disorder, whether there are a variety of things - that housing is necessary for those other things to reliably work and to get this person stably housed again. That is what is working. And so it's evidence-based versus things that aren't. And we're putting these labels on them, but really it's about what is going to solve this problem. So many people in the establishment are so invested in the status quo, even though it's not working - hopefully they'll become more open to evidence-based solutions. If not, they're going to have progressive challengers and progressive candidates like Jamika Scott, who is winning the race in the primary right now at 38% over Chris Van Vechten, who is a more conservative challenger in Tacoma. We see Kristina Walker, the incumbent, who is proposing evidence-based solutions for a lot of these things at 70% - not looking at a backlash there. But also in Spokane - dealing with a lot of other issues - and I will say in a lot of areas, especially, Spokane has been a leader in the state on housing, has been a leader on the state in many issues. If you're looking at the progressive versus moderate conservative in policy and action, Spokane is looking more progressive than Seattle in a number of ways. A lot of Seattle suburbs looking more progressive if you're looking at how policy is traditionally talked about. So I really think that it's about who has a shot at actually fixing this problem. Voters have heard the other stuff for a long time and have seen it fail. That doesn't mean that every progressive candidate is automatically gonna be successful, but it does provide an opening. And I think that explains a lot of the backlash that people are expecting that did not turn up and translate. [00:49:36] Robert Cruickshank: I think that's right. And I think Erica Barnett doing a good job explaining that - yes, sweeps are popular in Seattle. That is true. And that's been true for a while. They're not true because people genuinely like sweeps. It's true because you ask voters to choose between doing nothing and a sweep - they'll pick the sweep because they want a solution. If you ask them to choose between a sweep and an actual solution - Housing First policies, permanent supportive housing, actually building housing that is affordable at all income levels - 9 times out of 10, they'll pick that. What the right-wing backlash folks were counting on is enthusiastic support for sweeps as the best solution. And that's not where the voters are at in this city at all, and I think you're seeing around the state, they're not there either. [00:50:19] Crystal Fincher: You mentioned before, which I think was very smart - two years back, four years back, candidates on the left and progressives were struggling to articulate that they were opposing sweeps or opposing criminalization of poverty and had a hard time breaking through because other people were maliciously mischaracterizing what they stood for. In order to get beyond that with people who have a lot of money to maliciously mischaracterize what you're doing was getting beyond the - No, we don't want to do nothing. We want to solve this thing. When we're advocating against sweeps, it's not like people are happy with encampments. It's not like people are happy with people living outside. We believe everybody should be housed. There are different solutions there. The answer is not nothing. We certainly heard a lot from Jenny Durkan, we heard from others - Oh, the alternative is nothing. They want to do nothing. When you have people attend your press conference every time you stand at a pulpit, that message is going to carry. What progressives are doing a better job of is articulating - No, we absolutely don't want to do nothing. We find crime unacceptable, and we actually want to do something to fix it. We find homelessness unacceptable, and we're tired of spinning our wheels and spending so much money and taking so much time to not improve the problem. We want to do different things that actually have a shot. That message is carrying through more, there are going to be a lot of competitive races - I don't know that that's going to carry the day, but certainly a more effective message this go around. [00:51:43] Robert Cruickshank: I think that's right. What these results overall show is that progressives have a real opportunity, but it's not a certainty. They got to use it effectively. [00:51:50] Crystal Fincher: Anything else that you think is interesting to look at on the electoral spectrum around the state? [00:51:55] Robert Cruickshank: One thing that is gleeful and a positive outcome is Semi Bird getting recalled along with two of his allies in Richland. Semi Bird is the right-wing, soon-to-be former school board director in the Richland Public Schools who tried to overturn the state's mask mandate - that led to a recall effort that has been successful. Bird is also a Republican candidate for governor in 2024 - it's pretty much him and Dave Reichert at this point. We'll see what happens. But seeing Bird get recalled in Richland, which is not a progressive hotbed by any stretch of the imagination, is another sign that this right-wing backlash is not as strong as folks thought it was. So we'll see what happens from there. [00:52:33] Crystal Fincher: Yeah, we will see what happens from there. And I wanted to mention that there are a lot of school board races that did not have more than two candidates across the state. Some races in the primary had Moms for Liberty candidates, aka people who are bringing in the desire to ban books, who are trying to overrule teachers and dictate what they can teach, and really attacking LGBTQ+ students - especially trans students - and really trying to bring hateful rhetoric and Christian nationalism into our education system. There's a Highline School District candidate that made it through to the general. There are others, like in University Place, several places across the state, that are going to have these general election match-ups with some candidates who are solutions-focused and others who are strictly running to basically sow chaos, is what it turns out to be in effect - to defund the schools, to strip standards-based education, fact-based education, to stop teaching history. They love what's going on in Florida, and they want to replicate what's going on there that is really hurting that state and community. I just want people to be aware that is a thing that is happening, and we can't afford to not be engaged in these school board races unless we want to provide a foothold for that kind of thing. Candidates that start on school boards wind up in city councils, in the Legislature, running for Congress. It is making sure that we're engaged in these very local races to make sure that we don't let someone in the door who's going to turn out to advocate for really fascist policies. [00:54:10] Robert Cruickshank: I think that's right. And we've seen Moms for Liberty candidates fail in Washington state before. We've seen some of them make it through. We saw a strong effort to try to repeal the state's new law that protects trans kids - they narrowly failed to make it to the ballot. So far so good - knock on all the wood that there is - that they're not getting more traction here in Washington state. They're working as hard as they can, and we have to work as hard as we can to push back against that. [00:54:33] Crystal Fincher: Absolutely agree. Wanted to wrap up with talking about the influence of endorsements in these elections. We've talked a lot about how consequential The Times and The Stranger endorsements have been over the past several years. I think there are a number of reasons why - I think that the thinning out of reporters covering government, covering politics on that regular beat is considerably less than it used to be, and that is impacting just how informed the public is in general on a regular basis - making these endorsements much more consequential. We also have fewer newspapers. And so those are just a couple of things making those much more important. The Stranger - looking last year - it had been at least a decade since a Stranger-endorsed candidate had not made it through a primary. The Times-endorsed candidate almost always makes it through also. So these have been and continue to be very consequential endorsements. How do you see this? [00:55:28] Robert Cruickshank: It's still the case that Stranger endorsement is essential if you're a progressive trying to get through to the general election. It confers more votes than The Times endorsement does. For those of us who are progressive, that's a good thing. It's also a double-edged sword. And you can see in Districts 3 and Districts 5 this year, some of the downsides of The Stranger endorsement. What it did is it winds up cutting off conversation, debate, and contests between the progressive candidates in the field. I like Alex Hudson - she'll make a great member of the city council. I also like the idea of seeing Alex and the other candidates in District 3, or Christiana, Tye, Nilu - the candidates in District 5 - really pushing each other hard to have to do a good job persuading progressive voters that they're the right one to carry the agenda forward. Instead, what seems to happen is Stranger makes their picks and that's the end of the discussion. You get a lot of - you alluded to this earlier - a lot of low-information progressive voters who wait until the very end, open their ballots, realizing - Oh my gosh, they're due, I've got to vote. What does The Stranger recommend? I'll vote that way. I get that. They're not stupid voters. They pay very close attention to federal politics, but they just don't know a whole lot about what's happening locally. And The Stranger is a trusted source. The Stranger is independent. They're not making endorsements usually based on relationship building. You have a clear agenda that you can trust, and they built that trusted brand over 20 years. But we have to start asking ourselves - I'm hearing more and more people asking the same question - Is it too influential? Is it too strong? Is it distorting the way campaigns are operating? Some of this is on The Stranger to ask themselves - do they want to be kingmakers or do they want to be the ones holding everybody's feet equally to the fire? I don't think you can always do both. It's also up to candidates and campaigns to figure out how do you overcome this? You can look around the country - there are lots of places in the country with strong endorsements, whether it's from an organization or an editorial board or whatever, but campaigns figure out how to get around that. I don't think progressive campaigns in Seattle have figured out how to win if The Stranger isn't backing them. I think it's time to try to get that answered - not as a slap at The Stranger, but it's unhealthy for one outlet to have that much influence. [00:57:36] Crystal Fincher: Yeah, I would definitely agree with that. I think that it is important just to have that conversation and cutting that off is problematic. The Stranger does a better job of actually trying to pin down candidates on answers and making it visible when someone is hedging. I think that's a very useful thing, especially in Seattle politics where lots of times people love giving a progressive impression - paint a rosy picture - Of course, I love trees and I love kids and all of that. And some people are satisfied with that, but we have to get to real specific policy answers - Would you vote yes or no on this? - to get an idea of who we're really voting for. I think The Times has really fallen down on that front. One important thing in races overall is just understanding where candidates do stand and where they're not taking a stand. And that is very predictive about how someone is going to vote and whether they're going to lean on issues, whether they can be pressured to taking a No vote on something that they may have indicated or given a nod to that they're broadly supportive of. So I hope we have robust conversations just about where candidates stan

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Week in Review: July 21, 2023 - with Doug Trumm

