CITY LIGHTS
By Al Hooper

Students of human nature can learn something from a scene in a `90s flick called City Slickers. Tenderfoot Billy Crystal is riding alongside grizzled cowboy Jack Palance who is chuckling, in a grizzled way, at the tenderfoots rampant anxieties.
Grizzled cowboy says, City folk! and chuckles some more. You just dont learn!
Dont learn what?

Cowboy holds up a grizzled finger. In life theres only one thing thats important.
But whats that?
Cowboy says, Thats for you to find out!

Okay, it aint Shakespeare. But for Edmonds City Council candidates, it could well serve as a strategy primer in the current election.

What do incumbents Ron Wambolt and Strom Peterson stand for as they defend their council seats?

Lots of things. Good fiscal management. More tax-paying businesses within the city. Finding ways to increase the revenues that fund the services local residents find necessary to fulfill their lives in Edmonds By The Sea.

Pretty full list. And what of the other incumbent on the ballot? What does Michael Plunkett stand for?

Mr. Plunketts Pledge To the People is this:
No tall buildings!
Repeated with gusto.

Councilman Plunkett, who seeks a fourth term, had his faith in Santa Claus restored one recent morning when he woke to learn that developer Al Dykes has applied to build several condos on Mr. Dykes Safeway waterfront site buildings that would tower 75 feet above the earth.

The citys present building height limit is 25 feet.
Thats about one third of 75 feet, if you dont have your calculator handy.

Visualize Mr. Plunkett as he digests this windfall. No caffeine fix necessary he is already salivating. Eyes ablaze, he informs your everlovin Beacon:
Anyone upright on two feet knows the proposed 75-foot-high development limit for downtown waterfront properties is a straw dog set up to be knocked down. The real question among candidates and council members is not 75 feet but just how much above the `Peoples Height Limit will be allowed as a compromise.

How much could you abide, Mr. Plunkett?
I stand with the people of Edmonds, he says flatly. I will not vote to allow ANY construction above the Peoples Height Limit for waterfront properties. If there is a grain of equivocation in Mr. Plunketts response, it is not readily apparent.

Meantime, since this is Edmonds, the regulatory plot thickens. Congeals, even.
Incumbent Ron Wambolt is in a three-cornered scuffle to retain his seat against challengers Adrienne Fraley-Monillas and Lora Petso. Both challengers, it can be fairly said, hold views more closely aligned with Michael Plunkett than with Ron Wambolt.

AND WHATS THIS? We learn that developer Al Dykes has funneled $1,000 into Ron Wambolts election campaign!

Quick, Watson, the phone! Hello, hello? Mr. Wambolt?
For the record, City Lights regards councilman Wambolt as a public official of rare integrity and conviction. Just the same, sir, how do you think this looks to the voting public?

As a result of his contributing $1,000 to my campaign, Mr. Wambolt says, it was a real dilemma for me. A few people whose judgment I respect suggested I consider giving the money back because there will be some who use the contribution against me during the campaign. I was first leaning in that direction. But now Ive decided I wont take the easy way out.

Say what, Mr. Wambolt?
My thinking is this, he goes on. Why should the Traditionalists (a reference to the council split between so-called Traditionalists and Progressives) be able to take money from their Alliance of Citizens For Edmonds supporters as well as others of that ilk, and developers should not try to have a council member elected who looks at their proposals objectively and doesnt summarily dismiss them?

Sounds reasonable. If you happen to be in Mr. Wambolts corner.
Which his two challengers, plus Mr. Plunkett, are anything but.

Fortunately for Ron Wambolt, he is not running against Michael Plunkett in this skirmish. Mr. Plunkett has other prey to pluck. He and challenger Priya Cloutier, as the only two candidates in their race, dont face off until the Nov. 3 general election.

It is Mr. Wambolts hope hell be there for it. But first he must survive the Aug. 18 primary versus Adrienne Fraley-Monillas and Lora Petso only two of the three move on to November.

Dyou suppose building heights will be part of their pre-election conversation?
Does a bear squat in the woods?
That would be yes and yes. Flatly.