By Miki Mullor
Editor
STCA, the Town Center developer owned by Matt Samwick, has contributed $70,882.80 
to former Mayor Don Gerend’s Livable Sammamish PAC.
Gerend and Kathy Huckabay, also a former mayor of Sammamish, were the only citizen contributors to Livable Sammamish. Gerend was the public face of the political action committee.
Continue readingBy Miki Mullor
Editor
Development, the Town Center, traffic congestion and the 2019 city council election dominated the Top 10 2019 stories in Sammamish.
The Town Center became the surrogate for development throughout the city and the poster child for traffic congestion that is frustrating drivers across the Plateau.
The election, in which three city council seats and control of the council were at stake, became unusually bitter and set records for expenditures on both sides of what became a pro-development slate vs a slate that advocated “infrastructure first.”
Continue readingBy Scott Hamilton
Guest Contributor
Jay Inslee
A little noticed interview with Gov. Jay Inslee could potentially mean a new push to up-zone land in the Puget Sound region to accommodate more housing.
In a Dec. 10 interview with the Tacoma News Tribune, Inslee said “he will ask the state Legislature next year to approve major initiatives to increase the number of homes in Washington to address high prices and also take steps to reduce homelessness, which he called a ‘statewide crisis.’”
By Miki Mullor
Editor
STCA LLC’s first project in the Town Center area has been granted a “complete application” status by city staff. The significance of the status is that this particular project is now legally “vested, meaning any future change to the development code, such as density, design limitations or concurrency, will not apply to it.
The final results for the Nov. 5 election for Sammamish City Council have been certified by King County Elections.
There is no change in the outcome. Percentages compared with election night varied between 1 ½% to 2 ½%, the historic norm since Sammamish Comment has been following the elections from 1999.
By Scott Hamilton
Guest Contributor
In a maneuver reminiscent of Sen. John Kerry’s infamous “I was for it before I voted against it” declaration in the 2004 presidential election, Sammamish Council Member Pam Stuart declared she would support taking the 1% property tax increase allowed by law.
Council Member Pam Stuart
Then she voted against it when the vote was called.
She was the deciding vote in causing the motion to fail.
The vote came after the council on Nov. 19 added $270,000 to the city’s expenditures for the next year that hadn’t been budgeted.
This included $120,100 for the Technology Fund and $150,000 for a grant in the Health and Human Services Commission dedicated for youth mental health.
By Miki Mullor
Editor
The Sammamish City Council voted 6-1 tonight to authorize the Mayor to enter into a separation agreement with City Manager Rick Rudometkin. The vote authorized a one year severance pay for Rudometkin, who started last May. Rudometkin’s contract entitled him to 9 months of severance pay. The Council voted to grant him additional three months in return for a “smooth transition” and release from litigation. Council Member Ramiro Valderrama objected to the additional three months severance.
No reason was given to the decision, likely because the decision was discussed in an executive session and is therefore confidential.
The Council unanimously voted to appoint Deputy City Manager, Chip Corder, to an acting City manager.
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