A signature honor

FORMER Snohomish County Executive Bob Drewel discovered that a politician can go home again — to great and enduring honor.

He was invited to testify before the Snohomish County Council during a special budget hearing. Drewel is executive director of the Puget Sound Regional Council, where he landed after a 12-year, three-term limit atop county government. The ruse worked. Drewel arrived to watch the County Council vote to name the anchor structure on the county's renovated campus The Robert J. Drewel Building. No more placeholder name, Administration East.

Planning and construction work on the $175 million campus redevelopment began during Drewel's tenure, and the expansive vision matched his sense of the county's growth and trajectory.

Drewel has been away from the county campus for only three years. Bipartisan respect for his legacy and his commitment to a stronger role for Snohomish County in regional government drove an extraordinary honor.