Seattle City Council candidates square off on key issues

How to replace the Alaskan Way Viaduct, fix the "Mercer mess" and create more affordable in-city housing were the hot issues Tuesday evening as candidates for Seattle City Council squared off at the city's main library.

In a forum sponsored by The Seattle Times CityClub, the eight candidates, running for four council seats, agreed on many issues facing voters next month.

All oppose Tim Eyman's Initiative 1033, which would limit growth of state, county and city revenue to annual inflation and population growth.

All support a yes vote on Referendum 71, which asks voters whether to keep the state's newest domestic-partnership law.

And all support extending the city's affordable-housing levy.

But there was disagreement when talk turned to the planned tunnel to replace Alaskan Way Viaduct.

Mike O'Brien, a candidate for Position 8 and David Bloom, running for Position 4, oppose it.

"The cost overruns will be enormous and will fall in the laps of Seattle taxpayers," said Bloom, a housing advocate and deputy director of the Church Council of Greater Seattle.

Bloom said the tunnel would provide no access to downtown, and high tolls would send motorists onto surface streets. "This is a bad deal for Seattle taxpayers," he said.

O'Brien has said he supports a $3.3 billion proposal to replace the viaduct with surface streets. He was asked Tuesday night to explain his thinking in light of the fact that the $4.2 billion tunnel plan approved by the Legislature would cost just $900 million more.

"$900 million is a lot of money," O'Brien said. "If we had $900 million, is that what we would want to invest in?"

Asked whether his surface-street plan would cause gridlock in downtown Seattle, he replied that when the state closed down lanes on Interstate 5 south of Seattle and predicted huge backups, they didn't materialize. Drivers coped then, and they will cope if surface streets replace the viaduct, he said.

Council incumbent Richard Conlin and his opponent David Ginsberg agreed that public safety is a huge priority for the city. But while Ginsberg said he supports hiring more than the 25 new police officers in Mayor Greg Nickels' proposed budget, Conlin said 25 is all the city can afford.

Bloom has said he would like to build 5,000 units of affordable housing and was asked how he would pay for it. He didn't answer that question. But he questioned the city's priorities in allocating limited resources. Why, he asked, should the city put $1 billion into development in the South Lake Union neighborhood and $300 million into rebuilding Mercer Street when working families can't afford to live in the city.

"We need to shift our priorities about how we spend our money," Bloom said.

Bloom's opponent, attorney Sally Bagshaw, said she wants to build 1,000 more shelter beds with services, but said there is no money to build Bloom's 5,000 units of affordable housing.

Mercer Street proved to be a contentious topic. Jesse Israel, who is running against incumbent Nick Licata, supports it. Licata does not.

Licata said he supports a plan by former Mayor Paul Schell that would improve Mercer at a cost of $25 million but retain it as a one-way street, far below the $300 million proposed by Nickels' plan. He said under Nickels' plan for Mercer Street, travel times from the Seattle Center to Interstate 5 would increase from seven to 17 minutes.

Asked why none of his colleagues agreed with him, Licata said, "I've done more homework."

Israel said she wants a two-way Mercer Street. "This is a way of knitting the street grid back together," she said. "It is the least walkable, drivable, bike-able road in the city. It's about building a neighborhood." Israel reported this week that she'd given $15,000 to her campaign.

Robert Rosencrantz, who is running against O'Brien, said he supports the tunnel to replace the viaduct but doesn't want Seattle taxpayers stuck paying cost overruns, as required by the Legislature. Rosencrantz said there's about 50 million square feet of commercial real estate near the waterfront, and businesses there, which would have no blocked view of Elliott Bay if the tunnel is built, should pay the most. "The average taxpayer in Seattle should not get a bill," he said.

Licata was asked about his opposition to the taxpayer subsidies that helped build Safeco and Qwest Fields and said he thought they were an inordinate amount of money. Still, he said, he worked to get the Seattle Storm women's basketball team into KeyArena and supports reasonable financing for professional teams.

Asked how many times he's been to the two stadiums, he said about a dozen.

Susan Gilmore: 206-464-2054 or sgilmore@seattletimes.com