January 19, 2007
Seattle City Clowncil votes to prolong Viaduct indecision
The Clowncil voted 6-3 today to prolong its debilitating indecision on the Viaduct and to spend $1 million on a meaningless advisory ballot measure.
There will be two ballot questions, a YES/NO on a new elevated Viaduct; and YES/NO on the "tunnel lite" (a slimmed down $3.4 billion (before overruns) tunnel, just wide enough for smaller cars, apparently)
The tunnel measure won't specify where the extra $600 million will come from, so nobody responsible would give any weight to its approval. As The Times says "Council members seemed unsure what would happen if both measures passed." And as Erica Barnett says on The Stranger blog "No matter what happens, no one thinks this advisory ballot will be final".
But Clowncilmembers Clark, Conlin, Drago, Godden, McIver and Rasmussen think this million dollar circus act is money well spent.
Posted by Stefan Sharkansky at January 19, 2007
04:17 PM | Email This
1. A 'Yes on I-912' victory would have repealed the gas tax hike and stopped all this madness. Vote 'NO' ON THE DEATHTRAP TUNNEL-LITE.
2. As I recall fixing (rebuilding) the Viaduct was an emergency demanding immediate attention.
So this is leadership as practiced by the State and City of Seattle?
Clowns are at least entertaining. This circus is not entertaining and the price to pay may be in blood, if the next quake occurs sooner rather than later.
How many lives is the Seattle Council prepare to sacrifice for politics?
3. As I recall fixing (rebuilding) the Viaduct was an emergency demanding immediate attention.
So this is leadership as practiced by the State and City of Seattle?
Clowns are at least entertaining. This circus is not entertaining and the price to pay may be in blood, if the next quake occurs sooner rather than later.
How many lives is the Seattle Council prepare to sacrifice for politics?
4. Why even bother to have a vote, we all know how it will come out. Just get your kids a hard hat and a shovel,get them out of the local schools, (saving taxpayers millions) and pay them for a career of digging at a living wage. This is a great way to redistribute wealth right here in Seattle.
5. Snagger, While your idea is well founded, it would lead to a significant shortage of baristas.
This begs the question: "Who makes a better latte`?"
1. A Seattle high school dropout covered in tattoos.
2. A migrant worker following the coffee bean harvest.
We both know who could dig a better tunnel.
6. I think a vote is an excellent idea. I think that before any house in Seattle is torn down for a rebuild there must be a vote. Before another tent city comes to town there's a vote. Before any city employee drives a city owned car home or is given a "car allowance" there's a vote. Before permits are issued for protest marches there's a vote. Before Nickels invokes another parking lot type tax or installs any parking meter there's a vote. Before Nickels, Ceis and the councilcrats receive any paychecks there's a vote. No parole without a vote. Before there's a vote on anything there's a vote to have/not have a vote.
WOW! There's no limit to the potential of this vote thingamajig!!
7. Heres how the resutls wil lcome out
yes tunnel yes rebuild = do tunnel if possible if not then rebuilt
yes tunnel, no rebuild = do tunnel or STO
no tunnel, yes rebuild = just rebuild the thing
no tunnel, no rebuild = STO
My hunch is that both will be defeated the money will go 520 and we will simply remove the damn thing.
8. Tyler,What a deal, I'm sure the city will pay the postage on all those ballots. And it never really matters how the vote comes out because in the end the knight on the white horse will ride in with whatever extra votes are needed. The governor owes her election to that knight only this time they're going to need a much larger horse.
9. This little Gem perfectly encapsulates the entire defectiveness and indecisiveness that is the Seattle ethos.
Seattle is the city hijacked by guilt wracked moonbat cowards. Seattle has no idea what it wants. Putting the tunnel up to vote will lead to the same expensive dead end as the monorail. Infighting between green factions, transit factions, and every other mindless faction will assure continued stalemates.
Meanwhile, Seattle will continue to decline in respect to other more rationally minded American cities that are actually addressing their transit problems, road problems, etc.
I love it. It's great fun watching Seattle's confused angst. Good luck suckers.
10. I can picture the 6 dumba$$ KLOWNS riding their little trikes in circles honking their Klaxon horns at the Freemount Gay Pride Parade all decked out with white pancake make-up, Angelina Jolie sized ruby red lips, red rubber noses, size 34 floppy black shoes, bright checked shirts & stripped pantaloons, orange yarn hair trying to drum up the support of all the freaks at their Anal Freakfest....errrr ANNUAL Freakfest. Sorry about the Freudian slip....not really.