The Community Cats Podcast

Play Episode Listen Later Jul 21, 2023 35:04

On this week-in-review, Crystal is joined by Publisher of The Urbanist, Doug Trumm! The show kicks off with a rundown of The Urbanist's primary election endorsements, followed by discussion of a Federal Way shooting that raises lots of questions, the Burien council majority's continued failure on homelessness response, Ed Murray being spotted at political events, a court ruling that Seattle's primary encampment sweeps tool is unconstitutional, and a Mayor Harrell change of heart on South Lake Union light rail stations. As always, a full text transcript of the show is available below and at officialhacksandwonks.com. Find the host, Crystal Fincher, on Twitter at @finchfrii and find today's co-host, Doug Trumm, on Twitter at @dmtrumm. Doug Trumm Doug Trumm is Publisher of The Urbanist, where he has contributed as a writer and editor since 2015. He graduated from the Evans School of Public Policy and Governance at UW in 2019 with a concentration in urban policy. As a car-free renter living in Seattle, his policy focuses include improving transit and street safety and tackling the housing affordability crisis. His cat Ole is a national treasure. Resources “Carrie Barnes, Chair of the King County Democrats” from Hacks & Wonks “2023 Primary Election Endorsements” from The Urbanist “The Stranger's Endorsements for the August 1, 2023, Primary Election” from The Stranger “Seattle Times editorial board endorsements: Aug. 1, 2023, primary” from The Seattle Times Endorsements from PubliCola Progressive Voters Guide from Fuse WA 2023 Policing and Public Safety Voter Guide - Seattle City Council from People Power Washington “Person killed during drive-by shooting in Federal Way, police say” by Lauren Girgis from The Seattle Times “Burien still can't decide whether it'll take homelessness offer” by Anna Patrick from The Seattle Times “After Refusing Shelter Offer from King County, Burien Proposes Camping Ban” by Erica Barnett from PubliCola “Seattle Mayor Ed Murray announces his resignation on September 12, 2017.” by Nick Rousso from HistoryLink.org “City's Primary Tool for Sweeping Encampments Without Notice Ruled Unconstitutional” by Erica Barnett from PubliCola “Harrell Advances New Denny Station Options That Could Delay Ballard Link” by Doug Trumm from The Urbanist “Transit Advocates Push to Save South Lake Union Light Rail Station” by Doug Trumm from The Urbanist Ballard Link Extension: South Lake Union Stations Webinar #2 | Sound Transit Find stories that Crystal is reading here Transcript [00:00:00] Crystal Fincher: Welcome to Hacks & Wonks. I'm Crystal Fincher, and I'm a political consultant and your host. On this show, we talk with policy wonks and political hacks to gather insight into local politics and policy in Washington state through the lens of those doing the work with behind-the-scenes perspectives on what's happening, why it's happening, and what you can do about it. Be sure to subscribe to the podcast to get the full versions of our Tuesday topical show and our Friday week-in-review delivered to your podcast feed. If you like us, the most helpful thing you can do is leave a review wherever you listen to Hacks & Wonks. Full transcripts and resources referenced in the show are always available at officialhacksandwonks.com and in our episode notes. If you missed our Tuesday topical show, I chatted with Carrie Barnes, Chair of the King County Democrats, about how the county party engages in local elections and politics to improve lives in our area. Today, we are continuing our Friday week-in-review shows where we review the news of the week with a co-host. Welcome back to the program, friend of the show and today's co-host: Publisher of The Urbanist, Doug Trumm. Hey. [00:01:20] Doug Trumm: Hey, good to see you - thanks so much for having me. [00:01:22] Crystal Fincher: Very, very happy and excited to have you. And as we sit here, people have ballots at their homes - you should have received your ballot - if you haven't, you should pursue getting another one or tracking down where that is. But primary election is in full swing. The primary election end date is Tuesday, August 1st. And wow, there have been a lot of endorsements, including endorsements from The Urbanist. Who did The Urbanist decide to support in several different races? And what was the approach The Urbanist took to making these endorsements? [00:01:58] Doug Trumm: Yeah, we are excited to announce our slate. I'll, I guess, start with how we got there, which was a painstaking process - we've done it the same way, going back six, seven years. And that involves - first, the questionnaire to get people on the record about some issues important to urbanists and Safe Street advocates and housing advocates. And then after they've submitted their questionnaire, we invite them in for actual interviews that are now happening over Zoom - which has been convenient, I think, for everyone, since we're covering a wide area. We probably should have been doing this the whole time - save the candidates time and you get through more candidates. And it's about a 25-minute interview and you learn a little bit more - when you get a vague response in a questionnaire or some issue becomes relevant that maybe wasn't when you sent out the questionnaire. And then we debate what we felt about it. And luckily we didn't have any big fights this year, but obviously some disagreement. And I guess I can start with the Seattle City Council. We also endorsed in Bellevue this year, but where we endorsed, there's not a primary - so not the big fireworks that rolled that one out, but there will be more in the general. But we'll start in order. District 1 in Seattle - Maren Costa, we liked. She's a climate activist and clearly had the best housing platform. A slam dunk as far as what urbanists are looking for, I think, as some of the other candidates were much more wishy-washy about how much housing are they going to allow and how many ways are they going to allow to block it. Costa was pretty clear - I want housing. And then in [District] 2, we liked the incumbent, Tammy Morales. She's been the most strident Safe Streets advocate in the council, so we need someone like that 'cause it's very hard to get Safe Streets projects done. And her district is also in most in need of it, and she's been very clear about that. So it just seems like we need a strong voice, especially in that district. D3, we went with Alex Hudson. We thought she had the most policy chops experience - a lot of progressives in that race, but we thought Alex had the most ability to get it done. In D4, we liked Ron Davis. Didn't really seem to be anyone else who wanted the progressive mantle in that race, and maybe that's a credit partially to Ron Davis being a strong candidate. And we think he is really clear about where he stands and not very politician-y in that way, which is refreshing - was very clear about he wanted a lot of housing in the Comp Plan update that's due next year. Just to underscore that it's a really consequential election because that Comp Plan update is happening next year and a lot of big stuff happening next year, so definitely don't sit out this election. And Ron seems like the person clearly who actually believes in urbanism, believes in 15-minute cities, and things that can make it easier to get around the city as well. Competition just isn't very good. Then in D5, we went with Nilu Jenks. And that is interesting, right - so maybe I get your take on that rather than keep grandstanding here with our endorsements - but we liked Nilu a lot, but then it turned out The Stranger went with ChrisTiana ObeySumner, who we didn't get a chance to interview, otherwise we might have been so inclined potentially - just couldn't get that scheduled. So we ended up going with Nilu, who is pretty strong on most of our issues - was clear she was for housing abundance. And we didn't love some of her police takes, but we thought she was the best candidate we interviewed. And then The Seattle Times went with Cathy Moore. D5 is a weird race because Cathy Moore is now the de facto business chamber candidate, but there aren't as clear of lines. Did you have anything on that or should I keep going? [00:05:18] Crystal Fincher: I think you should keep going and I will chime in at the end. But I do agree that is a race with a number of very interesting candidates that I think are all worthy of looking into. And I think looking deeper into, particularly ChrisTiana ObeySumner and what they're doing is warranted. [00:05:36] Doug Trumm: Yeah, we're gonna continue to try to get that interview scheduled, so there's always potential in the general - it can be different. Also, who knows who's gonna make it through that primary, so it could be a very interesting field - there's a lot of candidates who have a decent shot. Tye Reed also has the Transit Riders Union endorsement and some other progressive endorsements, and is running probably farthest to the left. We wrote in our write-up that we liked Tye as well, but we just thought Nilu had the stronger chance in the general and also a little bit more of a bridge builder. Then moving on to D6, we went with Dan Strauss. We weren't terribly excited about it. He's been someone who's definitely tacked to the center and to the right. And his district has too, so maybe that's just survivalism, but we don't think those votes are good - I'm thinking of his recent vote that gave Ann Davison the power to lock poor people and drug users on the street. It just seemed like a forced vote - there wasn't actually a treatment plan and a diversion plan offered, but on pinky swearing - I don't know how you would take that pinky swear from Ann Davison. So that was a culmination of a continuing slide to the right, especially on safety. And he's been all right as Land Use Chair, but also has moved fairly slowly. But compared to Pete Hanning, his main competition, Dan's still clearly better so we went with Dan. And then D7, we went with Andrew Lewis. We thought Andrew Lewis and Dan Strauss were very similar - they both reflected as progressives and there was always questions about how progressive they really are, but I think Andrew's done a better job than Dan at defining himself and taking some brave votes here and there - he's been more accessible in explaining his waffles, rather than waffle-and-hide - I think that waffling is indicative of his kind of process to get somewhere. I'm not sure, always, what Dan's thinking. So we went with Lewis. The people running against Lewis also are all running pretty far right. It wasn't like there was someone who was gunning for The Urbanist endorsement in that race. But I think Lewis, as Chair of the Homelessness Committee, has done some good stuff and been very clear about trying to set up a alternate response and really hammering on that, so he's definitely worthy of a second term. We also endorsed in King County Council. One really hard race for us to endorse - because we had so many candidates we liked and we really went back and forth about how to do it - we ultimately decided not to do a dual. But in District 4 of the King County Council, which is Northwest Seattle, we went with Becka Johnson Poppe. And she works at King County now as a Budget and Policy Director, and that experience pushed her over the top for us. She's someone who already can hit the ground running. She knows this stuff inside-out and she has credibility - she is a progressive and has pushed on stuff. And one thing we're really watching on the King County Council is Metro Transit service - it's not where it was pre-pandemic, there's less frequency. And she's someone who's been clear about county-wide Transportation Benefit District, which could fund bus service and get us back to that pre-pandemic level eventually. Oddly, the King County Council's been dragging their feet on that and letting obstacles stand in the way rather than solve those obstacles, which is always frustrating to see. I think getting some new people in there, maybe they can take more of a problem-solving approach rather than - We can't get enough bus drivers, so I guess we're gonna accept mediocrity from our transit delivery. [00:08:32] Crystal Fincher: If that would have been a dual endorsement, who would have been the other? [00:08:36] Doug Trumm: Probably Jorge Barón. The vote didn't go that way, so I couldn't say for certain how it would have went. We liked all three candidates in that race, so I think it would probably have been Jorge - who got in late, but has an incredible record as far as leading [Northwest] Immigrant Rights Project. He's led that organization, has done incredible work. We certainly heard from him how he was going to apply that background to advocating for people of color communities in the county and understanding their issues better. And even though you're not gonna be determining that policy at the county level, you are doing a lot of policy that still affects people's livelihood. So liked Jorge Barón - he ended up getting The Seattle Times endorsement, he's pretty progressive for a Seattle Times endorsement. It might just be a reflection of three pretty progressive people in the race. Did The Stranger also go with Jorge? [00:09:19] Crystal Fincher: Yeah, he nailed what many candidates don't usually nail, which is getting both The Times and The Stranger endorsement. That doesn't happen that often, but when it does, it is usually a very encouraging sign for that candidate. But you're right, this is a race where there are only good choices. And so it just depends on your personal preferences and who you think can best carry out the vision - three solid candidates, each with impressive resumes and impressive experience. [00:09:49] Doug Trumm: Yeah, the third being Sarah Reyneveld, who got the Transit Riders Union endorsement, and I think a handful of labor endorsements. And has also been someone who's been active on transit issues - that countywide Transportation Benefit District, or other funding measures, to get the county back on track. Another open seat in the County Council in District 8, a more West Seattle-type area all the way to Burien and Tukwila. We went with Teresa Mosqueda, which was an easy choice for us, especially after her main competition - Burien Mayor Sofia Aragon - has been on this get-the-homeless-people-out-of-our-city-and-not-provide-services tangent now. So Teresa Mosqueda has been a great City Councilmember in Seattle, and obviously it'd be tough to see her go. She has a clear plan of how she's going to continue working on these issues at the county - transit, housing, healthcare, and childcare kind of being the pillars of her platform. And yeah, she's just someone who got a lot done, including JumpStart, which was the biggest step forward for progressive tax reform in Seattle in maybe ever. So I think that kind of resume is tough to beat. [00:10:49] Crystal Fincher: And that makes sense. There are a number of races for people to choose from this year - definitely going to be reshaping what the Seattle City Council looks like, with so many vacancies and so many open seats and new candidates that are going to be coming aboard. I think it's a solid group of endorsements. There are arguments that can be made for some other candidates in some of those races. I think District 5 is one of those where there are a number of good choices. You talked about Tye Reed, who was instrumental in the passage of social housing in Seattle - making that happen, getting that passed, and has been an organizer for a while around a number of different issues in the city. No one can question Tye's dedication to these issues and real personal investment - and making sure it can get better. We talked about ChrisTiana ObeySumner and Nilu Jenks, so we'll see how that race turns out - that's going to be another interesting one to check out. So we'll leave that there. We'll probably include links to other endorsing entities - just as you try to make up your mind as a listener and a voter - just to give you resources there to assist with those. Also want to talk about a number of other things, but we will go to this brief story about a drive-by shooting - evidently, sheriff deputies were on-site. There's not much that's been reported, and it really seems like the reporter dictated an initial statement from the police and didn't ask any questions. I'll read it to you, and then we can talk about it. Title - Person killed during drive-by shooting in Federal Way, police Say. A person was killed during a drive-by shooting while King County Sheriff's Office deputies were performing a wellness check early Saturday morning in Federal Way. Officers were attempting to check on the person seen behind a property in the 3900 block of South 320th Street shortly before 3 a.m. when two vehicles sped off and two shots rang out. Sheriff's spokesperson, Sergeant Eric White said the person was hit by gunfire and died at the scene. Deputies followed the two vehicles but they got away. No arrests had been made as of Saturday afternoon. Several businesses are located in the area of the shooting. That's the whole story. That's quite an interesting tale. What is your initial reaction to this, Doug? [00:13:16] Doug Trumm: Yeah, it's a head scratcher - have a story, we don't have a lot to go on. It tears down the mythology of what policing can do, especially with us rolling back our police chase limitations and letting police go hog wild in these chases again - at this past session at the State Legislature - because of pushback from the police lobbying forces. Theoretically, they were gonna do these chases and catch people exactly like this. They saw someone doing a drive-by shooting and they were in their cars, conceivably - this is the perfect time to do that chase. And yeah, it didn't work out, so it just underscores that using police chases is such a uncertain and certainly dangerous type of way to try to apprehend criminals when you can easily just ID the car and catch up with them later. And there's so many pedestrians and other bystanders that die in these chases - there really has to be a good chance of a good outcome, like some sort of win, to deal with that collateral damage. That's the first thing that popped into my mind. And the drive-by was apparently someone else. All these police press releases, reported with very little critical eye - when police are involved, they put it in passive voice and passive action. But because of that way they write the press releases, you wonder - Did the police open fire? Did they do anything? - we don't have that information yet. It was reported as a drive-by, so one would assume it wasn't just police opening fire during a wellness check. Were these people involved in the wellness check at all? - you end up with more questions than you have answers. In real-life situations, you realize there's so much that could go wrong. [00:14:42] Crystal Fincher: So many questions I have - a person was killed during a drive-by. Okay, so King County Sheriff's Office deputies were performing a wellness check. First thing, Federal Way has its own police department - doesn't contract with King County for its deputies. So these deputies, for some reason, responded instead of the Federal Way Police Department. Was it in response to a call? Who called it in? But they decide to go by themselves. Why were they on scene? So they were attempting to check out a person behind a property, they say, when two vehicles sped off and two shots rang out. I notice it doesn't say those shots came from the vehicle - it's vaguely worded and isn't useful, especially when there's so much that can be consequential, based on their characterization of what happens. Then the Sheriff's spokesperson said the person was hit by gunfire and died at the scene - I'm wondering if this reporter did anything but dictate this statement - did they ask anything about this? This is just a very vaguely worded statement. Deputies followed the two vehicles, but they got away. Again, this is a situation where even with the police pursuit law, they would have been able to follow them, but they said they needed a rollback to be able to catch criminals like this, and evidently that's not the case. What happened here? So no arrests have been made, no information has been shared that we've seen. What