James Vesely / Times editorial page editor
New hope for regional cooperation — maybe

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The question whether Bob Drewel will make a difference as the new executive director of the region's premier government council has been answered in less than a week. Drewel has made a difference already and will make the alphabet organization — the Puget Sound Regional Council — a bully pulpit for regional cooperation and change.

Drewel exited his post as Snohomish County executive through term limits, and if pushing him into a regional role is a benefit of those limits, we should consider it for others. Drewel is a large-personality, high-energy guy. Let's hope the grinding infighting of King County politics doesn't grind him down too soon.

The PSRC is the funnel. In addition to collecting lots of facts about the region, it is the federally required dispersal agency for federal funding. Its role, as a background player and brain bank for local governments, is sometimes under attack when local priorities take over for regional ones. But for decades, the council has acted quietly, in a nonpartisan way, to provide expert advice to policymakers.

It's a coordinating body for questions of economic planning, growth and transportation. The current president is Seattle City Councilman Richard McIver; members come from every nook and cranny of a four-county region.

And since Drewel became executive director, inside the offices they say he has energized the place and given it a new profile.

But what about the region Drewel now views from horizon to horizon? Well, the agency's own polling shows a place people love to live in, but they have doubts about how it is being managed.

Northwest Research Group conducted a poll on "Regional Visioning," and with 915 respondents in the sample, came up with some intriguing findings:

• People love it here. Fully 80 percent of respondents thought their town is a good or excellent place to live; 52 percent thought the natural environment and beauty are what they liked best. That only fortifies the larger notion that people are deeply committed to natural stewardship in a congested metropolis.

• People don't think local governments are doing enough coordination and planning, and 74 percent think traffic is worse than it was five years ago. Nearly half — 45 percent — of respondents felt coordination did not currently exist.

Unfortunately, that's only partly true. Coordination, planning, committees, commissions, task forces and councils abound. The I-405 commission, the Trans-Lake committee, the Blue Ribbon Commission on roads, the Cascade Water Alliance ... we have coordination coming out of our ears. The problem is that there's rarely a decision, it's all process.

• People, 67 percent of them, want growth to be focused into already-developed neighborhoods and areas. That lines up with the earlier question that shows a high desirability for urban environmentalism. As a generalization, people live here and move here for the greens and blues, the colors of the mountains, sky and water. They don't love it here for the color of asphalt.

• About two-thirds — 66 percent — of respondents want a transportation system that "supports many modes of travel," which also makes sense. People are ready to get out of their cars, or at least get you out of your car so they can ride in theirs.

• And there is not much support for where we are now. Asked how they feel about the status quo, the respondents show a deep level of dissatisfaction: 60 percent of respondents think transportation is on the wrong track; 48 percent think economic planning is on the wrong track; 50 percent think land-use planning is on the wrong track.

This poll and others can be interpreted in several ways — I did some of my own interpretation above. But no matter how we spin it, the general level of dissatisfaction with the state of our region is a fact. I'm hoping Drewel, McIver and others can alter the course.

Puget Sound Regional Council can be found at www.psrc.org. The full poll will be on its Web site this week, a spokesman said.

James Vesely's column appears Sunday on editorial pages of The Times. His e-mail address is: jvesely@seattletimes.com

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