Daily Archives: August 12, 2015

Stan Bump, Sammamish icon, passes away

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Aug. 12, 2015: Stan Bump, a very close friend, formerly of Sammamish and a former member of the Sammamish Planning Commission, died yesterday after a long struggle with ALS, more commonly known as Lou Gehrig’s disease.

Stan Bump

Stan and his wife Ellie became a fixture at Sammamish City Council meetings after his term expired on the Planning Commission. The Council reserved seats for them in the front row–the only citizens so honored–for their long dedication to attending council meetings.

Stan was a career Naval officer, retiring as Rear Admiral, with his last command that of Kings Bay (GA), an Ohio-Class Trident Nuclear submarine base. When I had to unusual opportunity of spending two days and two nights on the Trident sub, USS Maryland, in the Atlantic out of Kings Bay, I saw Adm. Stan Bump St. on the base.

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Transparency (or the lack of it), the evolving Sammamish City Newsletter and taxpayer dollars

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The August Sammamish City Newsletter contained a front page article about the state of the City’s finances and the Six Year Transportation Improvement Program (TIP).

This was followed on the next page by the Mayor’s Message, in this case from Tom Vance, who is in his second year as mayor.

The articles are clearly responses to public questions about the TIP funding and proposed City expenditures in the hundreds of millions of dollars over the next six years for a variety of projects, notably from Council Member Ramiro Valderrama. He’s repeatedly questioned the financial viability of the road projects and how these will be funded.

This column also questioned the TIP and its ending fund balance as adopted, showing a near-depletion by 2020.

The article is a clear response to Valderrama and to The Sammamish Comment. The Mayor’s Message is a clear puff piece, transparently touting policies and promotions as Vance heads into a reelection campaign that will get underway after Labor Day.

The City Newsletter has transformed from a means to inform citizens to a propaganda piece to refute questions raised by members of the City Council and the Public and, in the case of the Mayor, to defend his own practices from criticism.

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