Whitten answers issues questionnaire

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General Information

Name: Nancy Whitten

1. City Council Position Sought:        Position 2

2. Neighborhood you live in: Pine Lake

3. General area you live in: (e.g., SE 20th St. and 212th Ave. SE.)  By Pine Lake Park

4. Current or Previous positions in city government (and dates).   Sammamish City Council 2004-current; Suburban Cities alternate to the King County Growth Management PC, 2004-05; Suburban Cities alternate to the Puget Sound Regional Council Growth Management PB, 2006-10; City of Sammamish representative to Suburban City Assn., 2005-10.

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Richardson answers issues questionnaire

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General Information

Name:  Kathy Richardson

1. City Council Position Sought:  Position #2

2. Neighborhood you live in: If you don’t resident in a recognized neighborhood, please skip to next question.

3. General area you live in: North Lake Sammamish

4. Current or Previous positions in city government (and dates).

Planning Commission Position #5, 2010 – present; Vice Chair 2011.

Planning Commission representative on the Parks, Recreation, and Open Space Steering Committee, October 2010 – present.

5. Current or Previous positions in community organizations (and dates):

Founding member of Sammamish Homeowners (SHO), 2009 – present.

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Publication schedule for candidate responses to issues questionnaire

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Beginning October 13, I will publish candidate responses to a long issues questionnaire I sent the six city council candidates, leading up to the mailing of ballots to voters October 19 for the November 8 election.

Here is the schedule:

Position 2:

October 13: Kathy Richardson

October 14: Nancy Whitten

Position 4:

October 15: Ramiro Valderrama

October 16: Jim Wasnick

Position 6:

October 17: Jesse Bornfreund

October 18: Tom Vance

Other

October 19: A wrap-up view of the election.

October 20: A final comment.

November 8, 8:15pm: The initial returns are in. Based on the history of the past elections since 1999, the election night returns are within one or two percentage points of the final results and the leader on election night has been the winner in the final results. The only exception was in 2001 when Nancy Whitten led incumbent Ken Kilroy by 17 votes but lost the election by fewer than 150 (while remaining within the 1-2 percentage point “rule”). So on election night, I should be able to “call” the elections unless there is a squeaker like the 2001 Whitten-Kilroy race.

Issues questionnaire coming

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I will begin publishing later this week candidate responses to a long list of questions I posed concerning issues relevant to the City of Sammamish.

I sent the questionnaire to all six candidates shortly after the August primary. I’ll publish the returns in advance of October 19, when the first election ballots are mailed to voters–just nine days from this post.

Unlike the newspapers, where space is at a premium, these are much more expansive and the responses will be published verbatim, without edits of any kind.

Assessing the candidates’ forum

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Five of the six Sammamish candidates for City Council appeared at forum last week sponsored by the Rotary Club and the Kiwanis Club.

Kathy Richardson, who had planned a trip to Africa before she decided to run for City Council, was absent. She had a video-taped statement and a stand-in give a closing statement.

As far as the performance of the other candidates, there wasn’t really much difference between them on the issues. All believe the current City Council did not consider alternatives for creating a Community Center, the $64 million Taj Mahal that is proposed for the Kellman property in the Sammamish Commons. This 98,000sf proposal is 2 1/2 times the size of City Hall. Each of the candidates believes a public-private partnership should be considered, along with the possibility of a location outside the Town Center.

Some criticized Jesse Bornfreund as detached. Our view was that he was “relaxed.”

None supports a utility tax for general purposes and there was only limited support if for a specific purpose.

Who “won?”

Tom Vance was clearly the most well informed and in command of the details and nuances. We’ve remarked that nobody can out policy-wonk Vance. Nancy Whitten was second-best on wonkiness. Whether you agree with their positions is another matter. From a “performance” standpoint, Vance was the “winner.”

The other candidates had varying levels of knowledge of the issues, relying more on philosophical approaches to governing Sammamish in the next four years.

The Sammamish Review and Sammamish Patch have more detailed stories.