It’s a bit of tradition for FederalWayan to indicate how we intend to vote in upcoming elections. This one should come as little surprise, but for completeness’ sake, here goes.

CANDIDATES

FederalWayan supports a straight Democratic ticket. The top candidates of our concern:

Barack Obama

Like no one else that has run in this election cycle, Obama is the first and only 21st Century candidate. Unfettered by outmoded ideas, not pressed into a mold of a previous presidency, not tied to a failed system of policies, and with a forward-looking perspective that sees to an America beyond racial, class, and even political lines. While his opponent tacitly harvests the vote of the ever-divisive, Obama engenders not just hope, but unity; and inspires people to take ownership of their country. The greatest presidents are defined by those that inspired and unified; not by those that divided and conquered.

Chris(tine) Gregoire

Even before being governor, as state attorney general, Gregoire placed Regular Joe far ahead of big business. As governor, she kept the state’s economy strong after being injured by an early teaser of a national recession and bust, without resulting in devastating cuts to government services. While that recession may seem pale in respect to what might be forthcoming, that fact makes it even more critical to retain such governing going forward. Gregoire places individual social freedoms and needs ahead of the interests of padded pockets, and to eliminate that for the alternative is to pretend that “change” doesn’t mean anything.

Randy Dorn

To repair our state’s schools (and Federal Way’s) will need a non-entrenched, non-complacent leader to focus the state’s education efforts and standards. Passive acknowledgement of an imperfect system won’t do anymore. Far from passive, Dorn is an enthusiastic voice for reform in the state’s education system, but not only that, he’s a knowledgeable everyman who has been on the ground in that system as well.

Carol Gregory

Skip Priest converted an early mayorship of Federal Way — during the years of a miniature city Republican Revolution that saw most city founders quickly unseated and now mostly long forgotten — into a state representative seat. This year, joining fellow Republicans like Dino Rossi, he wants people to think of him as a nice friendly local guy who transcends politics — and ignore his actual record of voting like nearly every other Republican congressman in the state legislature. With little else to run on except for name recognition in a city where it is excruiciatingly hard to unseat an incumbent, we have an alternative in rising star Gregory, who has stirred up the local Democrats into an eager bunch behind her campaign, running on a credentialed platform of education reform and job development, instead of photo ops of a too-well-known face.

INITIATIVES AND PROPOSALS
Sound Transit Proposition 1: YES

Light rail now, light rail forever, light rail yesterday would be even better. Roads — even roads packed with more and more magical silver-bullet buses — won’t solve any transportation problems. Light rail is always popular wherever it has been placed; no opponent of Seattle metro light rail can name one instance in the past 60 years where a light rail system has fallen out of widespread use. Forecasts will tell you no one will want to use it; but faced with dealing with difficult traffic and unpredictable buses, a dedicated transit system will become increasingly popular. Once it’s built, and becomes a regular part of transit options, you’ll find that instead of being reviled; it’ll be in demand throughout the region. And Federal Way should be part of that system. Prop 1 doesn’t go nearly far enough nearly quickly enough in doing that; but saying no to light rail expansion — again — won’t make it come any faster.

Initiative 985: NO

The name “Eyman” associated with any initiative will immediately lower my expectations. Overall, I have no love of red light cameras, but if they do serve as a valuable deterrent, Eyman’s latest travesty will lead to their decline and probable removal. Beyond that, an illogical and unresearched mandate on HOV hour limits has no effective purpose (opening carpool lanes to traffic during times they are theoretically not even necessary) other than thumbing his nose at state transportation. While some may applaud the idea of making sure that highway incomes only go to highway expenses, a holistic metropolitan transportation approach does not make such rigid limitations, as there is more than one way to skin a congestion cat.

Initiative 1000: YES

People who have limited time left in their life should not be forced by law to spend their last days of life either in severe pain, or in a debilitating helpless condition. Those who read the actual text of the initiative — as I did — will note the explicit language and careful rules of the proposed program takes it miles away from the nightmare scenarios presented by those who wish to selfishly and autocratically enforce their individual morals (more strongly held among the perfectly healthy) on the terminally ill.

Initiative 1029: NO

Proponents of the bill make the sensible point that, taken in comparison to regulations for hairdressers and dog groomers, the requirements for a home care provider are much smaller — but not, mind you, nonexistent. However, that doesn’t necessarily mean that the requirements for home care providers need to be jacked up to be in line with them. We can live with less hairdressers, manicurists, and dog groomers; but not everyone can live without a home care provider. Certainly the regulations we have among these trades is a little out of whack — but if so, I’d be more willing to advocate lowering those other standards rather than jacking up those for (and thereby limiting the availability of) home care providers. There will always be isolated incidents of horror stories of untrustworthy home care providers, but we do not have an epidemic of irresponsible home care providers torturing our old people. Better that our seniors have easy access home care rather than be forced to live alone without assistance, or in expensive facilities.

King County Amendment 1: NO

It would be conflict of interest, I think, for the director of elections to be directly elected. Better that the person in charge of making sure our elections are run well, fairly, and securely not have to also be part of the system. Perhaps with a single term limit, this would be more reasonable. But unlike, say, a city mayor, the elections director doesn’t represent anyone or anything, or make decisions that affect the public sphere, but is simply an administrator who needs to run a serious and focused operation of an important democratic engine.

