Taxes aren’t necessarily a problem. Spending tax dollars on special campaign donor projects gives us poor value for our tax dollars. That is a big problem.
Our public schools are funded by property taxes. The wealthy live in wealthy cities and wealthy neighborhoods and the public schools in these regions are much better. In poor neighborhoods, our public education is generally terrible because the funding is terrible. Political refugees generally settle in poor neighborhoods adding additional financial responsibilities with limited additional funding. In addition, our public schools are run by a monopoly. You must attend the school in your region. Students don’t have options. Our teachers unions give big donations to our public officials to prevent our schools from allowing student choice.
Each year our public schools fail to graduate our poor and minority students. Seeing these ongoing injustices that persist year after year, we react. We hide the truth by getting rid of standards in our schools, advancing students despite our failure to educate them and then trying to hide the fact that our educational standards are falling and our students are failing. Seeing the fact that our schools are inherently unjust, we start blaming each other as unjust, labeling those who succeed as oppressors and start suggesting that the solution is to limit everyone’s education. If we want to really want give each student an equal educational opportunity, we need to resolve the economic injustice of funding public education based on how wealthy your neighborhood is and also end the injustice of public school monopolies and allow any child to attend any public school.
Our public colleges continue to take more and more wealthy students from out of state and out of the country while in-state students of limited means have fewer and fewer options.
Each year our wealthy get more wealthy and our poor get poorer.
Our public schools are funded by property taxes. The wealthy live in wealthy cities and wealthy neighborhoods and the public schools in these regions are much better. In poor neighborhoods, our public education is generally terrible because the funding is terrible. Political refugees generally settle in poor neighborhoods adding additional financial responsibilities with limited additional funding. In addition, our public schools are run by a monopoly. You must attend the school in your region. Students don’t have options. Our teachers unions give big donations to our public officials to prevent our schools from allowing student choice.
Each year our public schools fail to graduate our poor and minority students. Seeing these ongoing injustices that persist year after year, we react. We hide the truth by getting rid of standards in our schools, advancing students despite our failure to educate them and then trying to hide the fact that our educational standards are falling and our students are failing. Seeing the fact that our schools are inherently unjust, we start blaming each other as unjust, labeling those who succeed as oppressors and start suggesting that the solution is to limit everyone’s education. If we want to really want give each student an equal educational opportunity, we need to resolve the economic injustice of funding public education based on how wealthy your neighborhood is and also end the injustice of public school monopolies and allow any child to attend any public school.
Our public colleges continue to take more and more wealthy students from out of state and out of the country while in-state students of limited means have fewer and fewer options.
Each year our wealthy get more wealthy and our poor get poorer.
Create Zoning that values density, green spaces, trees, and close proximity of housing, businesses and shopping.
When people live, work, play, congregate, and shop in the same neighborhood, they have a much smaller carbon footprint, spend less time commuting, and overall have a better quality of life. I envision whole neighborhoods of owner occupied housing in buildings with retail businesses at the street level, offices on the second level, and housing in levels three to five.
Reward people who currently provide low income housing.
Currently we talk endlessly about providing low income housing, but in reality, we are tearing it down and building unaffordable housing, and we punish those who provide affordable housing by requiring them to provide free housing for 5 months of the year (November through March).
Reward those who have trees of significance. Currently we limit the development of land that has trees of significance. Essentially we are punishing those who value and grow trees. Instead, we should offer them greater development opportunities.
Reward those who have trees of significance. Currently we limit the development of land that has trees of significance. Essentially we are punishing those who value and grow trees. Instead, we should offer them greater development opportunities.
End legalized bribery of public officials and the subsequent wasting of your tax dollars on pet projects for wealthy donors or groups of donors.
While this is not something we can legislate at the local level due to federal laws and supreme court rulings, as voters, we can still band together and take a pledge of honor to vote only for those candidates who accept small donations donations from individual voters only.
