Seattle needs a Doctor. 

 Dr. Clinton Bliss' Top Priorities and Plans to Heal our City: 

#1 Permanently Remove Tent & RV dwellers from Our​ Parks & Public Spaces

How: ​We must get all tent dwellers out of city parks and off of city streets permanently, completely and all at once. Just like we would do if we had a surge of COVID cases, we will open an emergency treatment hospital within a controlled environment, most likely in one of the stadiums, staffed with medical doctors working with mental health, addiction, social service, and vocational rehabilitation specialists.  Tent and RV dwellers will be given the option to come to this treatment center voluntarily, and they can refuse, but they will not be given the option to stay in the parks or pubic spaces and those that do will be arrested and the courts will have to determine if they should be involuntarily treated or incarcerated.  If they are released and found once again to be living in a public space they will be arrested again.  No more living in city parks and public spaces!  No amount of affordable housing and shelter beds will end tent encampments and the practice of supporting addiction through theft.   The medical definition of an addicted person is one who will choose to support their addiction over anything else in their lives including their partners, their parents, their children, their job, their reputation, their body, and their housing.  If given free housing, they will trade it to support their habit.  Read more.

#2 Provide basic Emergency Food, Shelter, Security and Treatment for Our Residents who have no Other Options.  ​

How: Under my leadership, the City of Seattle will provide real residential treatment solutions – not just treatment plans and just a few shelter beds- for those who have nowhere else to go. Any person who presents an immediate danger to themselves or others or who is gravely disabled can and should be legally involuntarily detained for treatment for their own safety and the safety of all of us.  We must and will have treatment beds if we are to solve this problem. Those with addiction who do not present an immediate danger to themselves or others are free to refuse treatment.  Just because a person refuses drug treatment does not mean we have to enable it.  When we follow our moral and legal responsibility to provide a safe place that has real limits with restrictions on who comes and goes and what is brought in and out, we remove the default right to live in public spaces.  Those who choose their addiction over public safety will now be held accountable for their actions just like we would for ourselves and anyone else.  We must stop enabling criminal activity. We can and will fund this. Read more.

 #3 Bring Back Constitutional Community Policing

 How:  If elected, I will immediately nullify any section of the police union contract that limits accountability and oversight. A new culture of community connection and accountability must replace police brutality and use of excessive force.  The old ways must not be tolerated and those who refuse to change must be terminated.  As we do in medicine, we will put in place an internal review process that is separate from disciplinary processes so that officers can share and learn from their mistakes. Each police interaction with the public is an opportunity for learning and improvement.  Three point satisfaction surveys will in instituted for each and every interaction the public has with the police and the results will be used for process improvements and to hold police leadership accountable to the community in their precincts and to the people in the city. Police who fail to protect the public through diplomacy and when indicated, use of reasonable force will be disciplined.  While Police who use excessive force will be disciplined, police need to be allowed to do their job.  Acting as the enforcers of our laws of justice, police are authorized to take actions that are unlawful for a normal citizen.  The potential for abuse of this power is significant and needs to be balanced by special oversight at all times. Police who continue to use excessive force must be disciplined, removed and if appropriate prosecuted. I will not support defunding the police. Defunding the police is a reactive idea that is giving us more of what we don’t want.  The city council has already shifted funds from police. Now all of us are victims of rising crime and delayed 911 response times.  Defunding the police is a political reaction.  This kind of  thinking goes that if we don’t have police, we won’t have police abuses.  It misses the fact that we have criminals perpetrating civil rights abuses on us, just as we did in the latter days of CHOP.  Defunding the police doesn’t lead to fewer civil rights abuses, it leads to more, especially among our poor and most vulnerable. Read more

Dr. Bliss' Values.

If you want more of what you're getting, vote for my opponents who brought it to you.   If you want lasting solutions to our chronic issues of homelessness and police brutality, if you want sustainable solutions based on a deep understanding of the root causes of  our problems, not re-actions that make things worse, vote for Dr. Bliss.   

My campaign has three pillars: Integrity, compassion and wise action.

Integrity

Every day I bring focus to important issues is a win for us all & every day I feel like I have won.  ​ READ MORE

Compassion

Compassion is understanding and caring for others. I have spent my life caring for others. READ MORE

Wise Action

Wise action begins with a deep understanding of everyone's interests followed by... READ MORE 

We need solutions. Protecting Civil Rights is non-negotiable. - Dr. Bliss

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More on Doctor Bliss' Priorities and Plans For Our Seattle

We can do this together.

