We’ve semi-finalized the debate script. The debate will be in the Lincoln High School auditorium, entering from 44th and Woodlawn Ave. The City Council debate goes from 5:30 to 6:30 and includes Bagshaw, Bellomio, Licata-ish stand in, Fruit, Sawant, Conlin, and Shen. The Mayoral debate goes from 6:35 to 7:30 and features McGinn and Murray.
This is our neighborhood debate for city races, so we need a good community turn out to show the candidates we’re paying attention. I thought it would be interesting to post the debate questions here to see if fresh eyes could make some improvements. Let us know in the comments if you see a need for a particular question or for a format tweak. Thanks!
“Script” is right. Are all debates this structured? I will be in attendance, but wonder if I’m actually going to learn anything that I cannot find out on the candidates’ websites.
Yes, all debates are this structured. If you think some questions are “answered on the candidates websites” please mention which, and ideally suggest a more interesting question.
Too many of these debates feature the same five questions that are really designed to get the candidates to say they agree with the questioner. “Don’t you agree parking is bad? Don’t you agree bike lanes are good?” And so on. That’s boring. Let’s get some interesting questions going:
• The federal government may default tomorrow and throw our country into chaos. If that happens, will you declare Seattle an independent nation so we don’t go down with the Tea Party ship?
• What will you do if you lose?
• Seahawks or Sounders?
• How would you use the power of the mayor’s office to fix the Mariners?
• What is the most egregious lie told about you by the Seattle Times?
• Which Soviet leader do you most admire and why?
• We’ve legalized pot and gays can get married. What socially liberal thing should Seattle do next to piss off Fox News?
Surely these kinds of questions would be better than the same boring, stale questions that are just rehashes of conventional wisdom that one gets at any other debate.
I don’t work for the city government, but this paragraph is insulting:
“Government agencies are not directly funded by their customers, which can result in agencies that are more focused on internal politics and positioning themselves for the next round of budgeting than they are on serving the public. For instance, the current customer response time for reports to the new find it, fix it app is a full month. How will you make government workers feel more accountable to the people they serve, and how will you make government managers feel more accountable to the people that work for them?”
Why are you saying that slow response times = unaccountable public employees? Why don’t you ask why the response times are slow? And what he will do about it?
Junipero: Great! I took a crack at munging that into a question that the candidates might answer in an interesting way. The key thing though is to keep the spotlight on the candidates and not the moderator, so it needs to be a setup for a question that’s interesting to answer. For instance, “what will you do if you lose” is funny but will simply lead to a denial and 3 minutes of what? The Soviet / Fox News question I like though. Come to the debate!
Stacey: To make room for Junipero’s question I cut government accountability entirely. Government accountability pshaw. Also, if you ask why response times are slow the answer is “understaffed”. The issue is that it never takes 1 month+ for Amazon customer service to reply, regardless of staffing issues. They don’t bite off more than they can chew, and if a mouth is full then other mouths step in to help with chewing. Having said all that, the question is probably too dry for a debate anyhow. Super important, but too dry.
Caveat: I might get overruled by our committee on these changes.
Much as I dislike our current Mayor, I can’t bring myself to vote for Murray. For one thing, I see lots of establishment ties, but I don’t see true leadership there, and certainly not in recent Legislative sessions.
It’s not lost on me that perhaps one of the reasons McGinn has had difficulty is that he picked up some of Ron Sims’ former staff. Too bad!
So, and kind of consistent with Stacy’s post, if we’re talking “change,” perhaps my question to Murray would be: “Are you intending to bring in a new Cabinet, and if so, from where? More former legislative aides like yourself? People you owe political favors? Do you plan to hire anyone with ANY experience? How will you truly effect any change if you don’t make changes, and given you lack that kind of management experience, how do you propose to make that happen within the organization you plan to run, that being City government?”
If Murray can’t back his statements up with something that shows he can be the CEO of an organization with, what, 10,000 employees, I just don’t see that anything will be different. And much as it pains me, I’ll stick with McGinn.
The Fox News question is kind of lame for a mayoral debate, since pot legalization and gay marriage were both passed with statewide votes of the people.
Since this is a neighborhood debate, let’s focus on issues that affect our neighborhood, like the possibility of funding light rail expansion from the U District to Ballard, something that McGinn has advocated.
Or how about the issue of CVS coming to Wallingford? McGinn blocked the sale of a public alleyway to Whole Foods because they don’t pay a living wage. Is there a similar avenue to pursue in Wallingford with CVS?
I’m heartened to read comments like Neighbor2You’s above. Ed Murray is totally unqualified to be mayor of Seattle. I personally like McGinn and think he’s done a good job as mayor. I’m probably in the minority in that opinion, but regardless of your opinion of Mayor McGinn, I know that Ed Murray would be a much, much worse choice.
I’d like to know why Murray thinks the missing link has something to do with Lake Union and why he thinks Shilshole Avenue is a narrow street. Has he ever actually been there?
