Pick battles that help residents.
Picking battles with residents and the year that the City went 184% over budget on legal services
Because it’s a light news week, I’m using this issue of the newsletter for a larger topic: trust and transparency between residents and a city. A City of Clyde Hill memo item about “all of the City’s current outstanding controversies” from just a few years ago can help residents articulate what we want and expect from our City.
First, the news from the Administrator’s Weekly Report: the City Administrator is on vacation. Points Dr NE will have a Temporary Road Closure from November 22nd-24th. A reminder that there’s a SR-520 closure and that City Hall is closed for Thanksgiving. And yes, “the City has issued a follow-up survey with respect to dog waste.” (link)
Before you read the content below, I want to convey (especially to other residents) all the good that our city’s professional staff do. Nothing I write here is intended to detract from that great work.
What’s the point of a city?
One way to answer “why do we have Clyde Hill and not just another neighborhood in Bellevue?” involves the expectations of residents around city services. Let’s start with police, fire and emergency medical services, and stormwater:1
The City allocates its tax revenue to make sure Clyde Hill is well-policed. We enjoy a low crime rate. Kids walking to or from school and people walking their dogs are normal events you expect to see.
The City negotiates and manages contracts for many services and utilities, including one with the City of Bellevue for Fire and EMS.
The City maintains the stormwater drain system, because otherwise, well, this happens. From a video shown at the July 2021 Clyde Hill Council Meeting of of Winter 2020/21 stormwater-related flooding:
Cities are not easy
City Administrations need to make hard choices — to pick their battles. For example, here’s a photo of a house across the street from City Hall yesterday and back in 2007:
The City lacks restrictions in its municipal code regarding what many residents would identify as an issue. Not pursuing changes to the code here is a choice to not “pick this battle.”
So which battles did the City pick?
The year of 184% over budget for legal services
I’d heard hints about some particularly aggressive and antagonistic choices on the part of the City to pursue legal resolution of disagreements in the recent past, so I dug in.
Here’s a quick pass through the public record about Clyde Hill’s decisions — the battles it picked with a Cingular Wireless and with some residents — that resulted in this:
Act I: “Our attorneys thought it went well” (March 2016)
Act II: Controversies, plural (June 2016)
After I found no after-meeting notes discussing these issues, I listened to the audio record of the meeting. There was no report to the public about these issues.
Immediately after the executive (closed) session the Council voted to authorize a settlement — about 20 seconds in you’ll hear “a motion…
…to accept a [settlement] agreement with Gordon Bryson and Betsy Molesey…” Wait — who are these people? Settlement for what issue? What happened to Cingular Wireless?
Act III: The other controversy (July 2016)
The City had a concurrent (and expensive) dispute with Clyde Hill residents Gordon Bryson and Betsy Molesey:
From what’s available, it appears that there was a stormwater problem, a request for the City to address it, and a refusal — resulting in a Claim for Damages (circa February 2016), and then:
Act IV: Settlements
Imagine, hypothetically, you’re responsible for a city. Residents come to you with a problem with one of the few services you don’t contract out to another organization. Do you fight the residents who brought it to you?
Reading the public record of the $55K settlement and engineering repair work the City agreed to perform indicates that Clyde Hill said “Yes. Let’s fight our residents.”
The disagreement with Cingular went about the same. From one of the court decisions along the way:
One last excerpt from a City memo on these matters:
And reminder of where it started: “Our attorneys thought it went well.”
Act V: Budget Impact
In any job where you’re spending other people’s money, one of the most basic statements you know you’re going to have to say, repeatedly, in front of other people and with a balance sheet, is “I am responsibly spending the scarce and valuable resources with which you’ve entrusted me.” Here, add “on behalf of the community.”
These were Clyde Hill tax dollars that did not benefit the Clyde Hill community.
These are just the two cases I found. I have no reason to doubt that there were other aggressive and antagonistic City-on-resident interactions where the residents didn’t have the time, money, and energy required to fight City Hall.
So what? Oh, wait — prison?
Just one more thing…
For violations of the zoning code, the City can seek incarceration. Each day of non-compliance is a separate offense.
Alternatively, to our north:
I’ve read through many totally reasonable actions from the City… building a shed or gazebo that’s more that 120 sq ft and didn’t get a permit? Yes, you will get a stop work order and a fine. Good.
Much of this other stuff? As residents, we need to be clear about what we expect as our city exercises its immense power and resources on our homes, our streets, and our neighborhoods.
A good place to start is for the community to be loud and clear to local government that it should
Pick battles that help residents.
Thanks for reading this far! Please forward to your friends and neighbors around Clyde Hill and please subscribe!
Most of all — please send your feedback and your ideas for what other subjects to cover in this newsletter.
Complexity abounds: Bellevue School District (an entity separate from the City of Bellevue) is responsible for Clyde Hill Elementary, located in the City of Clyde Hill not the City of Bellevue. The Bellevue Library is a branch of the King County Library System.
Pick Battles That Help Residents is a good start, but doesn't quite go far enough for me. I don't want to battle with our City Government; I want a partnership with the entity whose sole purpose should be to serve the community. If the City views my interests as adversarial to theirs (and can throw me in jail for violating the Zoning code?!), then we have some serious relationship problems...