LET'S END LIVING IN TENTS & RVS IN OUR PUBLIC SPACES

We need to move people out of tents and RVs permanently. The Ninth Circuit Court ruling means we in Seattle have no excuses for not providing basic shelter, food, security and treatment. We must end the enabling and justification of theft, vandalism, and violent crimes

read more ON PUBLIC SPACES

The Problem:  City of Seattle allows living on the streets and city parks in RVs and tent encampments.  

Root Cause:   The medical definition of addiction is a person who will choose their habit over everything else in their lives, including their home, safety, health, spouse, and children.  For addicts, anything that can be diverted to drug use will be.  For addicts, free housing = money for addiction.  

The Solution:  Provide basic emergency food, shelter, security, and treatment to our residents who have no other options.  We need to move people out of tents and RVs permanently. The Ninth Circuit Court ruling means we in Seattle have no excuses for not providing basic shelter, food, security and treatment. We must end the enabling and justification of theft, vandalism, and violent crimes. READ MY PLANS

LET'S BUILD BACK TRUST IN GOVERNMENT

In business, if you receive poor service, you can choose to go down the street to their competitor.  When you are dissatisfied with your government, your choices are more limited. You can file a complaint, move, wait for the next election in 4 years - or run for office (if you can afford to). 

​ This process is ineffective, inefficient and unfair.

MORE ON BUILDING BACK TRUST

Governments around the world are known for their bureaucratic processes that hinder progress and provide poor service.  In business, if you receive poor service, you can choose to go down the street to their competitor.  When you are dissatisfied with your government, your choices are more limited. You can file a complaint, move, wait for the next election in 4 years - or run for office (if you can afford to).  This process is ineffective, inefficient and unfair.

We need a process that provides for continuous quality improvement in all aspects of government, with the expectation that each interaction between a civil servant and the public is handled appropriately and efficiently.  To this end, as I do in my medical practice, I will deploy a satisfaction survey that allows for feedback on each interaction any and every member of the public has with the city. These survey results will be reported continuously and used as the basis for determining process improvements in each and every city department, with department heads held accountable for ongoing improvement in the public’s satisfaction with their government.
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In addition, our city will periodically survey the Seattle public on their overall satisfaction, not just with city government, but with all aspects of life, to help guide policy decisions on what our residents need most.

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LET'S END POLICE BRUTALITY 

Protecting Civil Rights is non-negotiable.  We cannot allow the police unions to hold our civil rights for ransom. 


​If elected I will immediately nullify any section of the police union contract that limits accountability and oversight and contributes to violations of our city resident’s civil rights

Read MOre on Ending Police Brutality

The Problem:  The Seattle Police Department has been under federal decree since 2012 for repeatedly violating our resident’s civil rights.  The judge determined this pattern came from a lack of police oversight.  

The Reaction:  In response, our city negotiated revisions to the existing police union contract in 2018.  Unfortunately it permits even less oversight and allows even more potential for abuse.  The city currently has no timeline for resolution.   

The Root Cause:  Police union contracts protect rogue police officers from disciplinary action and prosecution. 
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The Solution: Protecting Civil Rights is non-negotiable.  We cannot allow the police unions to hold our civil rights for ransom.  If elected I will immediately nullify any section of the police union contract that limits accountability and oversight and contributes to violations of our city resident’s civil rights. READ MY PLAN.

CHANGES FOR CLIMATE CRISIS

We need to think differently if we intend to live on this planet for more than just a couple more generations.  Most of our human systems at this point are literally a dead end. We need to develop systems that allow us to rejoin with our fellow inhabitants on this planet and re-enter the cycle of life. 
I sincerely believe we are capable, it would be a generous gift to ourselves and our world

Changes for the Climate Crisis

We need to think differently if we intend to live on this planet for more than just a couple more generations.  Most of our human systems at this point are literally a dead end. We need to develop systems that allow us to rejoin with our fellow inhabitants on this planet and re-enter the cycle of life.  
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One of these dead end systems is trash.   Even when we recycle, re-use, repurpose, reduce and refuse, this delays the inevitable result that most things we have end up as trash in our landfills, lakes, and oceans.  The only way we can keep our oceans from overflowing with waste is to make regulations whereby any product manufactured must be endlessly recyclable and/or compostable and at the end of its life, must actually be recycled or composted.  
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We also need to start a human transportation technology revolution. .READ MORE​

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LET'S HAVE REAL EQUALITY FOR ALL 

Our system of economic privilege in our systems of education, justice, and governance are the engines of institutionalized racism.

More On EQUALity

The Problem: Our system of economic privilege in our systems of education, justice, and governance are the engines of institutionalized racism.

Root causes:  The wealthy elite get special treatment from our government institutions and our poor get treated poorly.  Examples:

Public primary education is funded through property taxes.  Wealthy neighborhood children get "private education on public school prices". Average US public primary schools provide education on par with Uzbekistan and Mongolia.  Poor neighborhood children get even worse. 