was the make and model of the car? Any description of the people inside the car? What came of that whole thing? There's no information. So if we take what they say at face value, what a spectacular failure in public safety. You have two officers on-site, and a person still gets murdered according to this account? All the excuses of they need more officers, they need more funding, we need to be able to have the officers nearby, on-site to protect people - there were two here, and they couldn't protect one person. How does that happen? Why does that happen? What was the situation? Was something missed? Did they not see people prowling in the area? What a failure. They assume that the shots came from this vehicle that killed this person. How do we not have a description of the car, a license plate, the people inside, any followup on that? Where does this case stand? None of that information provided. If police departments want to restore trust, if they want to have people work for them - those are the kind of answers that people want to see. Do people want to work for a department that can't stop a murder when two deputies are on scene, that can't apprehend a perpetrator when they have a zero-second response time and they can immediately respond? What is the purpose and utility here? And are they doing the work to figure out how to keep this from happening again, to figure out how to actually ensure safety? Unfortunately, too often that is not the case. And that's if you take everything just at face value here. It would be great to see some supporting information - some dash cam, body-worn camera video - just to see what happened, how this happened, and does the evidence match up with the narrative here? There is work that the Federal Way Police Department needs to do, that many departments need to do, and that the King County Sheriff's Office needs to do to rebuild trust within the community. [00:17:54] Doug Trumm: Why even run the story if you have so little information? It plays right into the police narrative. [00:17:59] Crystal Fincher: Yep, definitely a decision that The Seattle Times should dive into and ask themselves a lot of questions - about how this came to be published and what information they were relying on. Also wanna talk about the City of Burien and their continuing shame, really. The council majority deciding that not only do they wanna refuse the offer of shelter - the million dollars, 30-some odd Pallet shelters on provision, 100-ish parking spaces to backfill some space that a dealership was using. They are turning all that down and moving towards just a blanket camping ban in the city, which we've seen fail in so many other cities, but they are determined to do it themselves. This again is happening on a 4-3 council vote. The council majority, unfortunately, is winning this. What do you see happening here? What's your reaction to this, Doug? [00:18:57] Doug Trumm: Yeah, it's pretty sickening. I don't know that folks necessarily saw this coming. We saw some progressives elected onto the Burien City Council, so there was some hope that they were actually going to be looking towards making progress on this issue, doing things that actually work in the long term - rather than sweeping it under the rug and pushing it to other cities. But the four centrists on Burien City Council continue to hammer on this issue - they're not taking this offer of help that very few other cities in the region have, with so few strings attached, to a million dollars worth of housing for their homeless people. It's the type of thing that makes your head explode because - if you're mad about homeless people, having more roofs over the people's heads is the most direct way of dealing with that. And they had a million process complaints, like - Oh, what's gonna happen in five years or whatever? We're gonna be on the hook. It's just that type of thing that they wouldn't ask for any other offer of a million dollars from the county - suddenly they want a 20-year plan for this when they have no plan themselves. It's really, like you said, shameful. They've lost the majority of their Burien Planning Commission, as you've talked about in this podcast before, because of this move when the mayor decided to remove the head of the Planning Commission and then some other Planning Commissioners quit in protest. We all covered all that, but the one thing that's gonna happen if that commission continues to be unfilled is it's gonna slow down the production of housing in Burien - large projects have to go to that commission. If that happens, you're exasperating your housing shortage - they're creating the problem that they're complaining about. It's maddening, it's not treating these folks as human beings - I think it was Stephanie Mora referring that they should poop in doggy bags like they're dogs - it's clearly dehumanizing language. I think should be disqualifying for holding this office, but hopefully they lose their seats. For now, they're the people making policy for a city of about 50,000 people - it's crazy. [00:20:43] Crystal Fincher: Yeah, it absolutely is. And as you talked about, Mayor Sofia Aragon, Deputy Mayor Kevin Schilling, Councilmember Jimmy Matta have been part of making these decisions that are unconscionable. This is really a depiction of this soft, kind of progressive rhetoric with a wink and a nod. In previous statements, they had talked like - We definitely want to sweep, but we'll do it in a nice way, in a compassionate way, in the progressive way. But when it comes down to it, they really weren't interested in that at all. They just wanted to get people away and using very dehumanizing language. The real tell is - the place where they usually make an excuse and get away with it - We don't have the money. We don't have the resources. If we could, we would, but we just can't - we don't have anything, I'm sorry. So the only choice we have is to sweep because we just don't have the choice to do anything else. King County basically called that bluff and said - Okay, we've got a million dollars for you. We've got Pallet shelters ready to go. We've got a location that we can partner with. And hey, this dealership is gonna be impacted? We'll provide 100 parking spaces, which is larger than their inventory. - every objection, every excuse, every hurdle that they had was basically responded to by the county. And by the way, kudos to Dow Constantine and his office for taking a stance and for trying to constructively work with the City of Burien. There sometimes have been criticisms for Dow doing that in South County. He is doing it here. And Burien and the Council majority - they turned all that down. They could have already housed the people there. This would make a meaningful, visible, substantial difference in their situation overnight - once this is implemented - and they just decided not to. They're just looking for a ban. Bans are wholly ineffective, as the prior sweeps were wholly ineffective. And they just moved people from one location to another and making, as you said, the problem they're allegedly trying to fix even worse. This is just a continuing shame and negligence from the council. These people are their constituents - whether someone has a home or not, these are Burien residents - and their job is to help them and to serve them. And they refuse to do so. And it's shameful. It's pathetic. [00:22:59] Doug Trumm: Hopefully they come to their senses - this 4-3 split has been pretty durable. [00:23:03] Crystal Fincher: We will see what the primary elections hold. Sofia Aragon is running currently for King County Council against Teresa Mosqueda. I don't think anyone really expects Sofia to win this race. But it is really important to make sure people don't just rest on their laurels and sit on the sidelines. And even in this primary, even when it seems like one person is clearly more qualified than the other, you actually need to vote and make your own choice. [00:23:28] Doug Trumm: These are like conservative trial balloons - they're testing the waters - can Democrats get away with very conservative Trump-esque rhetoric, dehumanizing homeless people, pandering to cops in completely unaccountable ways? They want to see if that works. I don't know if Sofia is connecting these two - it seems like she would be when she declares for office for the King County Council race. But maybe her calculation is this makes her more popular. And I think it's really incumbent upon people who don't agree with that to actually turn out to an odd-year election, because it's validating that approach. And you're going to see more and more of it if people get rewarded for that. [00:24:05] Crystal Fincher: That's blatantly the calculation that they're making. Kevin Schilling has an opponent - Patricia Hudson - running against him right now, who is the progressive choice who is endorsed by King County Democrats. I mean, they received a very unusual letter of rebuke from the King County Executive's office, also from the 33rd District Democrats, which encompasses part of Burien. And the other part of Burien is the 34th, who also submitted an open public letter of rebuke. Anyone who calls themself a Democrat on record, locally, is outwardly opposing it. And it hasn't stopped them. In fact, they seem to be using that as cred. So this is important. These are still the people in office. They do need to be held accountable, and people need to make their voices heard. Another disillusioning development we've seen over the past couple of weeks is Ed Murray evidently popping up at political events around the region and definitely catching a number of people off guard. There seem to be some people who are okay with it. But just as a reminder - Ed Murray, former legislator, former mayor of Seattle, had to resign in disgrace as mayor of Seattle after credible allegations of molestation of underage people who were under his care and also potentially a family member. Also troubling was his response using someone's background against them - they were going through hard times as unhoused youth working with LGBTQ youth, who oftentimes very unfortunately are disowned by family, kicked out of the house, and left in very vulnerable positions - to then cite that vulnerable position as a reason why someone may not be believed was really victim blaming. The entire community, who has so many people who have been victimized - was a re-victimization to hear that. But he's been out of the public eye for a while and seems to be doing a soft launch to get back in. What's your reaction to this? [00:26:04] Doug Trumm: With someone like that who's had such a long political career, they don't start going to political events just for fun. They're plotting getting back into politics. He's clearly testing the waters here, seeing if he can get back into politics. He's seeing if he can get acceptance enough to the point where he can run for something again or be a campaign manager. I don't think it should happen. And it's also not a pleasant experience for folks who did have a negative reaction to his handling of that situation - making it very hard for his accuser to come forward because he was using the whole weight of his office against that person. That's not how you handle it if you're a leader - you don't victim blame. Luckily, he finally resigned, but he was going to hold on to that office with everything he had. [00:26:44] Crystal Fincher: I also think that's a low bar. It's wholly inappropriate for him to be in these. There's been no atonement. There's been no acknowledgment of what he's done. And while I don't believe in throwing people away forever, there has been nothing to indicate that he acknowledges what he's done, that he's attempted to make amends to his victims. In fact, that seems quite the opposite. He's just hoping to pick up where he left off. I think it is going to be really interesting to survey who is okay with him being at political events, and at their political events, and who is not - and what that says about different people as candidates. Who is finding this troubling and who is finding it just fine? I'm curious about where he does feel welcome and why, and what that says about those spaces. We will see how this continues to unfold throughout the city. And if you spot Ed Murray, shoot me a message. Also, a pretty significant court ruling this week came in about encampment sweeps, particularly about the City of Seattle - Seattle has been sweeping too broadly and is unconstitutional in its application. When there's clearly a risk to public safety or they are blocking completely a sidewalk, there is cause for encampment sweeps. But they've been doing it too much and for reasons that are too broad - they need to effectively offer shelter and provide shelter if they're going to sweep people. Without that provision of shelter, there's nowhere else for someone to go. It is illegal to say you can't exist here - in essence, you're saying you can't exist anywhere. And this court ruling was powerful with some pretty clear statements calling the current policy dehumanizing, destabilizing, and counterproductive. How did you see this? [00:28:31] Doug Trumm: The two individuals who brought it - their story was so tragic - they mentioned losing wedding rings, family heirlooms, because they've just been repeatedly swept while they're getting services or going to work or whatever. One person mentioned losing their work boots and then that jeopardized their employment and that sunk them deeper into the spiral of homelessness. They kept getting these last-second-notice sweeps because they were supposedly an obstruction. If the definitions are broad, they don't have anywhere to go. The ruling says the two main ways they were bending this rule is they were defining the blockages - 50% blockage, it becomes 100% blockage in their eyes, or even a 30% blockage - because some of these sidewalks in downtown are fairly wide. And unfortunately, some sidewalks in our city are pretty narrow. Often folks aren't trying to block the whole sidewalks. They're trying to go somewhere they can and not fear that their stuff's gonna get snatched up and taken away. They lost all these valuable possessions, including their wedding ring. What are we doing here? This cruel unusual punishment that rises to a constitutional violation and this judge issues this ruling. Now the City's gonna have to rethink how they do this. The other main way they avoid the Boise ruling, Martin v. Boise, is they say that anything in the park is an obstruction - because someone wants to use that particular part of the park, even if it's some secluded, say in the forest, in a large park when 99% of the park is still accessible. Part of Mayor Harrell's campaign pledges to clear the parks. Some of the parks are clearer than they were when he took office, but others still have encampments and it goes to this whack-a-mole approach of you're constantly chasing people around the city at great expense and great suffering to some individuals, like the two that brought the suit, and we haven't made durable progress. [00:30:11] Crystal Fincher: Another event this week with Sound Transit - Mayor Harrell is up for a Denny Station on West Lake Avenue again. How'd this happen? [00:30:19] Doug Trumm: Hey, I gotta give credit to grassroots organizers there - there's a lot of people involved. Seattle Subway sent, I think, over 6,000 letters via online petition. Uptown Alliance got a lot of letters because they were also very dismayed to see that the station on the eastern edge of their neighborhood was suddenly gonna disappear - at a whim - six, seven years into this process. And what was happening here, if you didn't follow this story, is there's gonna be obviously this new Ballard Link Light Rail line that will go from Downtown to Ballard. And on the way, it's gonna pick up Denny Triangle, it's gonna pick up South Lake Union, it's gonna pick up Uptown. And these were gonna be really high-use stations, but there's one problem in that some of the corporations and real estate interests in Denny Triangle were not excited about the station location. Folks like Amazon, Vulcan, were lobbying against this location because they didn't like the closure of Westlake Avenue, they said, which South Transit at this point in this process was estimating a full closure of four years. They're putting the station right under Westlake so they do have to mine it, it's gonna be closed for that part. But they realized that they could put decking over the top - they didn't propose that initially 'cause it's more complicated and expensive. But they realized they could do that, obviously, if the alternative is putting some station two blocks to the west, which is what the proposal that came forward out of this last-minute wrangling - wasn't in the DEIS, the draft environmental impact statement. So that means it requires more planning and process. So there's two public meetings online that Sound Transit is hosting - I think one of them is today and the other one is a couple of days from now - we can link to that in the notes maybe. But because this shifted-west alternative came forward late in the process, was proposed as a way to alleviate these concerns from corporations and real estate - they had to do this process. The mayor backed it at a meeting last month, I think it was, but then last week he walked that back. He said - You know what? We really need to keep the South Lake Union Station because what happens with shifting the station west is it gets super close to the other station on Aurora, which is a major bus artery. - so that's where a lot of people were going to transfer from bus to rail. And it would put you closer to Uptown too if you're headed to the eastern part of Uptown. So the shifted-west alternative consolidates the two stations into one. And that's what sort of set off all these alarm bells with Seattle Subway and Uptown Alliance and the urbanists and others that - Hey, why are we dropping a station? And they presented to Uptown Alliance - Sound Transit did two days ago, I think it was - and apparently the consolidating those two stations, they shared their ridership analysis, which was new information. It's gonna cost about 10,000 riders - someone who was at that presentation told me. And that's a pretty big deal - 10,000 daily riders. So the mayor didn't have that information last week when he made his statement - he said he was still waiting for ridership to confirm his decision, but he said he's starting to lean Westlake and just wants a good mitigation plan, which I don't know why we couldn't start there from the first place - because we're seeing across, especially the Ballard Link Station, that there's lots of changes that are happening because people don't like the construction period and don't think the mitigation plan is very good. And there may be something to that. The mitigation plan should be really good, but rather than focus on the mitigation, we've been just tossing around all these different ideas and extending the - what that means is you have to do a whole new study and that delays the whole project. So maybe small progress there on the Denny Station decision - we can focus on how to do that right and get a good construction mitigation plan, rather than last-minute options that are un-vetted and are going to require another year or two of study. [00:33:51] Crystal Fincher: And with that, we thank you for listening to Hacks & Wonks on this Friday, July 21st, 2023. The producer of Hacks & Wonks is Shannon Cheng. Our insightful cohost today is Publisher of The Urbanist, Doug Trumm. You can find Doug on Twitter @dmtrumm, that's two M's at the end. You can follow Hacks & Wonks on Twitter @HacksWonks. And you can find me on all platforms - Bluesky, SPILL, Twitter, all of them, Mastodon - @finchfrii, that's two I's at the end. You can catch Hacks & Wonks wherever you get your podcasts - just type "Hacks and Wonks" into the search bar. Be sure to subscribe to get the full versions of our Friday week-in-review shows and our Tuesday topical show delivered to your podcast feed. If you like us, leave a review wherever you listen. You can also get a full transcript of this episode and links to the resources referenced in the show at officialhacksandwonks.com and in the podcast episode notes. Thanks for tuning in - talk to you next time.