Please check out all the developments on Woodland Park Ave – stretch between 36th and 40th is totally disrupted by huge multi-units. I also suggest questioning all candidates on the utility of “live-work” spaces (apparently currently required for all
multi-units) and commercial spaces in multi-units – is lack of parking causing these
spaces to go unfilled (on Stoneway, at a minimum)? We need public parking lots in
South Wallingford. See you tonight!
@Neighbor2You: I like the topic of Murray making the transition from legislator to mayor and hiring aids, but I’m not sure how to ask a question that would get a good answer. Wouldn’t Murray just say he plans to hire the most qualified people for the job from all sources and yadda yadda yadda? Also, we can’t be hostile to anyone.
@Doug: Yeah, you’re right, I pulled the question. Still, the debate needs humor and to cover larger topics, not just go into the policy weeds. I’ll discuss with the moderator and pass the joke questions on to him.
I swapped the Fox News question for one you raise on building rail to Ballard. Thanks for calling out that issue- it’s a good one we had missed.
CVS is a great topic, but we don’t have a leg to stand on- they’re now talking about just renovating the interior of the old building now, not making any land use changes at all. Can you think of a good question to ask?
@Breadbaker: Murray clearly wasn’t familiar when he ad libbed to the Seattle Times, but he back pedaled with a statement on his Web site that seems to match up to existing policy. See the question in the script on the missing link, let me know if you see a need for changes.
@Mary: I see the issue, but I don’t know the zoning rules well enough to add a question here. Also, a point of ground floor retail / live & work is to reduce the need for cars, so parking is discouraged. I expect the hope is that those ground floor units will be rented very cheaply, allowing for neighborhood-enriching ground floor businesses and live / work arrangements. For a question we ideally need numbers like vacancy rates and a specific policy issue we’re pushing on.
@Eric, thank you for latest your comment, and for those previous. And if I may make a minor correction, I should have clarified that I am interested not only in who Ed Murray might hire for his own Mayoral staff, but also his plans for his Cabinet, as in, Department appointments.
I do acknowledge my severe misgivings about this candidate to run our City, but no intention to be hostile. And I do think it is a fair question to ask what his transition plan consists of at this time. The personnel requirements to set up shop and begin directing an agenda for change should be known by now.
My fear is there is no agenda, just vague stuff. So how about “If you were elected, what are your priorities for action? What would you do in your first 100 days in office? What are your plans for creating a Cabinet to carry forward your plans for change?”
@Neighbor2You: Thanks! That’s perfect. I added this to Murray:
In terms of what gets done in office, priorities and personnel are often more important than policy positions. If you are elected, what are your first, second, and third priorities for action, and what are your plans for creating a Cabinet to carry forward your plans?
@Eric: I’m not totally familiar with what businesses should expect from the city, but maybe something like this:
“Mayor McGinn: CVS is planning to gut the existing buildings at 45th and Meridian and build out a 10,000 square foot (?) store in that space. This project is deeply unpopular in Wallingford, as we already have three pharmacies in the neighborhood, and national mega-chains such as CVS do not fit well within our existing urban village.
Knowing that you were able to block a Whole Foods in West Seattle by not selling them a public alleyway, are there any similar avenues the City could take in blocking the sale of this space to CVS? For example: What sort of accommodations have to be made for CVS’s presumably large trucks to use city streets or block the bus stop on Meridian to park during deliveries?”
Seattle mayoral politics is always entertaining, but the results don’t have much effect. Under our charter, the Mayor is weak executive. Not entirely irrelevant, but not exactly powerful. Most of the power to shape and execute policy lies with the City Council.
@Doug: Thanks! Added to council questions since mayor is full up and, as prop3 said, council has more power here. A new law would need to be written, such as one prohibiting national retail chains over a certain size in urban villages. CVS is in no way disobeying existing law. I’m not even sure if a new law will work, but it’s an interesting issue to explore in general.
Any follow-up from the debate? How did it go? What were people’s impressions? Anyone’s votes swayed?
@Kelly: Thanks for asking! When the debate video stream is posted I plan a follow up post with the positions the candidates took.
I personally thought the council debate went great. Shen and Conlin both managed to flip my personal vote in their favor, with Shen being especially strong I thought. Then again, nothing serves a candidate better than debating an opponent who can’t be bothered to show up!
The mayoral debate was a bit flat I thought- it needed audience participation and some more yes / no questions like council got. We had hoped the two would mix it up if we kept the format more open, but the candidates are separated more by style than substance. That makes a debate tough. Somewhere along the line we also made a mistake and the candidates did not have a current debate script copy to prepare with, so they weren’t as ready as they should have been. McGinn is clearly the one I’d rather have a beer with, but of course that criteria is how we ended up with George Bush, so I’m personally undecided for mayor…
I worked late and missed the City Council debate. The mayoral debate was indeed flat. Mike McGinn was well-informed on issues related to the City, and was able to point to several points of accomplishment in the past four years. Ed Murray was dull and clueless…noun, verb, marriage equality.
