Sound Transit version 2.1

Imagine this scenario. Sound Transit comes back to ballot this fall with a shortened light rail plan and all three county executives within the voting district oppose it. Wouldn't that make for an interesting campaign season?

It might just happen. Right now, Ron Sims (King), John Ladenburg (Pierce), and Aaron Reardon (Snohomish) have grave reservations about Sound Transit's scaled-back proposal, which would extend the line up to Northgate and across the Interstate 90 floating bridge to the Eastside suburbs.

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A levy-less election?

What if there was a big election season, and Seattle didn't ask its citizens for a property tax increase? Believe it or not, our levy-loving city — there have been four in the last six years alone — is likely to be levy-less come this fall.

It's especially surprising given that a presidential election year, when turnout is strongest, is the friendliest environment for local ballot measures. High turnout means lots of younger voters, who generally favor tax measures.

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Gang activity is like a recession

Gang activity is like a recession…you often don't know it's a problem until it's too late to do much.

Several youth-related murders of late strongly suggest that gang violence, which had been somewhat contained in recent years, is coming back with a vengeance in Seattle and King County. (Today's Seattle Times notes the trend.

And, just as more fiscal stimulus is an imperfect solution for an economic downturn, more police presence isn't the ultimate answer during a violent upturn. As new Seattle City Council member Bruce Harrell recently observed to me: "These kids, I would argue, were lost even before the bullets struck them."

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Shaky assumption: An Alaskan Way Viaduct myth is dispelled

More movement this week on the Alaskan Way Viaduct – literal, not political. State engineers said yesterday, Jan. 23, that the elevated waterfront freeway has sunk another one-eight of an inch since the last check six months ago. In all, it's settled more than 5 inches since they started measuring shortly after the 2001 Nisqually earthquake.

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Tacoma's panhandling ban: Where did they all go?

It's not clear, but the begging has stopped in the City of Destiny. Could it work in Seattle?

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The mayors' climate summit: Who's counting the carbon?

So, just what is the carbon footprint of a climate summit? I refer, of course, to the U.S. Conference of Mayors gathering in Seattle this past week. Over 120 city leaders from around the country came here (mostly by plane) to discuss global warming. As far as I know, no one calculated how many greenhouse gases the event produced as they gassed about how many greenhouse gases they want reduced. There was a commendable effort, though, to keep the gases to a minimum. Perhaps the most obvious was using bio-diesel buses to transport delegates between locations. (Can you imagine a climate conference not using such things?)

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Michael Bloomberg, Mr. Big Business, calls for a carbon tax

It's hard to upstage Bill Clinton and Al Gore when it comes to the topic of climate change. But Michael Bloomberg did just that this afternoon in Seattle. The U.S. Conference of Mayors, which has been meeting here for the past two days, heard from both the former president and the former vice president yesterday. But the real news came today when the New York mayor took to the podium.

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Bill Clinton: take climate change seriously and prosper

An enthusiastic crowd welcomed former President Bill Clinton to Benaroya Hall in Seattle this afternoon. He was here to address the U.S. Conference of Mayors. And he had them at hello. Acknowledging his introduction by Mayor Doug Palmer of Trenton, N.J., who is the president of the U.S. Conference of Mayors, Clinton said: "Thank you for your friendship to me and my candidate!" The crowd loved it.

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Al Gore on the next climate pact

Al Gore just finished his keynote speech to the U.S. Conference of Mayors gathering in Seattle. He addressed the nearly 120 mayors via satellite about global warming. He didn't need a Nobel Prize to sound authoritative on the subject, but it certainly didn't hurt. He lavished praise on mayors for leadership on this issue. (More than 700 have now signed on to the carbon limits in the Kyoto Protocol.) "What a wonderful movement you have started," he said. It's something he proudly points out whenever he speaks on this issue overseas. "It is a rallying cry and a moment of uplift," he noted, especially since the U.S. government is not a signatory.

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Confab in Seattle: cities on the carbon-cutting edge

Mayor Greg Nickels, who's become nationally known for leading a movement of municipalities to where the federal government won't go, will be in the spotlight this week as some 100 mayors discuss global warming. His own act so far will be tough to follow. It's not going to be easy being greener.

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