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Inspiring Compassion for Animals with Nancy Robinson, Author and Animal Advocate

Play Episode Listen Later May 2, 2023 42:54

“Don't say, I wish somebody would help them. Go out and do it.” This episode is sponsored in part by Cats of the Wild Podcast, Doobert.com, and Maddie's Fund. In this episode, Stacy speaks with individual animal rescuer and advocate, Nancy Robison. After receiving help to TNR the cats outside her home in Long Island, NY, Nancy made it her personal mission to gather all the information she could on low-cost or free services for animals, including spay/neuter and TNR resources. She shares those resources whenever she has the chance, to minimize obstacles and help even more people get the help they need. Today, Nancy works with two local organizations and continues to support TNR efforts in Long Island. She also works closely with caregiver and rescuer, Cathy Moore, in upstate New York to provide as much help as she possibly can. Stacy and Nancy talk about the role of individuals in animal rescue, and stepping up when something needs to be done. They talk about compassion, and how it impacts our approach to animals and people with unique needs and challenges. A teacher for 35 years, Nancy strongly believes in the importance of teaching children compassion for animals. She and Stacy talk about the children's books she has authored, which were inspired by the bedtime stories her own mother used to tell about her childhood cat, Stubbs. Nancy's books are available for sale on Amazon. All proceeds from her books are donated to animal-related charities: Stubby: A Cat's Story Stubby: Her Continuing Adventures The Dogs of My Life To get in touch with Nancy, send an email to nanrobison@gmail.com or connect with One At A Time Cat Rescue via their Facebook group.

Training Needs Analysis

The Training Design Podcast

Play Episode Listen Later Apr 24, 2023 41:11

In this episode Sheridan chats with Michelle Potthurst about Training Needs Analysis. Michelle supports small businesses with L&D functions and has a real interest in Training Needs Analysis. A strong believer in giving people a skill and framework to use that suits their way of working. Michelle also wants businesses to find better ways to do things within the working environment such as using branching scenarios which show the real life scenario of what happens when you don't do it. To carry out any Training Needs Analysis and come up with the appropriate training solution, Michelle and Sheridan discuss the following questions: What is it we want people to do as a result of this training What do people need in order to achieve it? Why aren't people doing it? What challenges are they facing? This is a really interesting episode with so much insight from Michelle. Have a listen and we'd love to hear your thoughts on this subject. Connect with Michelle on LinkedIn https://www.linkedin.com/in/michelle-potthurst-b7755874/ Visit her website here https://melioralearninganddevelopment.co.uk/ Resource Links: More about Cathy Moore and her approach using Map it https://blog.cathy-moore.com/book-map-it/ When it's OK to be an order-taker (and how to do it well) https://www.trainingzone.co.uk/lead/strategy/stop-ridiculing-order-takers-in-learning-and-development About the 12 Levers of Learning Transfer https://trainingdesignersclub.co.uk/2021/06/23/transferring-learning-to-the-workplace/ The Manage Under Performance Power Hour https://www.power-hour.co.uk/product-page/manage-under-performance Contact the host: Visit ⁠www.trainingdesignersclub.co.uk⁠ for more information Check us out on YouTube ⁠https://www.youtube.com/c/TheTrainingDesignersClub⁠ Connect with Sheridan on LinkedIn ⁠https://www.linkedin.com/in/trainingdesigner/⁠

map sheridan levers training needs cathy moore

What Instructional Designers Need to Know in 2023 (Episode 56) | Belvista Studios' Insights

coaching tips blog human studios elearning instructional designers cathy moore

Play Episode Listen Later Jan 11, 2023 57:26

Do you want to learn from us and level-up in 2023? In this episode Kim, Hannah and Victoria speak about: - Our advice for instructional designers. - Our reflections of 2022. - Our best moments from 2022. - What every instructional designer should learn in 2023. Here are the resources mentioned: Human-centred Design Course: https://creatorhub.belvistastudios.com/courses/human-centred-design Accessibility Storyline 360 Tips: https://creatorhub.belvistastudios.com/courses/alt-tabbing-storyline-360-tips Storyboard Template: https://creatorhub.belvistastudios.com/courses/storyboard-template HCD Ultimate Kit Cohort: https://creatorhub.belvistastudios.com/collections/courses Map It by Cathy Moore (book): https://blog.cathy-moore.com/book-map-it/ The Rise and Conquer Podcast: https://www.georgiestevenson.net/pages/rise-conquer-podcast Our intent with Belvista Studios' Insights is to support others in the industry to take their instructional design and eLearning skills to the next level by sharing raw insights into what we are learning as a team at Belvista Studios.

Ep. 220 - Importance of Hope on Health

Beyond The Basics Health Academy Podcast

Play Episode Listen Later Sep 14, 2022 49:10

Forest bathing, the limbic system, and the effects of hope are all topics of conversation on today's episode with Cathy Moore. Listen in as we do a deep dive on how our mental state can affect our wellbeing and learn new ways to rewire your brain or face difficult fears. BE KIND TO OTHERS, TAKE CARE OF YOURSELF, AND MAKE GOOD CHOICES [00:15] Welcome to Kathy [01:15] The mind and body connection [05:41] Fear and the brain [10:24] Retraining the limbic system [13:21] Dan Seigel's hand model of the brain [17:15] Gut health importance [17:52] Programs for rewiring the brain [21:53] Ways to face fears and engage in life [28:37] Cortisol responses and respecting that response [32:51] Hope and its effects [37:51] Ways to add hope into your life [44:22] Research conducted about hope [48:11] Wrapping up Stay connected to Dr. Meaghan and her work through the following links: Youtube: One Agora Integrative and Aesthetic https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZBvlMzs8K94 Instagram: OneAgoraHealth DrMeaghanKirschling Facebook: One Agora Health Twitter: BTBHAcademy LinkedIn: Dr. Meaghan Kirschling Clinic Website: oneagorahealth.com

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MAP and Energy Medicine with Cilla Whatcott

Play Episode Listen Later Aug 3, 2022 47:34

Join me for episode 56 where we talk with Cilla Whatcott, my client and Classical Homeopath, about the MAP Method and her experience with MAP sessions. Hear how she describes the impact it has on trauma and the role that trauma has in health. We discuss the MAP as an energy modality and applications for anxiety, PTSD, depression, fears and phobias. In this episode we discuss: - How Cilla's baseline sense of anxiety was reduced through MAP sessions. - How meditation practice makes it easier to access the MAP Method. - How, during MAP sessions, the images from childhood and past life experiences are served up by the subconscious mind revealing trauma “bubbles” and beliefs. - The experience of a MAP session and how the practitioner and the client work together. - How it can take a few sessions to understand the flow and the benefits of MAP. Increased anxiety at first can be a sign of resistance. - How treating trauma memories also allows us to identify and replace negative beliefs that are holding us back. - How contributors can be very small things that don't appear to others as a trauma, but it has more to do with the individual's perception. - How MAP Practitioners connect with the client's subconscious mind to identify priorities. - How we follow the thread of the topic throughout the session and the element of trust necessary. - The importance of individualized medicine and how interest in it has grown, along with Energy Modalities. - Why working with the mind is essential for chronic conditions. - The positive results in reduction of fear and anxiety around cancer. - How she knows that something big has happened, that traumas have been released. - How we can reframe our experience of a traumatic event. - How MAP is deceptively simple, yet the effects are deep. The instructions kick off a search in the subconscious mind. - How people are layered and the emotions are the deepest layer. As we resolve layers of painful emotions, we start to see changes on mental, behavioral and physical levels. - The concept of “Never well since…” as used in Homeopathy and MAP. Don't miss episode 33, MAP for Complex Chronic Conditions, where functional medicine practitioner, Cathy Moore, describes her experiences with the MAP Method and why she refers patients for sessions. To learn more about the MAP Method and how it works, visit mapforhealth.us, where you'll also find our MAP Program offerings. Or, if you'd like to schedule a 60-minute Introductory MAP session please schedule online at MindReMAPforHealth.com

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MAP for Immune Dysfunction - Dawn's Story

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Play Episode Listen Later Oct 7, 2021 74:34

