Bellevue City Council deadlocks as to whether to take a position on Tim Eyman’s I‑1125

Last night, the Belle­vue City Coun­cil had an oppor­tu­ni­ty to take a posi­tion against Tim Eyman’s I‑1125, which places impor­tant trans­porta­tion projects that would improve mobil­i­ty in and out of Belle­vue at risk. The city coun­cil sched­uled a hear­ing, as required by Wash­ing­ton State law, pro­vid­ing pro­po­nents and oppo­nents with an equal amount of time to speak to the initiative.

Argu­ing in favor of I‑1125 was, to nobody’s sur­prise, Tim Eyman, who used up prac­ti­cal­ly all of his allot­ted time. State Rep­re­sen­ta­tive Ross Hunter and the Belle­vue Down­town Asso­ci­a­tion’s Patrick Ban­non then spoke on behalf of Keep Wash­ing­ton Rolling, the broad coali­tion oppos­ing I‑1125, which includes NPI.

Fol­low­ing the spec­chi­fy­ing, coun­cilmem­bers had a few ques­tions for Eyman and Hunter. Coun­cilmem­ber Grant Deg­gin­ger, who is retir­ing, want­ed to know why Eyman had includ­ed a pro­vi­sion in I‑1125 (Sec­tion 3) that takes aim at Sound Tran­sit’s East Link with­out specif­i­cal­ly say­ing any­thing about light rail. (The pro­vi­sion vague­ly says that no part of gas tax or toll-fund­ed projects can be trans­ferred for “non-high­way purposes”).

Eyman did not pro­vide much in the way of an answer. Deg­gin­ger con­clud­ed, cor­rect­ly, that Eyman’s inten­tion with Sec­tion 3 of I‑1125 is to stop East Link with­out actu­al­ly say­ing so, which he lat­er called “sneaky” and “un-Amer­i­can”.

The coun­cil then began debat­ing whether it should take a posi­tion on I‑1125.

Coun­cilmem­bers Don David­son and Con­rad Lee, who cur­rent­ly serve as may­or and deputy may­or, respec­tive­ly, made it clear pret­ty quick­ly that they did­n’t want to take a posi­tion on I‑1125, argu­ing it was not the city coun­cil’s place to tell vot­ers how they should vote. Coun­cilmem­ber Clau­dia Bal­duc­ci sharply dis­agreed, point­ing out the coun­cil takes posi­tions all the time on state and fed­er­al leg­is­la­tion. She not­ed that oppo­si­tion to I‑1125 is wide­spread and grow­ing, and observed that Belle­vue busi­ness­es and work­ers want the city coun­cil to oppose I‑1125.

How can we be lead­ers, Bal­duc­ci asked, if we punt on issues like this?

Coun­cilmem­bers John Chelmi­nak and Grant Deg­gin­ger weighed in next, each agree­ing with Bal­duc­ci. Deg­gin­ger had strong words for I‑1125. He jus­ti­fi­ably called it a “job-killing ini­tia­tive”, and, as I pre­vi­ous­ly men­tioned, exco­ri­at­ed the pro­vi­sion of I‑1125 that seeks to under­hand­ed­ly block East Link.

Last to speak was Coun­cilmem­ber Kevin Wal­lace, who not only agreed with Lee and David­son, but implied that he was going to vote in favor of I‑1125.

Because Coun­cilmem­ber Jen­nifer Robert­son was absent, that left the coun­cil dead­locked — unable to agree on any motion con­cern­ing I‑1125. Dur­ing the debate, Lee and David­son had moved and sec­ond­ed a non­sen­si­cal motion to take no posi­tion on I‑1125 (non­sen­si­cal because, as it stands, the coun­cil already has no posi­tion); this motion end­ed up being left on the floor.

The coun­cil meet­ing end­ed very abrupt­ly at 11 PM when, to David­son’s sur­prise, a motion to extend the meet­ing for anoth­er few min­utes failed. (The meet­ing had pre­vi­ous­ly been extend­ed from 10 PM to 10:30, and then from 10:30 PM to 10:45, and then from 10:45 to 11 PM). The meet­ing broke up imme­di­ate­ly after 11, leav­ing the ques­tion of what to do about I‑1125 unresolved.

Read­ers not famil­iar with Belle­vue pol­i­tics may be won­der­ing why Lee, David­son, and Wal­lace would be so uncom­fort­able with putting Belle­vue on record against 1125. After all, sev­er­al oth­er East­side cities (Red­mond, Kirk­land, Ren­ton) and the Port of Seat­tle have already done just that.

The rea­son is that each of them answers to Kem­per Free­man, Jr., who bankrolled Tim Eyman’s I‑1125.

In 2009, the last time David­son, Lee, and Wal­lace were on the bal­lot, they all got mon­ey from Kem­per. Con­rad Lee received $1,000 from Kem­per on July 8th, 2009. David­son received two checks, for $800 and $200, respec­tive­ly (total­ing $1,000) from Kem­per Hold­ings on July 16th, 2009.

And Kevin Wal­lace? He received a $500 check from Kem­per Hold­ings on April 30th, 2009.

As for Jen­nifer Robert­son, who was miss­ing from the dais last night and is unop­posed for reelec­tion this year, she also appears to be in the Kem­per club. Big time. Take a look at this con­tri­bu­tion history:

• $1,600 from Bet­ty Free­man (Kem­per’s spouse) on April 29th, 2011 (two checks for $800 each)
• $1,600 from Kem­per Free­man him­self on April 29th, 2011 (two checks for $800 each)
• $800 from Kem­per Hold­ings on Novem­ber 19th, 2010

I’d be very sur­prised if she votes to take a posi­tion oppos­ing I‑1125.

Because Kem­per has four out of sev­en coun­cilmem­bers in his cor­ner, he basi­cal­ly con­trols the Belle­vue City Coun­cil. That’s pret­ty sad. Belle­vue’s leg­is­la­tors should be account­able to all of their con­stituents, not just one of them.

Both the Belle­vue Down­town Asso­ci­a­tion and the Belle­vue Cham­ber of Com­merce have tak­en posi­tions against I‑1125. Both have urged the coun­cil to fol­low suit.

Strange­ly enough, Kem­per does­n’t con­trol those orga­ni­za­tions (in fact, he quit the BDA ear­li­er this year) but he appar­ent­ly con­trols enough votes on the Belle­vue City Coun­cil to pre­vent adop­tion of a res­o­lu­tion oppos­ing I‑1125.

Belle­vue busi­ness­es, work­ers, and res­i­dents who want to see their city coun­cil take a posi­tion on I‑1125 should start lob­by­ing Jen­nifer Robert­son, who was miss­ing from last night’s meet­ing. She’s in the Kem­per Club, but maybe she can be con­vinced that oppos­ing I‑1125 is the smart and sen­si­ble thing to do.

If you’d like to reach out to her and urge her to vote to oppose I‑1125 at the next coun­cil meet­ing, here is her offi­cial con­tact information:

Coun­cilmem­ber Jen­nifer Robertson
450 110th Ave. NE
P.O. Box 90012
Belle­vue, WA 98009
Phone: 425–452-7810
Fax: 425–452-7919
E‑mail: j.robertson@bellevuewa.gov