Councilmember Jeanne Kohl-Welles to retire from King County Council, public service

Two-term Coun­ty Coun­cilmem­ber Jeanne Kohl-Welles has decid­ed not to seek reelec­tion and will retire from pub­lic ser­vice at the end of 2023, she announced today in a let­ter to con­stituents and in a press release sent to the media.

“I’ve loved serv­ing on the Coun­cil. I’ve absolute­ly loved it,” Kohl-Welles said in a state­ment and in her let­ter. “But at some point, it’s time to pass the torch for oth­ers to get involved. My entire time in pub­lic office has been immense­ly grat­i­fy­ing; how­ev­er, there’s a time for every­thing and I feel real­ly good about this being the time to move on to some­thing new.”

Kohl-Welles, eighty, was a state leg­is­la­tor before suc­ceed­ing Lar­ry Phillips on the King Coun­ty Coun­cil, rep­re­sent­ing the 4th Dis­trict, a Seat­tle-area district.

A strong advo­cate for social jus­tice, eco­nom­ic secu­ri­ty, com­mu­ni­ty resilience, and the arts, Kohl-Welles leaves behind a rich lega­cy as a law­mak­er at mul­ti­ple lev­els of gov­ern­ment. She is known for her acces­si­bil­i­ty as an elect­ed offi­cial, for a firm grasp of the issues, and for being an ear­ly adopter of wor­thy causes.

It came as no sur­prise last year, for instance, when Kohl-Welles enthu­si­as­ti­cal­ly backed our pro­pos­al to move King Coun­ty’s coun­ty lev­el posi­tions to even-year elec­tions. We knew we could count on her. She did­n’t just vote for the pro­pos­al, either. She donat­ed to the cam­paign to help pass it and came to the cam­paign’s house par­ty last Sep­tem­ber. Coun­cilmem­ber Kohl-Welles walks her talk.

“I want to con­grat­u­late Coun­cilmem­ber Jeanne Kohl-Welles for more than thir­ty years of ser­vice rep­re­sent­ing her com­mu­ni­ty in the state House, Sen­ate, and the King Coun­ty Coun­cil. Since our time togeth­er in the Sen­ate, I’ve enjoyed work­ing along­side Jeanne,” said King Coun­ty Exec­u­tive Dow Constantine.

“She has been a tire­less advo­cate for work­ing fam­i­lies, vul­ner­a­ble peo­ple, arts and cul­ture, work­place safe­ty, and the peo­ple of King Coun­ty. I am espe­cial­ly grate­ful for Jeanne’s lead­er­ship as Bud­get Chair in 2020 and 2021 as we worked to address the eco­nom­ic chal­lenges brought on by the COVID-19 pan­dem­ic. I wish her and her fam­i­ly all the best in this next chap­ter of their lives.”

Here’s Kohl-Welles’ let­ter to her con­stituents:

Dear Friends and Neighbors,

After serv­ing you in elect­ed office for 30 years, it is with mixed emo­tions that I share with you that I will not be run­ning for re-elec­tion this fall and that I will be retir­ing at the end of this year.

Rep­re­sent­ing my con­stituents – first in the 36th Leg­isla­tive Dis­trict in the State House and Sen­ate, and more recent­ly in Dis­trict Four on the King Coun­ty Coun­cil – has been the priv­i­lege and hon­or of my life­time, and I am incred­i­bly grate­ful for the part­ner­ship, sup­port, and trust that you all have offered me over the years.

This deci­sion did not come to me light­ly. I have thor­ough­ly enjoyed serv­ing the pub­lic, those resid­ing in my dis­trict but also more broad­ly through­out King Coun­ty and the state.

It has been par­tic­u­lar­ly impor­tant to me to work col­lab­o­ra­tive­ly in strength­en­ing pro­tec­tions for the most vul­ner­a­ble and mar­gin­al­ized in our com­mu­ni­ties, espe­cial­ly as income inequal­i­ty, dis­place­ment, and home­less­ness have increased, as cli­mate change has become increas­ing­ly threat­en­ing to us all, and as gun vio­lence has become more frequent.

As long as I have held elec­tive office, I have worked to pro­vide access to afford­able, equi­table and qual­i­ty hous­ing, child care, edu­ca­tion, health care and a safe and secure life for all.

And so impor­tant to me has been increas­ing access to arts, cul­ture, her­itage, and sci­ence pro­grams and events, as well as an urgency in work­ing on cli­mate change and its effects on every­thing we all hold dear — our peo­ple, our envi­ron­ment, our nat­ur­al resources, our soci­ety, and our planet!