Join me for episode 47 where we talk with my client, Dawn Brozek, who was interested in the MAP Method to address Mast Cell Activation Syndrome (MCAS), histamine sensitivities, neck and shoulder pain, skin issues, fatigue, mild asthma, and tinnitus. Hear about the benefits she experienced from a set of 6 sessions including the significant reduction of her physical symptoms. In this episode we discuss: - The symptoms she had lived with for a good many years including skin hives, tinnitus, and muscle pain and tension in different areas. - The mind-body approach and how it compares to the medical approach. - The ACEs study conclusions about the impact of early trauma on lifelong risk of addictions, chronic health issues, early death, and risk of autoimmune conditions. - The benefits she received from talk therapy and EMDR and why she describes MAP sessions as much easier and gentler. - The powerful insights she received during MAP sessions. - The initiation process to the MAP Method: easy and quick. -The improvements in emotional stability and reduction in symptoms she noticed after several MAP sessions. - Why she describes the changes as durable. - Demystifying the MAP process: not about reprogramming the mind in terms of the personality. - Why she looks forward to MAP sessions and calls them “a gift.” - The premise behind mind-body healing: Physical symptoms can be alleviated by working with the psychodynamic factors that underlie them. - Using MAP audio recordings to resolve symptoms between sessions. Don't miss episode 33 where functional medicine specialist, Cathy Moore, talks about the MAP Method for complex chronic conditions. For more information about the MAP Method, how it is used for health issues, or to schedule a free consultation by phone please visit MindReMAPforHealth.com

Ep. 47 - An ID's Review of "Map It"

Anchored in Learning

Play Episode Listen Later Sep 27, 2021 18:15

Ask most instructional design groups their book recommendations and over and over you will hear the book Map It by Cathy Moore. So now it's my turn to give you my take on an iconic instructional design book. Follow Cathy online, on LinkedIn, Twitter & Buy Map It now! Are you ready to learn more about developing your eLearning portfolio and find your tribe? Join my Freelance Learning & Development Network on Facebook and follow me over on Instagram, LinkedIn, YouTube and/or Twitter for all things eLearning! Thanks for listening! If you enjoyed this episode, please leave me a rating and review, and share it with your friends. Have an incredible day!

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Small but Mighty

Giving Done Right

Play Episode Listen Later Sep 16, 2021 33:19

In the debut episode of season two, hosts Phil Buchanan and Grace Nicolette talk with Cathy Moore, executive director of Epiphany Community Health Outreach Services (ECHOS) in Houston, TX. Tune in as Moore discusses her experience working on the frontlines during both Hurricane Harvey and the COVID-19 pandemic, how she believes donors can best step up in a time of crisis, and how to think about the tension between giving to meet immediate needs and addressing an issue's root causes. For more resources on effective giving, check out the Center for Effective Philanthropy's website: cep.org Credits: Executive Producer - Sarah Martin Mixing by Kevin O'Connell Additional editing by Isabel Hibbard Music - “FasterFasterBrighter” by Blue Dot Sessions Artwork - Jay Kustka Want to send us a note? Contact us at gdrpodcast@cep.org

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Our thoughts and ideas about Cathy Moore's "Is training really the answer?" flowchart

Is Training The Answer?

Play Episode Listen Later Aug 18, 2021 29:23

In our very first episode of John and Rory discuss Cathy Moore's delivery framework, aptly titled: ‘Is Training Really The Answer'. We talk about the simplicity of the framework, whether we think such a framework can do what it is designed to do, and what we think the real takeaway of this framework really is. You can view the flowchart here: https://blog.cathy-moore.com/2013/05/is-training-really-the-answer-ask-the-flowchart/ You can reach out to John and Rory through the website: istrainingtheanswer.com

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276. Practice and Feedback: Evidence-Based Tools for Learning

Leading Learning - The Show for Leaders in the Business of Lifelong Learning, Continuing Education, and Professional Develop

Play Episode Listen Later Aug 10, 2021 37:43

Practice and feedback are essential to effective learning, yet all too often they aren't given the time and attention they deserve by learning businesses. Practice and feedback are powerful tools for moving a learning experience away from pure theory and content and towards deeper learning and application in the real world. In this fifth episode in our seven-part series on learning science's role in a learning business, we feature key insights related to practice and feedback from conversations with learning design experts Myra Roldan, Ruth Colvin Clark, Patti Shank, Michael Allen, and Cathy Moore. We connect their perspectives to highlight the importance of practice and feedback as evidence-based tools and critical components of designing effective learning experiences. Full show notes and transcript available at leadinglearning.com/episode276. We are grateful to our sponsor for this series, SelfStudy. *** SelfStudy is a learning optimization technology company. Grounded in effective learning science and fueled by artificial intelligence and natural language processing, the SelfStudy platform delivers personalized content to anyone who needs to learn either on the go or at their desk. Each user is at the center of their own unique experience, focusing on what they need to learn next. For organizations, SelfStudy is a complete enterprise solution offering tools to instantly auto-create highly personalized, adaptive learning programs, the ability to fully integrate with your existing LMS or CMS, and the analytics you need to see your members, users, and content in new ways with deeper insights. SelfStudy is your partner for longitudinal assessment, continuing education, professional development, and certification. Learn more and request a demo to see SelfStudy auto-create questions based on your content at selfstudy.com.

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Ep. 214 - Digestive Health with Cathy Moore

Beyond The Basics Health Academy Podcast

Play Episode Listen Later Jul 26, 2021 38:06

“Let food be your medicine,” says Cathy Moore, PA-C, a Physician's Assistant at One Agora Integrative Health. Cathy explains that many of us have started treating food as a passing need rather than a vital fuel. We often eat on the go and may not even remember what we ate for lunch by the time we're eating dinner! This approach critically disrupts our gut health, since we aren't taking the time to rest and digest before, during and after each meal. Rather than rushing through meals, Cathy suggests that we instead be intentional about what we eat and how we eat it. By taking deep breaths before starting a meal, for example, we activate our parasympathetic nervous system, prepping our bodies to better digest our food. An increase in mindfulness around food also allows us to establish a better relationship with what we're eating, promoting an attitude of gratefulness rather than the fear that so often surrounds restrictive diets. Tune into this week's episode of Beyond the Basics Health Academy for a conversation with Cathy Moore about digestive health. Learn about the differences between healthy and harmful bacteria, the strategies you can use to retrain your taste buds, and how best to balance between your emotional and nutritional worlds. Improving your gut health is not an impossible feat! Join Cathy and host Meaghan Kirschling for some simple steps you can take to kickstart the journey towards a balanced microbiome. Quotes • “If you're going to sit down for a meal, it's important to take some time and look at your plate, just connect and be intentional with what you're eating instead of eating emotionally. Because most of us are eating out of emotional needs that haven't been met. So, when you're intentional with what you're eating, you're looking at your plate, you're sending gratitude and thankfulness into those foods, which really actually brings good frequencies into that food and helps with the structure of the food.” (4:25-4:52) • “I think every meal is a chance to heal the body. It's either that food is going to bring life-giving frequencies and health and life into our body or it's going to bring cellular death.” (5:39-5:47) • “We have the good, healthy bacteria that's really necessary to be able to regulate and govern over our immune system function. And you want to have plenty of what's called acromancia. I call them the ABCs: acromancia, bifidobacterium, and clostridia. Those are our main healthy, good bacteria that we really need in balance, and when those have too much, then that causes problems, but when there's not enough, the immune system is really suppressed and low.” (18:48-19:17) • “Oftentimes, patients will feel like, ‘Gosh, I'm just anxious all the time. I'm so nervous.' And you think about...what's going on in their brain, when actually we should be thinking, ‘What's going on in their gut?'” (22:33-22:45) • “Let food be your medicine.” (26:46-26:48) Links Book a session with Cathy: https://www.oneagorahealth.com/ BE KIND TO OTHERS, TAKE CARE OF YOURSELF, AND MAKE GOOD CHOICES. Stay connected to Dr. Meaghan and her work: • Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZBvlMzs8K94 • Instagram: @oneagorahealth // @drmeaghankirschling • Facebook: One Agora Integrative Health Clinic • Twitter: @btbhacademy • LinkedIn: Meaghan Kirschling • Clinic Website: https://www.oneagorahealth.com/ Podcast production and show notes provided by FIRESIDE Marketing

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This Might Be A Podcast - Episode 138 - She Thinks She's Edith Head

This Might Be A Podcast

Play Episode Listen Later Jul 3, 2021 123:45

First time guest Cathy Moore braves the dangerous waters of discussing a song that appears on two albums- She Thinks She's Edith Head, with parenthesis if we're talking the Long Tall Weekend version or without if it's the Mink Car version. Which is superior? We're gonna find out!

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MAP for Chronic Pain - Helen's Story

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Play Episode Listen Later May 18, 2021 66:03

Join me for episode 40 where we talk with my client, Helen Scharber, about her experience with MAP sessions, a method of advanced neural retraining, for her chronic pain from an autoimmune condition known as Ankylosing Spondylitis and food sensitivities. Hear about what it is like to be in a MAP session, the benefits she received from a set of 6 sessions and why she would recommend the method to others. In this episode we discuss: - Helen’s health journey, which has included 20 years of chronic pain from an autoimmune rheumatic condition known as Ankylosing Spondylitis (AS). - How her food sensitivities made her AS symptoms worse and methods she had tried to resolve them. - Why she decided to try working with her subconscious mind to resolve food sensitivities. - Other basic neural retraining methods (EMDR, tapping) and how they compare to MAP. - How she found the MAP Method, and why she decided to work with me. - Description of the MAP Method and the role of the practitioner. - How your subconscious mind reveals its programming through MAP sessions. - Why Helen describes MAP sessions as “easy and relaxing” and also “simple yet profound.” - How, after a few months, Helen’s chronic pain subsided and most of her food sensitivities have resolved. - The waxing and waning of physical symptoms through the MAP process and why she found it “comforting.” - We discuss Dr. John Sarno’s work and the mind-body connection. - Her informal ROI calculation of costs vs. benefits of MAP sessions. Don’t miss episode 33 where we discuss the MAP Method for complex chronic conditions with Functional Medicine specialist, Cathy Moore. To learn more about the MAP Method please visit www.mapcoachinginstitute.com. For more information on my approach and services, please join my Facebook page Mind ReMAP for Health or visit MindReMAPforHealth.com to sign up for your introductory session or a free 15 minute consultation by phone.

Instructional Design Questions from Our Community Answered (Episode 22) | Belvista Studios' Insights

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Play Episode Listen Later Apr 21, 2021 11:43

Do you want advice as an instructional designer? In this episode we asked you, our community, what you would like to know/learn. We answer the following community questions: - Please tell me about your methods of getting the needs straight from the learners. E.g. interviews and questionnaires etc. - Do you think the eLearning architectures (receptive/directive/guided discovery) are a good starting point to design more effective resources depending on the purpose of the learning (inform/response strengthening/knowledge construction)? - What questions should one ask a SME to understand 'desirable difficulty' when designing an activity? Our intent with Belvista Studios' Insights is to support others in the industry to take their instructional design and eLearning skills to the next level by sharing raw insights into what we are learning as a team at Belvista Studios. Here are the resources mentioned: - Human-centred Design Playbook: https://creatorhub.belvistastudios.com/courses/human-centred-design-playbook - Action Mapping by Cathy Moore: https://blog.cathy-moore.com/action-mapping-a-visual-approach-to-training-design/?doing_wp_cron=1618896881.7116529941558837890625 - Our eLearning blogs: http://blog.belvistastudios.com/

How to Advance Your Instructional Design Process (Episode 21) | How to Become an Instructional Designer

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Play Episode Listen Later Apr 17, 2021 45:40

Do you want to advance your instructional design process? In this episode Kim and Hannah discuss how our instructional design studio uses a combination of action mapping (by Cathy Moore) and human-centred design to create effective learning solutions. We cover: - Understanding your training/project goal. - Discovering what people need to do to achieve your goal. - Determining why people aren't meeting your goal now. - Discovering changes that will help you meet your goal. - Prototyping. - Obtaining feedback. Here are the resources mentioned: - Action Mapping Workflow at a Glance (by Cathy Moore): https://blog.cathy-moore.com/action-mapping-workflow-at-a-glance/?doing_wp_cron=1618200042.5802440643310546875000 - How to Empathy Map | How to Become an Instructional Designer (YouTube video): https://youtu.be/rJVx456SYt8 - Human-centred Design for Instructional Designers (YouTube playlist): https://youtube.com/playlist?list=PL53y2Uv-umyZ7HP3WsyIOMEtsSmYG6R81 - CCAF Design (By Allen Interactions): https://www.alleninteractions.com/services/custom-learning/ccaf/elearning-instructional-design - ADDIE Model: https://www.instructionaldesign.org/models/addie/ - Human-centred Design development opportunities (learn with us!): https://creatorhub.belvistastudios.com/collections?category=courses

Action Mapping and Activity Design with Cathy Moore

Action Mapping Podcast

Play Episode Listen Later Mar 25, 2021 30:38

When it comes to training design, perhaps focusing on what people need to be able to do, not simply what they need to know, can make all the difference. That's because this leads to activity-centered training rather than traditional information presentations.