In my last campaign for mayor four years ago, I didn’t accept money from anyone for anything. And other than paying about $2000 in order to run for office I didn’t spend any personal money on my campaign either. I got just under 1% of the vote in Seattle and felt very proud of my campaign and our contribution to the dialog at the time. At the end of the primary process, we held a victory party to celebrate our achievements in contributing to the public discourse. As an example, I repeatedly stood against the concept of defunding our police, in particular because it would make our city less safe and would disproportionately negatively impact our poor and minority communities, and ultimately this idea was replaced with the idea that we need to have police accountable for their actions and we should never have to negotiate with police unions for our civil rights.
I believe our campaign also contributed significantly to the understanding of the problems and solutions for managing people who suffer from addiction, particularly on the point that while we should offer the opportunity for treatment, if the war on drugs has taught us anything, it is that we can not force an individual to stop their addiction, and that we can often make the problem worse by enabling destructive behavior. Treatment of any serious health condition occurs in a controlled environment, not in a city park.
One thing that I learned in my last campaign is that many individuals wanted to contribute their vouchers or make a small contribution, and ultimately I felt I was being elitist by refusing these good faith efforts to participate. In Seattle, In order to participate in the democracy voucher program for the mayor’s office, a candidate must get a minimum of 600 signatures of support and a minimum of 600 donations of $10 dollars or more before that candidate can redeem the democracy vouchers. So for practical purposes, I suggest that in Seattle we limit the donation to ten dollars maximum per individual voter donation, and ask that each donor also sign a letter of support. While my opinion is that all a campaign really needs is a website and motivated voters to spread the word, we could still use the proceeds to have celebratory rallies in our neighborhood parks. In any case, I welcome your vouchers, your signatures, and your personal 10 dollar donations.
Also, while I do not want to seek endorsements of organizations with the expectation of a payback that is contrary to the public interest, If you organization finds it is aligned with the values of this campaign, I would be glad to be endorsed, no matter how small your group. You can add your organization to the list of endorsers here:
In my last campaign for mayor four years ago, I didn’t accept money from anyone for anything. And other than paying about $2000 in order to run for office I didn’t spend any personal money on my campaign either. I got just under 1% of the vote in Seattle and felt very proud of my campaign and our contribution to the dialog at the time. At the end of the primary process, we held a victory party to celebrate our achievements in contributing to the public discourse. As an example, I repeatedly stood against the concept of defunding our police, in particular because it would make our city less safe and would disproportionately negatively impact our poor and minority communities, and ultimately this idea was replaced with the idea that we need to have police accountable for their actions and we should never have to negotiate with police unions for our civil rights.
I believe our campaign also contributed significantly to the understanding of the problems and solutions for managing people who suffer from addiction, particularly on the point that while we should offer the opportunity for treatment, if the war on drugs has taught us anything, it is that we can not force an individual to stop their addiction, and that we can often make the problem worse by enabling destructive behavior. Treatment of any serious health condition occurs in a controlled environment, not in a city park.
One thing that I learned in my last campaign is that many individuals wanted to contribute their vouchers or make a small contribution, and ultimately I felt I was being elitist by refusing these good faith efforts to participate. In Seattle, In order to participate in the democracy voucher program for the mayor’s office, a candidate must get a minimum of 600 signatures of support and a minimum of 600 donations of $10 dollars or more before that candidate can redeem the democracy vouchers. So for practical purposes, I suggest that in Seattle we limit the donation to ten dollars maximum per individual voter donation, and ask that each donor also sign a letter of support. While my opinion is that all a campaign really needs is a website and motivated voters to spread the word, we could still use the proceeds to have celebratory rallies in our neighborhood parks. In any case, I welcome your vouchers, your signatures, and your personal 10 dollar donations.
Also, while I do not want to seek endorsements of organizations with the expectation of a payback that is contrary to the public interest, If you organization finds it is aligned with the values of this campaign, I would be glad to be endorsed, no matter how small your group. You can add your organization to the list of endorsers here:
