City attorney Tom Carr will not participate in tonight’s high-profile debate on public-safety issues. The debate is sponsored by the ACLU of Washington and about 40 other civil-rights and minority community organizations.
Although Carr told me earlier this month that he planned to attend the debate, he now says he has a scheduling conflict: A long-planned house party and fundraiser hosted by a friend. “I didn’t change my mind—it’s the format. It’s an hour and a half long, and there’s no way you can do two things at once,” Carr says.
Carr will send his assistant Ruth Bowman to present a statement on his behalf. Susan Hutchison, a conservative candidate for King County Executive who has given money exclusively to Republicans, is the only other candidate in any race who has confirmed she will not attend tonight’s debate.
Peter Holmes, who is challenging Carr, says Carr’s decision not to attend tonight’s debate is “disappointing. He’s repeatedly said that public safety is the central mission of the city attorney’s office, and the title of this debate is ‘To Protect and Serve.’”
Holmes will still attend the debate, which will be held at the Rainier Valley Cultural Center, 3515 S Alaska Street, starting at 5:30 pm.
Tweet
So where’s this fundraiser being held? What’s the address, so that people who support Carr can go and show their support ?
Is it public?
The Carr campaign website doesn’t have any info on it.
I’m really shocked Carr didn’t re-arrange his schedule to accommodate this forum.
I guess this shows where the public safety concerns of the citizens of Seattle rank in his priorites. I guess this shows what Mr. Carr really thinks of SE Seattle.
Or perhaps his campaign manager just doesn’t understand that as a sitting City Attorney you can’t blow off a forum like this.
There are a lot of candidates that aren’t going to this forum, including Richard Conlin and Nick Licata. Maybe that is because this forum doesn’t even begin to approach any sense of fairness. First of all, the title is “Public Safety?” and the wording indicates that the leftist organizations sponsoring this thing have a clear agenda, are living in constant state of victim-hood, don’t want a police presense and yet cry for help when another teen is shot. No wonder.
This isn’t about candidates ignoring SE Seattle. In the primary, there were more forums in the 37th LD than the rest of the city combined. There was a forum last week, just 1 1/2 miles up the road from this one. There are three more scheduled in the next 2 weeks.
When organizations want to sponsor forums, perhaps they ought to check with other organizations to see if 1) they want to be fair and impartial or provide the bait and gun to shoot the candidates at the door, 2) there are other nearly-identical forums scheduled, and 3) they ought to realize that this is one big, long city and all the problems don’t happen in SE Seattle. It just seems that way for a reason.
Councilmembers had a competing official event, then showed up after it was over. They also sent real surrogates, who answered questions, while Carrs surrogate fled after reading a short statement. And check out the groups’ questionnaire, Carr didn’t even bother to answer most questions.
The pattern is clear.
It spells out screw you, SE Seattle.
Kind of the same Glenn Beck attitude as the commentor above.
(Btw, just where was the secret Carr fundraiser again? I’m sure when PDC reports are filed we’ll see a bunch of checks for Carr all written on this date….)
There are a lot of candidates that aren't going to this forum, including Richard Conlin and Nick Licata. Maybe that is because this forum doesn't even begin to approach any sense of fairness. First of all, the title is “Public Safety?” and the wording indicates that the leftist organizations sponsoring this thing have a clear agenda, are living in constant state of victim-hood, don't want a police presense and yet cry for help when another teen is shot. No wonder.
This isn't about candidates ignoring SE Seattle. In the primary, there were more forums in the 37th LD than the rest of the city combined. There was a forum last week, just 1 1/2 miles up the road from this one. There are three more scheduled in the next 2 weeks.
When organizations want to sponsor forums, perhaps they ought to check with other organizations to see if 1) they want to be fair and impartial or provide the bait and gun to shoot the candidates at the door, 2) there are other nearly-identical forums scheduled, and 3) they ought to realize that this is one big, long city and all the problems don't happen in SE Seattle. It just seems that way for a reason.