Tag Archives: King County

Outraged, shocked, surprised about Sammamish cooking the books on concurrency? I’m not.

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  • The City Council meeting tonight at 6:30p will undoubtedly discuss the Mullor Study. The study may be accessed here.

Commentary

By Scott Hamilton

Scott Hamilton

The news yesterday that Sammamish has been using outdated traffic counts, mostly from 2012 but some from 2014 and none from 2016, to run its traffic concurrency tests for development applications is fundamentally cooking the books to approve projects.

I should be outraged, but I’m not.

I should be shocked, but I’m not.

I’m not even surprised.

It just goes to show you how far our city government and City Council declined over the years to become a mini-King County.

I reached this conclusion as far back as 2009. That was 10 years after Sammamish incorporated.

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County, State, water district elections for Sammamish

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Filings for candidates for the November election ended Friday. There are races other than those for Sammamish City Council of local interest.

King County Council

Kathy Lambert

As expected, incumbent Kathy Lambert filed for reelection to the District 3 seat of the King County Council. Sammamish is part of District 3.

Former Sammamish Mayor Tom Vance in March filed the necessary paperwork with the Public Disclosure Commission (PDC) to challenge Lambert, but in the end, he did not file the required documents to become a candidate.

Instead, John Murphy of North Bend filed to challenge Lambert. Continue reading →

Ex-Mayor Vance to oppose County Council Member Lambert

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Tom Vance

Former Sammamish Mayor Tom Vance yesterday filed with the State Public Disclosure Commission to run against incumbent Kathy Lambert, King County Council member of District 3, which includes Sammamish and Issaquah.

Sammamish Comment revealed March 20 Vance was trying to line up endorsements and had filed broad public records requests from Lambert’s office.

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Issaquah-Fall City Road cost jumps 36% over pre-annexation estimate

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The construction cost of Issaquah-Fall City Road (IFC) improvements quietly has gone up by 36%.

Or has it?

The Sammamish City Newsletter says the improvements to Issaquah-Fall City Road will now cost $36m. In 2015, the figure was $23m.

The March Sammamish City Newsletter’s page 1 article updating the plans to widen Issaquah-Fall City Road is the following, opening paragraph:

“When 10,000 Klahanie-area residents came into Sammamish last year, the city knew that a big responsibility was going to follow them through the door – a $36 million item known as Issaquah-Fall City Road.”

This figure is not what the City told Klahanie residents and the taxpayers of legacy Sammamish when promoting annexation to Sammamish.

Instead, then-City Manager Ben Yazici and then-Mayor Tom Vance said IFC Road would cost $23m, a reduction from the $38.8m King County priced the road improvements, cited by Issaquah.

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Candidates emerge for likely County Council run, 45th State Senate

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Tom Vance

Tom Vance, who was defeated in November 2015 in his reelection bid for the Sammamish City Council, is gearing up to run against King County Council Member Kathy Lambert, say people familiar with the situation.

Vance has been soliciting endorsements for a run, people tell Sammamish Comment.

He also dropped an expansive Public Records Request on Lambert’s office for 16 years of data for travel records and meeting attendance.

Vance served on the Sammamish City Council from 2012 through 2015. He was mayor in 2014-15. He lost 54%-46% to Tom Hornish. Vance ran for Council in 2009, losing to John Curley 55%-45%. In his successful 2011 campaign, he defeated a weak and unqualified candidate 68% to 32%, only to drop by 22 points in his losing race against Hornish.

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