Tag Archives: City Staff

City Clerk Melonie Anderson retires

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Commentary 

By Miki Mullor
Editor

Melonie Anderson

Tonight will be the last Sammamish City Council meeting for City Clerk Melonie Anderson who is retiring on June 30. Anderson is the longest tenure city employee and has been the city’s first permanent City Clerk.   

The role of the City Clerk is pivotal to records keeping of the local government. Every ordinance (local law) adopted by City Council must be authenticated by City Attorney and City Clerk to be true and correct to City Council’s action.

20 years of service 

The Sammamish Comment located the first ordinance Anderson authenticated. It was the Fireworks Ordinance, number 02000-65, adopted on June 28, 2000, prohibiting Fireworks discharge in the City. 

Anderson will retire exactly 20 years and two days after signing this ordinance for the City. 

Almost the entire body of the ordinances in Sammamish bears Anderson’s signature. 

A beacon of integrity 

The City Clerk’s role is also responsible for keeping the government transparent by providing access to government documents in response to public records requests. 

The Comment has used public records requests extensively over the years to uncover facts, documents, council and staff thinking and actions, wrongdoing  and to hold the City accountable.  The City Clerk’s team many times finds itself at odds by having to provide documents to the public that may put its employer and colleagues in unfavorable light. 

In this challenging environment, Anderson, a Sammamish resident herself, has been a beacon of integrity and transparency. Sammamish residents were well served by Anderson’s unwavering commitment to the law and for doing the right thing, even when faced with adversity from previous City Managers. 

It is with mixed feelings that we wish Anderson a happy retirement. Her calm presence at City Hall will be missed.  

Good luck, Melonie, in your retirement. Well deserved.

City Staff Secretly Meets With King County On Growth

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By Miki Mullor
Editor

Sammamish staff took deliberate steps to keep a meeting with county officials secret in order to avoid public records requests, Sammamish Comment discovered.

The meeting involved discussion to set growth targets for Sammamish. 

Staff-to-staff meetings aren’t typically public. They aren’t announced on government websites, meeting notices aren’t issued and the public isn’t invited to attend. But it’s highly unusual that a government takes steps to keep the meeting secret from public records.

Sammamish did just that over a meeting last month. Calendar entries for Sammamish staffers didn’t list the purpose of the meeting. A voice mail specifically detailed the motive to avoid public records requests.

Ironically, The Comment obtained the entries and voice mail under a public records request and was nevertheless able to piece together the purpose of the meeting and the motive for hiding it.

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Unfettered development vs controlling it is the only issue in this election

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By Scott Hamilton

Commentary

Sept. 20, 2019: It is now clear that the Sammamish City Council election this year has come down to one issue: unfettered development across the city vs controlling development so it doesn’t further overwhelm the roads and aggravate the congestion that already exists.

All other issues have taken a back seat.

If you support unfettered development, Karen McKnight, Rituja Indapure and Karen Howe are your choices for council.

If you want to control development and moderate traffic congestion, Christie Malchow, Kent Treen and Ken Gamblin are your choices.

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Staff confirms Klahanie annexation’s adverse affects on other road projects

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Aug. 26, 2019: The Klahanie area annexation to Sammamish in 2015 caused road projects in the legacy parts of the city to be delayed, despite promises from then-Mayor Tom Vance and then-City Manager Ben Yazici there would be no adverse impacts.

Then-Mayor Tom Vance and then-City Manager promised no ill affects on legacy Sammamish from Klahanie annexation.

Acting public works director Cheryl Paston confirmed at the City Council’s Aug. 20 meeting what Sammamish Comment feared and reported in 2015: the Klahanie annexation would divert money from key projects to fulfill a Christmas list of promises made by Vance, Yazici, council members Don Gerend and Ramiro Valderrama to entice Klahanie residents to vote to annex to Sammamish.

As the current city council debates over projects listings on the Transportation Improvement Plan—notably the Sahalee Way project—the 2015 council led by Vance and Yazici’s administration manipulated the TIP then to claim sharply reduced costs for a major Klahanie road project while simultaneously shifting monies from other road projects in legacy Sammamish.

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