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5 Things Every Instructional Designer Should Consider (SPECIAL GUEST) (Episode 19) | Belvista Studios' Insights

coaching elearning instructional designers cathy moore

Play Episode Listen Later Mar 17, 2021 48:35

Do you want to know what every instructional designer should consider? In this episode Kim, Hannah and Victoria are joined by special guest, eLearning Content Developer, Nicole, who asks: - Should every eLearning module have a quiz or assessment? - Should a learning experience fit within a certain duration of time? - How do you know when a storyboard is ready for client review? - What do you do if training is not the solution? - How out of the box should we go with training solutions? Our intent with Belvista Studios' Insights is to support others in the industry to take their instructional design and eLearning skills to the next level by sharing raw insights into what we are learning as a team at Belvista Studios. Here are the resources mentioned: Writing Effective Scenario Questions Guide (FREE): https://creatorhub.belvistastudios.com/courses/writing-effective-scenario-questions-guide Quality Assurance (QA) Checklist (FREE): https://creatorhub.belvistastudios.com/courses/quality-assurance-checklist Action Mapping by Cathy Moore: https://blog.cathy-moore.com/action-mapping-a-visual-approach-to-training-design/ Upstream: The Quest to Solve Problems Before They Happen (book): https://www.penguin.com.au/books/upstream-9781787632745

Wetland Archaeology – Amplify Archaeology Podcast – Episode 20

Amplify Archaeology Podcast

Play Episode Listen Later Feb 1, 2021 53:43

Wetland Archaeology with Cathy Moore and Dr. Ben Gearey Amplify Archaeology Podcast Episode 20 Bogs and wetlands are one of the most iconic and characteristically Irish landscapes. Almost 1/6th of the country is covered by bog, and it is particularly significant in the midlands. Bogs have long served a variety of functions [...] The post Wetland Archaeology – Amplify Archaeology Podcast – Episode 20 appeared first on Abarta Heritage Home.

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MAP for Optimal Health and Fertility with Kristin Cornett

Beyond The Basics Health Academy Podcast

Play Episode Listen Later Jan 17, 2021 66:55

Join me for episode 35 where we visit with Kristin Cornett, Functional Nutritional Therapy Practitioner, founder of the Tiny Feet virtual fertility practice and host of the Mastering Your Fertility podcast. In this episode, a rebroadcast of episode 94 of Kristin’s podcast, we discuss the MAP Method™ of advanced neural retraining for optimal health and fertility. Listen until the end to hear about the emotional and physical changes Kristin experienced after eight MAP sessions and why she decided to pursue MAP Method training herself. In this episode we discuss: - My personal journey that led me to Nutritional Therapy and neural retraining. - The importance of the brain, nervous system, and subconscious mind in physical and emotional well-being. - What MAP is and the science behind how the method works. - What a typical MAP session looks (and feels) like and what you can expect as a client. - Kristin’s life-changing experience with MAP and how it's helped her make profound shifts in her life and health. - Some of my favorite stories about major changes I've seen in others during my MAP training. Don’t miss episode 33 for a discussion of the MAP Method for complex chronic illness with Cathy Moore, PA. To learn more about Kristin Cornett and her Tiny Feet virtual fertility practice, visit https://tinyfeet.co/ where you can take the “Are you healthy enough to get pregnant?” quiz or download a free Fertility Recovery Guide. To listen to Kristin’s Mastering Your Fertility podcast page, visit: https://tinyfeet.co/podcast

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Ep. 211 - Low Dose Immunotherapy and Allergen Support with Cathy Moore

Play Episode Listen Later Jan 14, 2021 18:53

On today's BTBHA episode, Cathy Moore from One Agora sits down with Meaghan to talk about low dose immunotherapy and allergen support.

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Inside the Mind of an Instructional Designer (Episode 11) | How to Become an Instructional Designer

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Play Episode Listen Later Dec 31, 2020 18:10

Do you want to know what an instructional designer does? In this episode Kim and Hannah share their thoughts and insights as instructional designers. Here are the resources mentioned: Free storyboard template: https://creatorhub.belvistastudios.com/courses/storyboard-template Action Mapping (by Cathy Moore): https://blog.cathy-moore.com/action-mapping-a-visual-approach-to-training-design/ Do You Need a Degree to Become an Instructional Designer? (video): https://youtu.be/z4-Alf9i1Lo Three Psychology Principles to Use for eLearning Design (blog): http://blog.belvistastudios.com/2018/10/three-psychology-principles-to-use-for.html How to Apply the Mere Exposure Effect to your eLearning Design (blog): http://blog.belvistastudios.com/2020/03/how-to-apply-mere-exposure-effect-to.html HCD Ultimate Kit: https://creatorhub.belvistastudios.com/courses/HCDUltimateKitCohort Human-centred Design Course: https://creatorhub.belvistastudios.com/courses/human-centred-design Human-centred Design Playbook: https://creatorhub.belvistastudios.com/courses/human-centred-design-playbook Human-centred Design for Instructional Designers: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL53y2Uv-umyZ7HP3WsyIOMEtsSmYG6R81

Bookmark Christmas Special

Bookmark

Play Episode Listen Later Dec 27, 2020 46:26

Leigh Chambers welcomes Cathy Moore, Director of the Cambridge Literary Festival, as the featured guest on this special edition. She’ll be talking about founding the Festival, running it through the […]

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Bookmark Christmas Special

Bookmark

Play Episode Listen Later Dec 27, 2020 46:26

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MAP for Food Addiction with Suzanne Bond

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Play Episode Listen Later Dec 22, 2020 61:03

Join me for episode 34 where we talk with Suzanne Bond, registered nurse, trauma therapist and MAP Method practitioner. She’s the founder of The Mind and Body Clinic in central England where she and her team focus on improving overall health and wellbeing. Hear about her breakthrough program for resolving binge eating and food addictions. Listen until the end to learn how to participate in her next Freedom from Food Addiction four-week program. In this episode we discuss: - How Suzanne discovered the MAP Method™. - How the MAP Method has changed her life, psychologically and physically, and how it has helped her in her business life. - How she uses MAP with patients for anxiety, fear and addictions. - How she came to develop a program for binge eaters and the amazing results they experienced. - Her group program for binge eating and food addictions. - How to register for the Freedom from Food Addiction course --new classes starting each month! Don’t miss episode 33 for a discussion of the MAP Method for complex chronic illness with Cathy Moore, PA. To learn more about Suzanne Bond and The Mind and Body Clinic, visit: https://themindandbodyclinic.com. To reserve your spot in the next Freedom from Food Addiction course, visit: https://themindandbodyclinic.com/booking

MAP for Chronic Complex Conditions with Cathy Moore PA

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Play Episode Listen Later Dec 10, 2020 45:00

Join me for episode 33 where we talk with Cathy Moore, a functional medicine Physician Assistant specializing in chronic health issues including Chronic Fatigue Syndrome (CFS), Mast Cell Activation syndrome (MCAS), chronic Lyme and autoimmune conditions. She practices at One Agora Integrative Health Clinic in Bloomington, Minnesota. Hear about her experience with the MAP Method and why she finds it useful to refer patients for MAP sessions. Listen until the end to learn how the MAP Method differs from psychotherapy, EMDR and brainspotting. In this episode we discuss: How Cathy discovered the MAP Method™. How the field of Psychoneuroimmunology (PNI) and the work of Candace Pert, Ph.D. supports the connection between emotions and the immune and endocrine systems. Her personal experience with the MAP Method and how it compares with EMDR, EFT, tapping, or brainspotting. The top 3 reasons people with complex chronic conditions get stuck in their healing process. Why she recommends the MAP Method for her patients. Results Cathy has seen in her patients as a result of MAP for chronic fatigue, impaired detoxification, sleep issues, anxiety, addictions, and multiple traumas. Don’t miss episode 30 for a discussion of how trauma impacts chronic health risks and episode 31 for Frequently Asked Questions about the MAP Method. For more information about Cathy Moore's practice or to schedule a consultation with her, please visit: https://www.oneagorahealth.com/about-us.html

Blathnaid Treacy: Look Good, Feel better.

Louise McSharry

Play Episode Listen Later Dec 5, 2020 9:52

Look good Feel better partner with Beauty businesses to support those struggling with the side effects of cancer treatment. Cathy Moore is a volunteer with the charity and spoke to Blathnaid about how the charity can help people, Cathy's own experience with the charity and the difference talking to a specially trained beautician can make!

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How to Improve Your eLearning Design Skills (Episode 5) | Belvista Studios' Insights

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Play Episode Listen Later Oct 8, 2020 19:37

Do you want to improve your eLearning design skills? In this episode Kim, Hannah and Victoria from Belvista Studios run a rapid fire question round on all things eLearning design. Our intent with Belvista Studios' Insights is to support others in the industry to take their instructional design and eLearning skills to the next level by sharing raw insights into what we are learning as a team at Belvista Studios. Here are the resources mentioned: Chris Do 'The Futur' YouTube channel: https://www.youtube.com/user/TheSkoolRocks Chris Do 'The Futur' Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/thefuturishere/ Action Mapping (by Cathy Moore): https://blog.cathy-moore.com/action-mapping-a-visual-approach-to-training-design/ How to Conduct User Interviews YouTube video: https://youtu.be/DxP3GR55T3I How to Conduct User Observations YouTube video: https://youtu.be/WH-PyuwD_GE Storyboard template: https://creatorhub.belvistastudios.com/courses/storyboard-template Writing Effective Scenario Questions Guide: https://creatorhub.belvistastudios.com/courses/writing-effective-scenario-questions-guide

How to Write Scenario Questions (Episode 29) | Learning with Belvista Studios

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Play Episode Listen Later Sep 28, 2020 43:16

DOWNLOAD OUR WRITING EFFECTIVE SCENARIO QUESTIONS GUIDE HERE: https://creatorhub.belvistastudios.com/courses/writing-effective-scenario-questions-guide Writing scenario questions can be challenging. Where do you start? How do you make them engaging? How do you ensure that they meet the project goal? At Belvista Studios we have been writing scenario questions for years. We have learnt what works, what does not and the techniques that will make your job 100 times easier (not to mention the epic impact it will have on your projects, learners and clients!). Who is it for? Freelancers, consultants, in-house teams or agencies that create training solutions and who want to: - Create effective scenario questions. - Change behaviour through their learning solutions. - Follow a step-by-step process for creating better scenario questions. - Impress their clients, learners and team through presenting high-quality scenario questions. Here are the resources mentioned: Writing Effective Scenario Questions Guide: https://creatorhub.belvistastudios.com/courses/writing-effective-scenario-questions-guide How to Hold a Creative Conversation: https://youtu.be/X3pxwx9svD4 Creating Training Goals (by Cathy Moore): https://blog.cathy-moore.com/2013/11/how-to-create-a-training-goal-in-2-quick-steps/?doing_wp_cron=1598510680.7190029621124267578125 Bloom's Taxonomy: https://th.bing.com/th/id/OIP.suya_c8dC4miApbg5AkMmQHaFn?pid=Api&rs=1 The Power of Storytelling in eLearning: http://blog.belvistastudios.com/2018/03/the-power-of-storytelling-in-elearning.html How to Write Scenarios for Learning Design (with Nicole Papaioannou Lugara): https://youtu.be/PUVeMUi-V-s How to Create Better Multiple Choice Questions (with Cara North): https://youtu.be/U89rgQm8OL0 The Creator Hub: https://creatorhub.belvistastudios.com/