Our justice system functions as an adversarial system of rough justice where you hire guns in the form of attorneys to defend your interest.  The amount of justice you receive is directly proportional to the number and quality of the attorneys you can hire, with public defenders spread thin and no attorneys to represent non-criminal law for those who are poor.

Our system of governance favors the wealthy elite.  The wealthy elite choose who will run, who gets airtime, who is in the debates, who is a viable candidate.  Then the wealthy elite, through campaign contributions determine what messages are heard.  And then the two party system suppresses minority opinions and values. 

​If we truly want to have different results, we must design a different system.  A system whose roots reflect our ideals. We must make carefully considered plans based on a deep understanding of ourselves. We must develop and follow well considered principles that move us away from our natural tendency towards brutalizing each other in the name of some ism or anti-ism. We must step off our war path, drop the tug-of-war rope, and embrace a new and peaceful beginning. READ MORE.​

HOW WE CAN END THE WAR ON DRUGS

The war on drugs has been a terrible failure.  It promotes a massive underground economy that fuels violence.  

More on Ending the War on Drugs

The war on drugs has been a terrible failure.  It promotes a massive underground economy that fuels violence in the US and abroad, funding vast criminal networks that compete for market share.  It is the cause of Warlords in Afghanistan and the Drug Lords in Northern Mexico, and destabilizes governments around the world.  It is the root cause of many of our crime in the US and imprisonment in the US and it disproportionately negatively affects our poor and minority communities. 
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That being said, unilaterally declaring Seattle a prosecution free zone may very well make our city a major distribution center causing increased violence between competing criminal networks for control of our city, similar to the violence that broke out in CHOP/CHAZ, with such tragic consequences. 

While it is far beyond the scope of the City of Seattle to solve this problem unilaterally, I do intend to champion this cause at the state and national level on behalf of our residents.

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AFFORDABLE HOUSING

We must have affordable housing for all people who live or work in our city who need it.  Too many people working in Seattle are not housed in the city and have to leave because they can’t afford to live in Seattle.

more on affordable Housing

Under my leadership, the city of Seattle will develop a public private partnership similar to our public utilities, that will be responsible for providing affordable housing for people who work in our city.  Our city needs a public works project of affordable housing available to those who work in our city and make less than 70% of the median household income.  Under my leadership, the City of Seattle will build pre-designed and pre-permitted mid-rise units situated all around the city.  Residents would live close to their jobs to limit traffic, travel, and our carbon foot-print.  These units would provide construction jobs for people who live here as well.   READ MORE. 
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If we want more affordable housing we need to build it, not tear it down, and we need to reward those who provide affordable housing, not punish them.

TREES IN SEATTLE

If we want more trees, we need to make different choices and reward people who plant and nurture trees, not punish them.

MORE ON TREES IN SEATTLE

Our city leaders say they want more trees, but they pass legislation that encourages building out instead of up, and then react to the fact that trees are being cut down to build more housing, so they pass a law protecting trees of significance that cause the property value to decrease on land that has trees and increases the value of land covered in blacktop.  They have unwittingly punished those who plant and care for trees, given a gift to those who cover our city with cement, and have made a system that discourages planting and growing of trees.  People who value the resale value of their property will pull up young saplings and stop planting trees.  In short, this short sighted legislation doesn’t make Seattle greener, it makes it grey and black. 

We need to replace our laws that punish those who plant and grow trees with laws that reward tree growth and ownership by increasing the value of their land, providing increased building height and floor area ratio for those sites that protect and grow trees.   We must end the covering up of our open spaces, and instead protect and increase green space in Seattle,  developing zoning that encourages sustainable green building that turns our city into a garden as has been done in Singapore. 

Why I am running for Mayor of Seattle

Many of the actions the city has been taking to resolve our problems are making them worse instead of better.  Tent encampments grow, police accountability decreases, with no plan for resolution and no end in sight.  This is not acceptable.  When we react to a problem, rather than studying it carefully, we typically get more of what we don’t want.  Instead we need wise action, based on a deep understanding of the core problems facing our city.  Building affordable housing will not move people from tents indoors.  People who want affordable housing move to an affordable neighborhood. People live in tents on public lands because it’s free.  These are two separate issues.  If elected, my first actions will be to (1) Provide basic emergency food, shelter, security, and treatment to our residents who have no other options;  (2) Permanently remove tent dwellers from city parks and (3)  nullify any section of the police union contract that limits accountability and oversight. To achieve the first two actions, I will work with the community, as this is a community problem, and seek federal and state funding and resources to help us in upholding the mandate passed down to our city that has been so unhappily and wrongly interpreted to allow for tent and RV dwelling in our public spaces. To achieve the third action, I will work with the City Attorney and other stakeholders to bring about police accountability and oversight. In both I will borrow from my experience as a healthcare leader, which will be invaluable in understanding how to treat people who are suffering from mental illness or addiction; and in implementing systems of oversight, not only in police, but throughout city government. ​

About me:

My core values are integrity, determination, compassion, service, vision, and action. My professional creed is to provide the kind of care that I would like to receive for myself or my family.