King County Amendment 2: YES

You should not be allowed to fire someone because they are gay (or not gay) or because they act in a manner not typical for their biology. This proposal makes the county follow that principle.

King County Amendment 4: NO

Making it more difficult for citizens to enter government is not a democratic principle, any more than poll taxes or reading tests to vote are. I don’t approve of requiring any sort of arbitrary set of credentials to hold public office. If the people can’t be trusted to make good decisions, then democracy is a failure. Assuming that it is not, then the people do not need to have their candidates pre-filtered by the government they are trying to get them into. Often, those who are not entrenched in established circles do a far better job in government than do those who have been vetted by a self-important professional old boy’s club.

King County Amendment 7: NO

Again, we do not need higher arbitrary hurdles to climb for entering the democratic process. Washington has a proud citizen initiative tradition; it should be maintained and made more open rather than more prohibitive.

King County Amendment 8: NO

I am opposed to nonpartisan elections. I think we need less nonpartisan elections, not more. Some are convinced of the notion that they can determine who will govern best based on what character they can pretend to glean from a political campaign. As a result, instead of being able to vote for values you support, campaigns are run based on who is (or appears to be) the nicer guy rather than who has the best ideas and who is best likely to support your principles in the decision making role of governing. Charismatic people do not necessarily lead to good government or good policies; charisma alone is not enough. Party identification (and endorsement) is a generally reliable gauge of whether they will govern in way that you likely to approve of; even when it isn’t, it is a good gauge of who is more likely to.

Last week was National Banned Books Week in libraries nationwide. If you missed it, you can still celebrate in spirit by checking out something that has been banned in our own backyard:

Balzac and the Little Chinese Seamstress

An Inconvenient Truth

If I asked you what is the most important issue facing Federal Way, what would you say?

If you work for city government, your answer is probably “code compliance”. Signs are too big, woodworkers are too loud, real estate ads are in the wrong place.

Yes, in the lovely fantasy world of city government, Federal Way is a virtual utopia, whose worst problems are signs, scribbles, and saws. A big happy community of upper-middle class Christian homeowners.

Well, that’s not the Federal Way I read about in the papers. Federal Way is a city where in the past year two people have been shot to death in public places before a dozen witnesses. Where teaching established science in schools is threatened by anti-science crusaders. Where major downtown construction has been put on hold for who knows how long. Where dozens of retail spots have lain empty for years. Where we are about to lose 1,000 good non-retail jobs at a major local employer.

What is the city focusing its efforts on?

Cutting down 45-year-old neighborhood signs, because they are too tall. Shutting down home-based, charity-donating craftsmen because they are too loud. Kicking homeless people off street corners because they are too uncomfortable to look at.

Someday, perhaps, we can replace our head-in-the-clouds city government with one that is aware of Federal Way’s real problems, focus city resources towards solving those real problems, and react effectively and quickly to the needs of a growing urban environment. Unfortunately, our city government and laws are not structured or designed to allow that change to happen any time soon. Perhaps the best we can hope for is that our city leaders will wake up and see the city for what it is: a dual-metro satellite city with real urban problems that will only get worse the longer they are ignored; the longer we waste our effort on eradicating minor inconveniences like neighborhood history and identity, instead of fighting the real threats to the city’s viability like violent crime, low quality jobs, troubled schools, and a complete lack of cohesive community. The answer is not to take a saw to old landmarks, or to ban modern science, or to criminalize poverty.

Can our city government spend its resources reasonably? Can it open its eyes and see the real Federal Way of 2008? Can we change it to do so if it won’t?

Big news in Federal Way today, of the sort we don’t want but seem to have more than usual lately. A young man in his mid-20s was shot to death at Lakota Middle School shortly after football and cheerleading practice let out. News is calling it a “drive by shooting” and the attackers appear to have specifically targeted the unidentified victim. No one else was hurt. The vehicle used in the attack was apparently seen scoping out the Lakota lot over the past week. KOMO and KIRO made field reports this morning from Lakota Park.

1. Despite lots of witnesses present at the time of the attack, no one seems to have any helpful information other than it was a bunch of Latinos in a black SUV. No make or model of car. No license plate. No facial descriptions. You’d think someone would have thought to get the license plate at very least, or be able to say what kind of SUV it was, particularly as people are certain that they’ve seen the vehicle there repeatedly this week. So it must have some identifying characteristic, or else how would they be sure it was the same one? How many black SUVs do you think there are? Does
having Latinos on board help narrow it down all that much?

2. I fully expect the City Council will respond to this by passing a city law making it illegal to post yard sale signs on light posts, and the School Board will respond by beefing up its hairstyle dress code enforcement. Because our esteemed city leaders think we can solve our city’s problems by such things as hiding the homeless and forcing kids to wear uniforms.

Story at: Times TNT KOMO KING 5

If sea level were to rise 15 meters, Federal Way would be located on a Puget Sound island running from West Seattle to Edgewood.

What would you call it?

Now that our President has publicly committed to confronting global climate change, will our School Board do the same and dump it’s Frosty-Hardison-sponsored insistence on “alternative viewpoints“? The District doesn’t seem to mind it’s teachers watching it, at least.