I’ve also cher­ished work­ing along­side so many tal­ent­ed, intel­li­gent, and ded­i­cat­ed peo­ple and in bal­anc­ing mul­ti­ple, some­times con­flict­ing, inter­ests in the pur­suit of bet­ter pub­lic pol­i­cy for all of us. I will miss the work might­i­ly, but most­ly the peo­ple and the com­mu­ni­ties in my district.

While I will enjoy find­ing more time for fam­i­ly and friends and for return­ing to my writ­ing, I do know it will be chal­leng­ing to shift gears after work­ing so long with so many fan­tas­tic peo­ple and on so many chal­leng­ing issues in the pur­suit of the com­mon good.

After 30 years, there are many lessons I’ve learned, but per­haps the most impor­tant is that there is always anoth­er side to the sto­ry. Some­times, an issue is pre­sent­ed in a way that makes it appear the solu­tion is sim­ple. It rarely is.

Just as we are mul­ti-faceted as indi­vid­u­als, the ways we expe­ri­ence and are impact­ed by social issues are, too.

That is why it’s been vital to me to bring as many voic­es into pol­i­cy­mak­ing as pos­si­ble – those with dif­fer­ent back­grounds and expe­ri­ences can pro­vide a more com­plete pic­ture of the issues we face. In fact, I have found it essen­tial to lis­ten to dif­fer­ent voic­es and to craft solu­tions that take all angles into account.

Tru­ly well thought out leg­isla­tive advances serve the com­mu­ni­ty and bet­ter stand the test of time. After work­ing col­lab­o­ra­tive­ly, we’re more like­ly to reach equi­table, effec­tive and sus­tain­able outcomes.

While I look for­ward to the next chap­ter of my life, I also look back fond­ly on all I have done and all those with whom I have worked along­side. I feel blessed by my career, for­tu­nate to be part of such a won­der­ful com­mu­ni­ty and a par­tic­i­pant in craft­ing need­ed pub­lic pol­i­cy and social change.

And we’ve accom­plished a lot over the past sev­en years (and in the pre­vi­ous 23 in the Leg­is­la­ture), so check out an abbre­vi­at­ed list of Coun­cil accom­plish­ments below.

But, with near­ly a year to go, my work is not done yet and I am eager to fin­ish strong! So, stick around for more infor­ma­tive e‑news edi­tions and oth­er com­mu­ni­ca­tions from my office this year, and expect to see some excit­ing leg­is­la­tion and oth­er projects before I leave at the end of Decem­ber. As always, please reach out to me or my exem­plary staff with any of your ques­tions, con­cerns, or ideas.

Last­ly, pol­i­tics is – in every sense of the term – a pub­lic endeav­or, and this is how I’ve approached it my whole career.

Not only could my work not have exist­ed with­out that amaz­ing staff I just men­tioned, it def­i­nite­ly could not have exist­ed with­out the tire­less work of count­less oth­ers, includ­ing those work­ing in advo­ca­cy groups and non­prof­its, jour­nal­ists, com­mu­ni­ty orga­niz­ers, com­mu­ni­ty-based orga­ni­za­tions, union mem­bers, pol­i­cy ana­lysts, aca­d­e­mics, busi­ness own­ers, con­cerned cit­i­zens, and yes, lobbyists.

Our form of democ­ra­cy is messy, some­times chaot­ic, and ulti­mate­ly beau­ti­ful. It’s best when it’s open, vis­i­ble, and built on rela­tion­ships and dia­logue. Per­haps it’s the soci­ol­o­gist in me that leads me to love the pub­lic aspects of the work as much as I do, but I think we can all agree that at the core of our gov­er­nance exper­i­ment is a dynam­ic, col­or­ful, beat­ing heart. Thank you all for accom­pa­ny­ing me on this journey.

Warm­ly,

Jeanne

The Coun­cilmem­ber’s retire­ment press release also fit­ting­ly includes trib­utes from all eight of her Coun­cil col­leagues, Demo­c­ra­t­ic and Repub­li­can alike.

Fel­low Coun­cilmem­ber Joe McDer­mott has also announced his retirement.

The oth­er two coun­cilmem­bers up this year, Clau­dia Bal­duc­ci and Gir­may Zahi­lay, are seek­ing reelec­tion. They will be run­ning for three-year terms, owing to the pas­sage of King Coun­ty Char­ter Amend­ment 1, which they part­nered with us to bring to fruition. Char­ter Amend­ment 1 received a 69% yes vote from the voters.

Our con­grat­u­la­tions and thanks to Coun­cilmem­ber Kohl-Welles. We deeply appre­ci­ate her ser­vice and wish her the best as she com­pletes her time in office.