Ep. 143 Safely Starting the 2020-21 School Year

Education Matters

Play Episode Listen Later Jul 11, 2020 24:27

As North Carolina continues to develop plans for safely beginning the 2020-21 school year, we take a look at the possibilities surrounding what next year could bring and what that means for both large and small school districts across our state. Joining us today are Cyndy Bliss, Principal of Myrtle Grove Middle School in New Hanover County, Doctor Barry Williams, Superintendent of Gates County Public Schools, and Cathy Moore, Superintendent of Wake CountyPublic Schools. Guests: Cathy Moore, Superintendent, Wake County Public Schools Cyndy Bliss, Principal, Myrtle Grove Middle School, New Hanover County Dr. Barry Williams, Superintendent, Gates County Public Schools

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Isolation 7

My Yellow Couch Podcast

Play Episode Listen Later May 24, 2020 48:58

In this episode I speak with Cathy Moore, Look Good Feel Better Ireland Ambassador. Look Good Feel Better Ireland is a charity organisation that offers free skincare/make-up workshops for people undergoing cancer treatment. Cathy shares with us her journey with breast cancer and how Look Good Feel Better gave her a sense of purpose and helped her feel connected to herself and to others as she navigated her way through treatment. We spoke about how we all deal with our diagnosis in different ways and what supports are there for anyone who finds themselves in this challenging situation. Cathy is a laughter yoga teacher which I loved hearing all about and she brings us through a short laughter exercise which instantly made me feel better. Cathy is a breath of fresh air. Her joie de vivre is infectious and she left me feeling that even though bad things happen to us their is always light at the end of the tunnel if we choose to look for it. Enjoy x

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Gamification for Learning (Episode 20) | Learning with Belvista Studios

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Play Episode Listen Later Apr 22, 2020 60:50

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Cambridge Breakfast: The Listening Festival

Cambridge Breakfast

Play Episode Listen Later Apr 15, 2020 10:33

The organisers of the Cambridge Literary Festival are launching The Listening Festival in the space occupied by their spring event. Cathy Moore is the director of the Festival.

How to Write Scenarios for Learning Design (Episode 16) | Learning with Belvista Studios

Leading Learning - The Show for Leaders in the Business of Lifelong Learning, Continuing Education, and Professional Develop

Play Episode Listen Later Mar 16, 2020 55:12

If you like this podcast, you will like our CREATOR HUB. It offers a range of services that aim to support you in developing, improving and growing to meet your future needs in the instructional design and eLearning industry. Visit it here: https://creatorhub.belvistastudios.com/ In this episode Kim and Hannah speak with Nicole Papaioannou Lugara. Nicole's focus is on performance-focused training and learning design. She has written and storyboarded 300+ instructional video scripts. We chat about: How to write video, voiceover, scenario and storyboard scripts Writing techniques for learning design How we can replicate successful TV shows and movies Script writing that reflects reality Practical quick wins for writing a good story Why it is okay to write a shitty first draft How to write stories with meaning How to evaluate performance change How to understand the problem that you are solving How to effectively QA your scripts How to incorporate drama and humour into your writing Adopting a human-centred design approach Learning design tools and resources Here are the resources mentioned: Nicole's LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/nicolepapaioannouphd/ Canva is a design tool: https://www.canva.com/ Pixabay for free photos, images and vectors: https://pixabay.com/ Vyond is an online animation creator: https://www.vyond.com/ Camtasia for screen recording and video editing: https://www.techsmith.com/video-editor.html Shitty First Drafts by Anne Lamott: http://wrd.as.uky.edu/sites/default/files/1-Shitty%20First%20Drafts.pdf Dr. David Chandross who is the lead game designer/researcher at Game and Train: https://elearningindustry.com/members/dr-david-chandross Bloom's Taxonomy: https://cft.vanderbilt.edu/wp-content/uploads/sites/59/Bloomtaxonomy.jpg The Kirkpatrick Model: https://learning.linkedin.com/content/dam/me/learning/blog/2017/april/Kirkpatrick-Model.png Grammar Girl for quick and dirty tips on grammar: https://www.quickanddirtytips.com/grammar-girl The OWL is an online writing lab: https://owl.purdue.edu/owl/purdue_owl.html Hemmingway App is an editor that highlights and corrects grammar, fluency and sentence structure: http://www.hemingwayapp.com/ eLearning Heroes Challenges are ongoing opportunities to learn, share, and build your e-learning portfolios: https://community.articulate.com/hubs/e-learning-challenges Freelance Instructional Designers, eLearning developers and LXD group on Facebook at: https://www.facebook.com/groups/freelanceID Upskill Experience, which is where Nicole hosts her workshops for IDs and freelancers: https://www.upskillexperience.com/ Map it by Cathy Moore helps you turn training requests into projects that make a real difference: https://blog.cathy-moore.com/book-map-it/ We hope you enjoy and thanks for listening! :) We're on Instagram! Daily tips and insights into our studio: https://www.instagram.com/belvistastudios/ LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/belvista-studios We are an award-winning eLearning company in Brisbane, Australia with global clients, which provides end-to-end eLearning solutions including instructional design, graphic design, animation and development. http://belvistastudios.com/ Follow our journey as we learn how to create the best eLearning.

219: Action Mapping and Activity Design with Cathy Moore

Play Episode Listen Later Dec 31, 2019 30:39

When it comes to training design, perhaps focusing on what people need to be able to do, not simply what they need to know, can make all the difference. That’s because this leads to activity-centered training rather than traditional information presentations. These concepts are what led Cathy Moore, speaker, training designer, and author of Map It: The Hands-On Guide to Strategic Training Design, to create the action mapping model. Her goal is to “save the world from boring instruction” and her tools and resources are helping to do this one learner at a time. In this encore episode of the Leading Learning podcast, Celisa talks with Cathy about action mapping including what it is, why it’s effective, and how to apply it. They also cover the role action mapping plays in measurement and evaluation and scenario design. Full show notes available at https://www.leadinglearning.com/episode219. We are grateful to our sponsor for this quarter, Community Brands: ** Community Brands provides a suite of cloud-based software for organizations to engage and grow relationships with the individuals they serve, including association management software, learning management software, job board software, and event management software. Community Brands’ award-winning Crowd Wisdom learning platform is among the world’s best LMSes for corporate extended enterprise and is a leading LMS for association-driven professional education programs. Award-winning Freestone, Community Brands’ live event learning platform, is a leading platform for live learning event capture, Webinars, Webcasts, and on-demand streaming.

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Episode 13 – Becoming a Customer Education Instructional Designer

CELab: The Customer Education Lab

Play Episode Listen Later Apr 25, 2019

This episode is part three of our informal trilogy about instructional design in customer education. (See parts one and two.) What does it take to become a great instructional designer or content developer in Customer Education. How can you succeed in the role if you’re transitioning from another career? We'll tackle these questions and more, so listen in! For those making the leap into Customer Education as Instructional Designers, they typically come from three places: Customer Success and Support: The rock-star customer-facing folks who love educating their customers, and want to do it full-timeInternal L&D: Education experts who have been working in corporate L&D or enablement, and want to transition to external educationMaster's programs: People who have committed to get a degree in instructional design or instructional systems design Which is best? Are any of them best? The big question most people ask is whether they need a degree to be most successful in the field. What's more important, field experience or a degree? https://www.pexels.com/@startup-stock-photos We'll look at these three common paths and give some perspective on them. How do CSMs and support agents become Customer Educators? Let’s start with one of the most frequent places we see customer education-focused trainers and content developers come from. And the younger the company, the more frequently we see this happen. They’re rockstar CSMs or support agents who naturally gravitate toward training customers or documenting things. This can be great career development. If you spend all your time with customers, then you tend to have more customer empathy, something that more frequently doesn’t factor into more academic instructional design. If you love training customers and helping them learn, this can be a career path. Plus you get the benefit of learning instructional design and content development skills, which you probably didn’t have before. The risk in coming from this side of the house is that many startups don’t realize what skills are needed to do this job well. When support agents become “the training person,” they get asked to put together decks and webinars, but they don’t always know what will make that content effective. So they become order takers instead of consultants. It’s also hard for them to find mentors who really know this field well, especially with a customer education focus. Our recommendation to these “accidental instructional designers” is to go to conferences like ATD TechKnowledge and DevLearn, to take instructional design and content development courses and bootcamps (like you can find on any online learning site -- LinkedIn Learning, etc), to follow great instructional designers (Julie Dirksen, Cathy Moore, Connie Malamed, Cara North, and Melissa Milloway are all great examples of instructional design pros who "work out loud") and join communities (

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Czy masz szkoleniową infekcję? Rozmowa z Przemkiem Kędzią (S02E16)

Rozmowy Rozwojowe - 2EDU

Play Episode Listen Later Apr 14, 2019 42:01

W systemie edukacji uczymy się, wierząc, że zdobyta wiedza i kompetencje przydadzą się nam w przyszłości. Dorośli w środowisku pracy uczą się, aby rozwiązać konkretny problem, najlepiej tu i teraz. Wymaga to innego podejścia do projektowania szkoleń. Lata edukacji formalnej kształtują nasz sposób myślenia o edukacji i o szkoleniach. Zostaliśmy zaprogramowani i powielamy utrwalony schemat, projektując szkolenia dla ludzi i organizacji o zupełnie innych oczekiwaniach i potrzebach niż uczniowie i studenci. Cathy Moore, autorka książki Map it, nazywa to zjawisko zainfekowaniem tradycyjnym modelem uczenia. Ta książka stanowiła inspirację do przeprowadzenia badania poziomu infekcji. Wyniki badania pokazują, jak mocno w naszej mentalności zakotwiczony jest tradycyjny model nauczania i jak duży ma on wpływ na projektowanie szkoleń dla osób o zupełnie innych potrzebach. Z jednej strony zgadzamy się z tezą, że podejścia do projektowania dla edukacji i dla dorosłych istotnie się różnią, a z drugiej – w znacznym stopniu powielamy intuicyjnie cechy tradycyjnego modelu podczas projektowania szkoleń dla dorosłych w środowisku pracy. Drugie badanie nazwaliśmy badaniem wspomaganym. W jego ramach zestawiliśmy tezy charakterystyczne dla modelu tradycyjnego z tezami odpowiadającymi nowemu modelowi i poprosiliśmy uczestników o wskazanie, z którym z przedstawionych stwierdzeń zgadzają się bardziej. Wyniki badania wspomaganego wykazały zdecydowanie niższy poziom zainfekowania ankietowanych. Widzimy więc wyraźnie, że jesteśmy świadomi różnic pomiędzy oboma podejściami i jeżeli myślimy o nich świadomie, to mamy większe szanse na przygotowanie projektów szkoleniowych zgodnie z nowym modelem. Wymaga to jednak refleksji i umyślnego działania – w przeciwnym razie zastosujemy intuicyjnie ukształtowane przez lata edukacji formalnej wzorce i wbudowane schematy myślenia. Efektem będą krytyczne reakcje uczestników i niesatysfakcjonujący rezultat szkolenia – zarówno dla nich, jak i całej organizacji.

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Czy masz szkoleniową infekcję? Rozmowa z Przemkiem Kędzią (S02E16)

Rozmowy Rozwojowe - 2EDU

Play Episode Listen Later Apr 14, 2019 42:01

map rozmowa lata masz raport wyniki drugie badanie wymaga widzimy zostali efektem przemkiem cathy moore

Bookmark: Kelcey Wilson-Lee

Bookmark

Play Episode Listen Later Mar 23, 2019 48:52

Leigh Chambers studio guest is historian, Kelcey Wilson-Lee who’s talking about her book Daughters of Chivalry; The Forgotten Children of Edward I. Cambridge Literary Festival Director, Cathy Moore, tells us what to expect in next months Festival. And Jonathan Fennell discusses his epic work Fighting The People’s War; The British and Commonwealth Armies and the […]

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133 — How can experience design tap into our emotions?