I am a medical doctor with over thirty years experience in hospital administration at the Veterans Hospital and Swedish Hospital, running family/primary medicine clinics in Seattle. and working as an emergency room doctor in rural communities in Washington. I was trained in the bio-psycho-social model and deeply believe in a holistic and comprehensive approach to allopathic medicine. I earned my medical degree at UCLA, School of Medicine, one of the top ten medical schools in the US. I served my residency at the University of Washington.
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I am a thirteenth generation American (yes, my real family name is Bliss). I have lived in Seattle continuously for 31 years.  I consider myself an independent Democrat. I voted for Biden in the last election, was a strong supporter for Bernie Sanders in 2016 and unhappy with the election outcome and ensuing presidency, and voted for Obama in 2008 and 2012.

I have the experience to be your Mayor

My leadership experience includes Acting Chief of Staff at Walla Walla VA Hospital, Director of Emergency Services at American Lake VA Hospital, and Chair of Swedish Family Practice Quality Assurance Committee. Over the years I have worked at Neighborcare, serving members of underserved communities and run a private family practice in Seattle. I have also worked as an ER doctor in hospitals in rural communities around Washington including South Bend, Forks, Pasco, Moses Lake and White Salmon. 

In my career I have taken leadership roles when there was a crisis and a need.  In my role as Chief of Staff at the VA Hospital, I took over in a crisis where all medical doctors had stepped down from leadership positions as they felt administration had an unreasonable expectation in the number of patients seen in a day.   After reviewing the information, I found that I agreed with the doctors and asked the VA administration to reverse their decision, and was told this would not be done.  I had to find a way to implement this policy while getting the doctors on board.  What I did was to make a process where doctors got the doctors to document their telephone calls with patients at the end of the day as formal visits, thereby giving the number of visits without increasing their workload.  More importantly, I asked the doctors if they won this fight, did they feel that the number of patients seen was a good measure of the work that they did and they universally said no.  I pledged to them that we would begin measuring the things that did matter to them and patients, including quality of care, patient satisfaction, and ability for patients to get into the doctor quickly.  I began reporting these measures at our weekly hospital leadership meetings, and within 3 months, the hospital administrators stopped even monitoring numbers of patients seen and within 9 months I had all medical leadership positions filled once again.  This example of one of my successes illustrates my commitment to a solution that provides a win for everyone, my capacity for deep understanding that leads to real change and durable solutions. 

My Campaign Statement

Are you suffering from compassion fatigue? Are you frustrated with the lack of planning and progress in police accountability and the ever expanding tent encampments in our city parks? I am too.  As your mayor, I will act with the vision, courage and compassion needed to address these and other pressing issues.    As a graduate of one of the top ten US medical schools, I’ve spent my career as a medical leader developing sustainable systems that provide compassionate care for all.

As a leader, I understand that core values like police accountability can never be safely negotiated away.  The Seattle Police Department has been under federal decree since 2012 for repeatedly violating our resident’s civil rights.  The judge determined these violations stemmed from a lack of police oversight.  Specifically, our police union contract protects rogue police officers from disciplinary action and prosecution.  In response, our city negotiated minor revisions to the existing police union contract in 2018.  In 2019, the federal court found the city remains in violation.  The city currently has no timeline for resolution.   

In 2019 the 9th Circuit Court ruled that charging a person with vagrancy when they have nowhere else to go is cruel and unusual punishment and a violation of their civil rights.  In response our city allows living in tent encampments and promotes policies and legislation encouraging theft, vandalism, and violent crimes as a way to meet basic needs. 

We need solutions.  Protecting Civil Rights is non-negotiable.  
If elected I would immediately:

• Provide basic emergency food, shelter, security, and treatment to our residents who have no other options. 
• Permanently remove tent dwellers from city parks. 
• Nullify any section of the police union contract that limits accountability and oversight. ​

Vote for wise action!   Join me in solidarity!  
​Vote for Doctor Bliss! 

Send us what issues, ideas and concerns you would like Doctor Bliss to address.   

Seattle Can Be a Great Place to Live for Everybody