The clock is running out on Ace Hardware’s effort to find a place to build and stay in Sammamish.
The lease expires at the end of August 2013. So far, every effort to work with the City of Sammamish to find a new location and clear the path to build has failed. It’s not for not trying.
As November fades to December and the last City Council meetings in Sammamish of the year, Members are going to be considering whether to grant citizens the right to Initiative.
The City Council has to allow this right—it didn’t come as part of incorporation.
The request for the right to Initiative comes from long-simmering frustration with the City and a perception that neither the Council nor the employees listen to Citizens.
As with most things, the reality is more a shade of gray than black and white. But there is certainly enough evidence over the course of the City’s 13 year history to understand the pent-up frustration.
Opinion polls gave failing grades to six of seven City Council Members, the work of the City Council as a whole, the City Staff and the City Manager.
The polls, conducted on this blog, are, to be sure, unscientific. But an unscientific poll conducted to gauge support for the Community Center proved to come within 2.5 percentage points of the final result.
Graphs of the Opinion polling about the City appear below the jump.
Except for Council Member Ramiro Valderrama, whose Favorable score was 78%, each council member’s favorables-unfavorables fell below any passing grade metric anywhere in any school.
Approve-disapprove polling for the City Council as a while, the City Staff and the City Manager also were failing scores.
And Don Gerend, who has been a council member since the formation of the City in 1999 and who has told people he intends to run for another term next year (after 14 years in office), should retire, respondents voted. Gerend, Mayor Tom Odell, Deputy Mayor John James and John Curley are up for election next year. Curley said when he was campaigning in 2009 he planned to serve only one term. If he follows through, this guarantees one open seat in the 2013 election.
My analysis of each poll results follows the graphs.
Through Nov. 14, King County Elections ballot results give the Sammamish Community Center a 53.18% Yes vote to 46.82% No. The margin is 1,402.
Through Nov. 14, 24,504 votes had been cast in all races and 22,030 in the Proposition 1 ballot. Total voter turnout recorded through Nov. 14 was 84.66% of the 28,998 registered voters.
Only 115 ballots from Sammamish were received Nov. 14.
This data is close enough to being finished that I can offer these observations:
The Sammamish Review has confirmed what was reported here earlier by a reader: Petco is coming to Sammamish. Here is the story.
Petco is moving into the vacant space previously rented by Hollywood Video. It’s also taking over space of the displace Rancho Grande restaurant, which was forced out due to a “leasing inconvenience.” Also displaced is the Sushi restaurant.
I’m still trying to confirm multiple reports that Trader Joe’s is what will displace Ace Hardware, whose lease expires in August 2013.
Sammamish Comment 