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Play Episode Listen Later Feb 19, 2019 37:15

Think of an experience that triggered such an emotional reaction that your behaviour was permanently changed. Such experiences often happen by accident, but they can also be designed. This week on the GoodPractice Podcast, Ross G is joined by Owen and PA Consulting's Kenny Temowo to discuss experience design in detail, and ask whether it can be scaled to reach larger audiences. If you'd like to share your thoughts on the show, you can find us on Twitter @RossGarnerGP, @OwenFerguson and @K_Temowo. To find out more about GoodPractice, visit goodpractice.com or tweet us @GoodPractice or @GoodPracticeAus. Kenny blogs on LinkedIn at: https://www.linkedin.com/in/ktem1/detail/recent-activity/posts/ The 'crossing the line' experience to demonstrate privilege can be viewed at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4K5fbQ1-zps Cathy Moore's Haji Kamal scenario is discussed on Cathy's blog: http://blog.cathy-moore.com/2010/05/elearning-example-branching-scenario/ The College of Extraordinary Experiences in Poland is online at: https://www.extraordinary.college/ Kenny's work-in-progress acrostic for 'experience design' is: U - Unexpected (Do people know it is going to happen?) S - Setting (Where will you set the experience?) H - Humour (Can you disarm, without harming?) I - Interaction (Can you focus on the interaction, rather than tech?) F - Frame (How will you frame the experience?) T - Task (What will the challenges be during the experience?) The paper Owen discussed was: Morehead, K., Dunlosky, J., & Rawson, K. A. (2019). How Much Mightier Is the Pen than the Keyboard for Note-Taking? A Replication and Extension of Mueller and Oppenheimer (2014). Educational Psychology Review, 1-28. You can find out more about China's moon-based botany at: https://www.theatlantic.com/science/archive/2019/01/plants-flowers-international-space-station-moon-mars/581491/ NASA's surprisingly comprehensive list of U.S. material on the Moon is online at: https://history.nasa.gov/FINAL%20Catalogue%20of%20Manmade%20Material%20on%20the%20Moon.pdf

How Client Feedback Helped Transform a Houston Health Agency

Stanford Social Innovation Review Podcast

Play Episode Listen Later Jan 29, 2019 9:51

Due to her father’s work as an engineer, Paula John moved around a lot in her youth. She often felt seen but not heard in the relationship with her dad. With her own family, she tried hard to listen, and she expected the same consideration from her local Houston health agency, she told former NPR host Bill Littlefield. When she reached out to the agency for help with an illness, and it sent her home empty-handed after a four-hour wait, she gave it harsh feedback. “She was right,” said Cathy Moore, executive director of Epiphany Community Health Outreach Services (ECHOS). “Some of the things she said were some of the things we focused on most.” Through a Listen for Good grant, ECHOS began regularly surveying clients like John and responding to their feedback to transform the way ECHOS works. https://ssir.org/podcasts/entry/how_client_feedback_helped_transform_a_houston_health_agency

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126 — Christmas Special: Have I Got L&D News For You

Play Episode Listen Later Dec 18, 2018 34:16

Come in and know us better, man! It's time for the GoodPractice Podcast Christmas Special! Always a holiday favourite (and, for many, the true start of the festive season), this year we're hosting a panel quiz. Rosses D and G are hosting, with Owen Ferguson and Keira Hodge pitted against Jonny Anderson and Jo Cook. Topics include L&D trends, automation and the end of face-to-face training. And we reveal a definitive answer to the question: 'Did virtual reality transform L&D this year?' If you'd like to share your thoughts on this episode, you can find us on Twitter @RossGarnerGP, @Ross__Dickie, @OwenFerguson, @KezzaFarley, @BioFractal and @LightbulbJo. To find out more about GoodPractice, visit goodpractice.com or tweet us @GoodPractice or @GoodPracticeAus. You can find out more about Jo at lightbulbmoment.info. If you're wondering what the buzzer noises are, check out episode 49 in evidence-based practice (which also happens to be one of our most popular episodes): http://podcast.goodpractice.com/evidence-based-practice-for-hr-and-ld If you're just looking for a quick definition: Handschuhschneeballwerfer (n.): a coward willing to criticize and abuse from a safe distance Fremdschämen (n.): the almost-horror you feel when you notice that somebody is oblivious to how embarrassing they truly are See Hello Giggles for more: https://hellogiggles.com/lifestyle/10-fabulous-german-words-english-equivalent/ Cathy Moore, who Jo referenced, has appeared on the GoodPractice Podcast here: http://podcast.goodpractice.com/112-how-do-you-design-for-behaviour-change ... and on the Training Journal podcast, here: http://blog.cathy-moore.com/action-mapping/audio-interviews-about-action-mapping/action-mapping-interview-january-2018/ You can download our latest research into 70:20:10 here: https://www.goodpractice.com/ld-resources/the-evolution-of-702010/ We'll be back in the new year. Until then, have a great Christmas!

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112 — How do you design for behaviour change?

education hispanic superintendents innovation officer leadership conversations johnston county cathy moore

Play Episode Listen Later Sep 11, 2018 33:41

It's an exciting week on The GoodPractice Podcast as Cathy Moore joins Ross G and James to explore her 'action mapping' technique. Action mapping is an outcomes-focused approach to behaviour change that we use at the start of every project. It was a real thrill to discuss it in detail (and check that we were doing it right!). If you'd like to share your thoughts on the show, you can find us on Twitter @RossGarnerGP, @JamesMcLuckie and @CatMoore. To find out more about GoodPractice, visit goodpractice.com or tweet us @GoodPractice and @GoodPracticeAus. Cathy is speaking at the OEB conference later this year if you want to hear from her in person. Find out more at: https://oeb.global/ She blogs at blog.cathy-moore.com The assessment concept Ross discussed, 'consequential validity', is covered here: Boud, D. (1995). 'Assessment and learning: contradictory or complementary'. In: Knight, P. ed. Assessment for Learning in Higher Education. London: Kogan Page/SEDA. pp. 35-48. Yes, Ross is back at uni, so look forward to another 10 weeks of academic references.

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Episode 69 - Leadership Conversations

Education Matters

Play Episode Listen Later Jul 27, 2018 24:34

Cathy Moore was named Superintendent of Wake County Public Schools in May. It’s the largest school system in the state and the 15th largest in the country. She is the first woman and first Hispanic to hold the district’s top job and we talk to her on this week’s show. We also take a look at a new partnership in Johnston County aimed at recruiting more home-grown teachers. Guests: • Cathy Moore, Superintendent, Wake County Public School System • Brandon Garland, Innovation Officer, Johnston County Public Schools • Dr. Mary Ann Danowitz, Dean, NC State College of Education

Action Mapping and Activity Design with Cathy Moore

Leading Learning - The Show for Leaders in the Business of Lifelong Learning, Continuing Education, and Professional Develop

Play Episode Listen Later Mar 13, 2018 30:31

When it comes to training design, perhaps focusing on what people need to be able to do, not simply what they need to know, can make all the difference. That’s because this leads to activity-centered training rather than traditional information presentations. These concepts are what led Cathy Moore, speaker, training designer, and author of Map It: The Hands-On Guide to Strategic Training Design, to create the action mapping model. Her goal is to “save the world from boring instruction” and her tools and resources are helping to do this one learner at a time. In this episode of the Leading Learning podcast, Celisa talks with Cathy about action mapping including what it is, why it’s effective, and how to apply it. They also cover the role action mapping plays in measurement and evaluation and scenario design. Full show notes available at https://www.leadinglearning.com/episode125. Thank you to Blue Sky eLearn, sponsor of the Leading Learning podcast for the first quarter of 2018. Blue Sky is the maker of the Path learning management system, an award-winning, cloud-based learning solution that empowers your organization to maximize its message. Blue Sky also provides a range of virtual event and instructional services to help you maximize your content and create deeper engagement with your audience. To find out more about Blue Sky eLearn and everything it offers, visit http://www.blueskyelearn.com. Highlighted Resource – a collection of Action Mapping resources created by Cathy Moore.

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Cathy Moore - Creator of Action Mapping

TLDCast Podcast

Play Episode Listen Later Mar 10, 2018 58:55

Cathy is an internationally recognized training designer dedicated to saving the world from boring instruction. She’s a passionate advocate for improving business performance by respecting and deeply challenging people. Her advice and designs have been used by organizations that include Microsoft, Pfizer, the US Army, Barclays, and the US Department of the Interior. She’s the creator of the action mapping model of training design used to improve performance by companies worldwide. A fun speaker, Cathy has presented her ideas for improving instructional design in several countries. She’s also an in-demand webinar presenter with an irreverent style. This podcast is powered by ZenCast.fm

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Learning Through Games (with Ellen Burns-Johnson)

Nice Games Club

Play Episode Listen Later Mar 6, 2018

Your nice hosts welcome instructional designer Ellen Burns-Johnson to the clubhouse, as we discuss the many ways to approach teaching using interactive games. Along the way, we talk about bugs (of the many leg variety), snow falling from buildings, and traumatizing but educational game experiences. Learning Through Games Game DesignUI / UXEllen references THOTH, a twin-stick shooter made by Carlsen Games.Much of Ellen's work is based off of the CCAF framework.Learn about how to make fake news from the educator backed Bad News.Custom eLearning Vs. Off-The-Shelf eLearning: Which Is Right For You? - Ayesha Habeeb Omer, Ph.D, eLearning IndustryCathy Moore talks about training design ideas on her blogKentucky Fried Chicken's Virtual Reality game The Hard Way - YouTubeAssassin's Creed Origins' new educational mode is a violence-free tour through … - Andrew Webster, The VergeEllen played SimAnt as a kid!Ellen Burns-JohnsonYour Nice HostGuestBy day, Ellen Burns-Johnson is a learning experience designer (LXD) and consultant. With more than a decade of experience in the education and training industries, she has crafted the instructional strategy and design for dozens of major initiatives across diverse topics, from classroom safety to IT sales. Emphasizing collaboration and playfulness in her approach to creating learning experiences, Ellen's work has earned multiple awards for interactivity and gameful design.By night (and on the weekends) Ellen stays as plugged into the Twin Cities Gamedev scene as she's able to, contributing to game jam teams and local projects. She was a level designer and “explosion czar” on Widget Satchel and a designer/producer for a few different Ludum Dare and Global Game Jam teams.Ellen lives in Saint Paul with her husband Eric and their two dogs, Dante and Pixel. Ellen is terrible at racing games, she always picks the sniper build, and she loves a good puzzle/platformer. External link Ellen on LinkedInEllen on Twitter

If you are frustrated with the limited models available for instructional design, then you’ll be interested in this conversation with Cathy Moore. She is the creator of Action Mapping, a model of training design that focuses on improving workplace performance.

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Cathy Moore on action mapping pt5

Play Episode Listen Later Feb 6, 2018 5:16

TJ deputy editor Jo Cook finishes her mega-chat with author and training designer Cathy Moore about action mapping and her new book, Map It. Get more info on Map It here blog.cathy-moore.com/book-map-it/

Cathy Moore on action mapping pt4

Play Episode Listen Later Jan 29, 2018 10:29

Our deputy editor Jo Cook's back with the penultimate part of her mammoth chat with action mapping expert Cathy Moore about latest book Map It. Get more info on Map It here blog.cathy-moore.com/book-map-it/

Cathy Moore on action mapping pt3

Play Episode Listen Later Jan 23, 2018 9:09

Part three of Jo Cook's chat with author and training designer Cathy Moore about action mapping and her new book, Map It. Get more info on Map It here blog.cathy-moore.com/book-map-it/

Cathy Moore on action mapping pt2

Play Episode Listen Later Jan 19, 2018 9:11

Our deputy editor Jo Cook continues her chat with author and training designer Cathy Moore about action mapping and her new book, Map It. Get more info on Map It here blog.cathy-moore.com/book-map-it/

Cathy Moore on action mapping

Play Episode Listen Later Jan 16, 2018 8:27

Our deputy editor Jo Cook talks to author and training designer Cathy Moore about action mapping and her new book, Map It. This is part one of five - it's a fascinating chat and there's a lot to say, so look out for the next few parts in the coming weeks. Get more info on Map It here http://blog.cathy-moore.com/book-map-it/

55 — How can L&D start delivering online learning?