@Doug: The trouble is that the arguments for Murray clearly aren’t related to his local knowledge, debating skills, issue positions, or charisma. The only argument for Murray is McGinn can’t work successfully with people at the city, county, state, and federal level. I think if McGinn would be winning if he was showing contrition. He needs to say things like that he’d meet more with council going forward, that he sees how the tunnel can be good for buses and carpools, that he regrets how he provoked disputes X, Y, and Z in his first term. Politicians need to be able to compromise, just look at Washington these days.
McGinn is an issues glamor boy, someone who rounds up a portfolio of progressive issues and makes it his business to push them hard. I don’t think it’s the greatest thing for the city, but it’s what we voted for, and given that I’d rather see an honest and committed performance. I don’t know what Murray brings as an alternative, other than less commitment and perhaps honesty. That’s where I am on Conlin vs. Sawant, too – Sawant may not be really qualified, but we can manage with someone like that on the council; we need more honest commitment like that, and for that Conlin’s the first one that has to go.
@Eric: McGinn and the city council work fine together. Somehow they manage to pass city budgets year after year, and Seattle is doing pretty well considering the crappy economy we’ve had during McGinn’s first four years.
I’m not sure what the regrettable “disputes X, Y and Z” that you speak of are. The mayor is not a rubber stamp for the city council, and that’s okay by me. The fact that Murray is endorsed by some of the least-effective and least-accountable members of the current city council (Godden, Clark, Burgess and Rasmussen) is telling.
Last night Murray spoke of McGinn shunning some of the Seattle’s fine political leaders of the past. As usual Murray was short on details, so I’m not sure who he was speaking of, but I’m guessing he’s referring to folks in the Nickels administration. That administration was completely unfriendly to the needs of neighborhoods, and accountable only to political insiders and cronies. Do we want a return of that?
Regarding McGinn incidents, I can think of a few off hand- the lawsuit with the feds over police, failing to attend the launch of the tunnel when everybody else went, name calling the governor, and godden calling out that he fails to even meet with her. I’m sure there’s lots more given murray’s endorsement list, which is basically everyone, including all prior seattle mayors. Compare mcginn with obrien- same politics, but obrien is much loved, and a great opposition candidate like Shen can’t dent him.
@22: McGinn is hardly a toady for SPD. There’s a reason the corrupt Seattle Police Guild endorsed Ed Murray. Did McGinn take the first offer from the feds regarding police reform like the city council wanted him to? No, he negotiated for a better one. The fact that McGinn attended the memorial service for John T Williams says a lot to me as well.
Why would McGinn show up at the tunnel launch? He had absolutely nothing to do with the project. And since he was in opposition of the project, his appearance would’ve been viewed as hypocritical, and he’d be chastised for that. Peter Hahn (his transportation director) was there. That seems appropriate.
McGinn didn’t “name call” the governor. He simply said that Christine Gregoire could not be trusted to protect Seattle from tunnel cost-overruns, which was entirely true since Gregoire refused to sponsor a 2010 bill that would’ve protected us from these overruns. Additionally, Gregoire refused to veto language in a 2009 bill holding Seattle property owners accountable for these overruns. I like that the mayor was fighting for Seattle.
Finally, Jean Godden will forever be a gossip columnist.
Well, to take one example, if McGinn had showed up at the tunnel launch it would have shown he was willing to stop fighting a done deal, heal wounds, and look to make the best of things. It would have been taken as a healing moment, not hypocrisy at all. It’s not “fighting for Seattle” to lash out at Gregoire, who was just compromising to get a bill passed. It’s not like Gregoire wanted that language in the bill. Seriously, not compromising on the left is every bit as bad as not compromising on the right- it leads to governmental collapse, which is a real threat these days.
Protecting Seattle from tunnel cost overruns is not a left/right issue.
My understanding is that the provision was unconstitutional to begin with and that it was just put in as cover so legislators outside Seattle could vote for the legislation. In case that turns out to be wrong, throwing fits and pissing off the state government surely isn’t the way to protect Seattle from overruns. If he actually cared about that issue and wasn’t just bitter about losing the fight then he’d be looking to build relationships in the legislature and make sure the project went as smoothly as possible.
Frank Chopp (our dear Representative For Life) was the legislator who included the provision that Seattle property owners be responsible for cost overruns. Here’s a 2010 article to provide a refresher.
Key quotes:
“The stick-it-to Seattle provision was included at the insistence of House Speaker Frank Chopp, a Seattle Democrat who also dislikes the tunnel and sometimes finds himself allied with McGinn on transportation issues…
“Gregoire said of viaduct tunnel cost overruns: ‘It’s a hypothetical, it has no bearing. There’s no reason to expect cost overruns.'”
So that was Gregoire’s response to McGinn: Don’t mind what the law says, just trust me.
I don’t think that link worked. Trying again here.