Tag Archives: Jason Ritchie

As City Council vote nears, does readership predict outcome?

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As Sammamish’s City Council primary heads into the final weekend before Tuesday’s vote, Sammamish Comment tracked the reader views of the questionnaires to gauge interest in the candidates.

There is no polling of a City Council election that we know of, so the readership of the questionnaires is the only solid evidence of interest in candidates.

Facebook has had a lively discussion of some of the candidates, but the participants are tilted decisively into a no-growth camp.

The readership interest in the candidate questionnaires is not scientific, but it’s the only thing we have to go on.

The question is, will this be a predictor of the outcome Tuesday night?

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Good candidates, good answers, rookie mistakes

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  • Sammamish Comment recommendations for City Council candidates to advance to the November general election begins tomorrow.
  • A full report of the Candidates Forum is in the next post, below.

Commentary

Sammamish residents have an unusually good set of candidates this year from which to choose for the Aug. 1 primary, and from this, the November general election.

This hasn’t always been the case. In some years, some very weak candidates, or some with clear and self-evident personal agendas, ran. In several years, at least some incumbents were unopposed or had token opposition.

There are nine candidates seeking three Council seats, requiring a primary. These are in Positions 3, 5 and 7.

Position 3 candidates are Minal Ghassemieh, Karen Howe and Karen Moran.

Position 5 candidates are Ryika Hooshangi, Rituja Indapure and Chris Ross.

Position 7 candidates are Melanie Curtright, John Robinson and Pamela Stuart.

Position 1 candidates, Mark Baughman and Jason Ritchie, go straight to the November election; they are not on the Aug. 1 primary ballot.

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Position 1 City Council Candidate Questionnaires today

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Today Sammamish Comment publishes the candidate questionnaires of Position 1 for City Council.

Note that because there are only two candidates seeking this position, they do not appear on the Aug. 1 primary ballot. However, Sammamish Comment believes it is only fair that all candidates respond to the questions at the same time.

Position 1

The candidates for Position 1 are Mark Baughman and Jason Ritchie.

The candidate responses are printed verbatim. The Comment only checked their responses for spelling and grammar. Each response is in its own post, so scroll down on The Comment’s Home Page to see each response.

The responses were reviewed and processed by Scott Hamilton.

Position 1 Questionnaire: Jason Ritchie

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Jason Ritchie

Questionnaire

Name:  Jason Ritchie

Position:  Sammamish City Council Position 1

 General

Why are you running for Sammamish City Council?

I believe in public service. I want to be a part of creating a future for our City that we can all be proud of. This means managing growth with significant investments into our infrastructure, protecting our environment, including heritage trees and wildlife and making sure we are creating a transparent, accountable and balanced budget process. I own and operate a small business here in Sammamish helping to create housing for people with physical challenges. I want to be a voice for the small business owner on the Council.

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Democrats, Unions lining up behind some City Council candidates

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Democratic elected officials and other known Democrats, plus several labor union organizations, are lining up behind several candidates in the Sammamish City Council primary.

The City Council is a non-partisan election, but it’s not at all unusual for the Democratic and Republican parties to endorse and even send mailers or undertake robocalls on behalf of candidates.

So far, the Republicans haven’t endorsed any of the candidates–at least none is listed on any of the candidate websites–except for King County Council Member Kathy Lambert.

Unlike the 2015 City Council election, the incumbents are largely staying out of this election. The exception: Kathy Huckabay, who is retiring at the end of her term in December. Huckabay publicly endorsed Jason Ritchie, who is running in Position 1. (Position 1 is not on the Aug. 1 primary ballot, however.)

Former Mayor Tom Vance, who was defeated in his bid for reelection in 2015, endorsed two candidates.

Behind the scenes, several Council Members are helping candidates.

A graphic of the elected officials and organization endorsements is below the jump.

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