The Sahalee (and Timberline) Candidate forum was 2:21 hours long.
The next question is “What is different between you and your opponent”. The first bite-size clip features Kent Treen and Karen Howe, who are running for seat 4:
https://youtu.be/Wo4lnDqPDVA
By Scott Hamilton
Analysis
Sept. 16, 2019: The agreement between Sammamish and the YMCA for the latter to run the community center was the result of a sole-source, no-bid contract.
No Request for Proposals was issued that would compete management of the center.
The contract between Sammamish and the YMCA was a sole-source, no-bid arrangement. No Requests for Proposals were issued. A Sammamish businessman wanted to bid. City of Sammamish photo.
An offer by a Sammamish health club owner to submit a bid that would return 15% of the gross receipts to the city didn’t even get a hearing.
One of the leading advocates throughout the years for the YMCA was a city council member who also sat on the YMCA board, a clear conflict of interest that was ignore by the city administration and a successive series of city councils. (This member was off the council in 2012-13, when the votes were held.)
The YMCA was fundamentally the only entity supported by the city for nearly a decade before a contract was negotiated.
These lie at the roots of the current controversial examination of the city’s management contract with the YMCA that sees the agency siphoning off $1.4m a year to the Greater Seattle YMCA rather than keeping the money in Sammamish or sharing the profits with the city’s general fund.
The Sahalee (and Timberline) Candidate forum was 2:21 hours long.
The next question is “What is different between you and your opponent”. The first bite-size clip features Christie Malchow and Karen McKnight, who are running for seat 2:
https://youtu.be/fnE2aticAdg
The Sahalee (and Timberline) Candidate forum was 2:21 hours long.
The next question is “What is different between you and your opponent”. The first bite-size clip features Rituja Indapure and Ken Gamblin, who are running for seat 6.
The Sahalee (and Timberline) Candidate forum was 2:21 hours long. This is the first of 
series of short clips each featuring one question and the candidates’ responses.
We plan to provide the entire event in “bite size” clips.
The first clip is below.
By Miki Mullor
Editor
Controversy erupted in August when the City of Sammamish announced that STCA’s Town Center Phase I project passed traffic concurrency.
The City Council convened for a special meeting Aug. 20 to question how was it that this project, 419 homes and commercial space, that has failed concurrency for nine month suddenly passed it.
Related stories:
Now, emails obtained by the Sammamish Comment through a public records request reveal that city staff inexplicably overruled its own engineer in favor of STCA’s engineer when forecasting the number of car trips the project would generate.
The staff’s decision lowered the forecasted traffic impact of STCA Phase I by at least 19% in the AM and 30% in the PM peak hours.
In order to fully understand the implications of ignoring the city traffic engineer and accepting STCA’s traffic consultant data instead, some background is necessary.
Continue readingThe full length video of the City Council candidate forum that was held at the Sahalee Country Club on Sept. 5 is now available.
The event was hosted by Sahalee HOA and Timberline HOA and was moderated by David Steele, Vice President of Sahalee HOA. About 150 residents attended – 2/3 of which is estimated to be residents from other parts of the city.