The only way this tunnel will pass is if they convince the kooks that they can live the dream and it won't cost them a dime! Let the lies begin!!
11. So, the decision-makers want to let the people decide for them. Kewl. So, since they have decided not to do their jobs, if they would kindly return their salaries back to the the taxpayers, it's all good.
12. The Seattle analysis parylsis continues
Almost six years have passed since the Ash Wednesday earthquake in 2001
If the city council really wanted a vote, it should have happened in 2005 (during a regularly scheduled election) with options to chose
a do nothing
b retrofit the existing viaduct
c build a new viaduct
d dig a tunnel
e build a bridge
f go to surface streets
g other
Given Mr Nickels participation in Sound Transit and that 10+ years have passed since voters approved light rail and it still is not running, my feeling is the resolution/completion will drag out another 10 - 15 years
Spending $1 million for a special advisory election shows the city council is not good stewards of taxpayer resources
13. It is worth looking at what is going on here from a regional perspective.
Nickels is trying to grab a pile of RTID money to enrich his base (unions, developers). The tunnel would end up using about one billion of RTID taxes. The way Nickels is trying to pull off this grab is have Seattle-only voters vote on this, even though the whole region's taxes would go to pay for it. Would somebody in Bellevue or Everett really benefit from a tunnel? No. So Nickels, who has no say on RTID policy, is trying to engineer what RTID spends a huge chunk of its money on.
The castrati on RTID are saying nothing about this power grab. RTID is not standing up for what it wants - instead, it is just letting Nickels ramrod it.
14. The good news about "analysis paralysis" is that it saves money since the result is the "no action alternative."
And since the "emergency" is trumped-up to justify a big project, that's ok by me.
(That is not to say that there is not need for Repair to the existing structure and maybe even the seawall. But don't believe everything a government official tells you whether she is a Deomocrat or a Repuiblican.)
15. (boss Hog)Nickels and his band of bandits should also be on that ballott for a recall vote.
16. If this is a state highway,shouldn't a vote be held state wide??
Can anyone imagine the boondoogle,it would be a night mare..
Where are the enviros wouldn't they want the filled returned to its natural habitat???
17. This vote is a fart in the wind. The only things it will accomplish is wasting and I do mean pure wasting of a million dollars of hard erned tax payer money, but it will also show Mayor Billions that the emperor has no clothes.
Chopp and the Olympia democrats, who also dearly love to spend our money, but thankfully in this instance they don't want to send it on an endlessly expensive tunnel.
18. This is what liberals do. They act like they support democracy, hence the "governing by committee" act. But when it doesn't go along their predetermined route of outcome, they show us why they admire dictators like Castro, Chavez, etc.
19. If both pass that would be "AWESOME" (using Chris Farley's voice). Realistically, part of me feels sorry for King county residents, part of me thinks they get what they deserve.
Maybe they can build both a tunnel and an elevated highway, think of the traffic flow problems that would be cured.
After all it is an EMERGENCY to replace the viaduct - well, in 2005 it was.
20. Jimmy Carter would be proud of the ineptitude of the Clowncil. It's a three ring circus (X 2). As long as it doesn't cost us suburbanites any money - whatever... They need a carbon tax to pay for this foolishness.
21. If Seattle expects to have the state help fund their via-tunnel, then the rest of the state should be allowed to vote. Can you say new narrows bridge with the help of King county voters?
22. My God, I read some of the posts here and its no wonder we Republicans got our butt kicked this election. We got in the traffic mess that we are in today because of 2 things, 1) the environmentalists didn't want to pave over the earth with asphalt, and 2) the conservative Republicans think that we shouldn't spend any money. Now I understand that we spend a freakin' sheet load of moula in this state for everything but what we need. You aren't going to change that since we have an electorate that is consistantly dense and loves the feel good politics the Dems are selling. But when you vote against spending money for roads and transportation, you end up with grid lock similar to what we have. Only it will get much worse. When will my fellow Republicans pull their collective heads out of their arses and get a clue. They can't win elections by saying no. They have to show why the people should vote for them. They have to show they have insite and foresite. They can't stomp their feet when a politician supports gays or abortion. Those are the politicians that win in Washington. Sorry, but it's a fact. It doesn't matter what they teach you in church. Not everyone else believes what you have been taught. Someone once made a comparison between Muslims and by the bible Christians. It might not be that far off... Believe in what I do, or else.
