32nd District candidates: Keith Scully and Danica Noble

Washington state’s midterm elections are Tuesday, Nov. 3.

The Beacon sent six questions to Keith Scully and Danica Noble, both Democrats vying for a two-year term as state representative in the 32nd Legislative District, Position 1, which serves south Edmonds, Esperance, and parts of King and Snohomish counties, including Woodway, Lynnwood, Shoreline, Mountlake Terrace, and northwest Seattle.

Scully is a Shoreline councilmember who has served two terms as mayor. Noble has no elected office experience. The seat became open when longtime Position 1 candidate Cindy Ryu decided to run for the 32nd District senate seat.

Edmonds Beacon: The Legislature approved Washington’s first tax on personal income over $1 million. It’s now a hot topic in advance of the election. Do you support or oppose the new millionaires tax? Why or why not

Keith Scully: I support a complete overhaul of our tax system to make it progressive rather than regressive. The Millionaires Tax was a chance to start fixing that. Instead, it's essentially another tax layered on top of a bad system. Asking the wealthiest to pay more is fair, but this tax does nothing to reduce the regressive burden on everyone else. Families in Lynnwood and Edmonds still pay the same sales and property taxes they did before.

My goal isn't simply to raise taxes. Long term, I want to completely reform our tax code so it's progressive: replacing or sharply reducing sales and property taxes with an income tax that exempts lower- and middle-income households and asks more of those most able to pay, and basing the B&O tax on profit rather than gross receipts.

Danica Noble: I support unregressing our tax system, but this tax was only half the job. Making our tax system fairer should also mean reducing the burden of existing taxes, especially sales taxes, on working families.

I also want accountability for how the money is spent. Supporters promised funding for education, but the legislation does not require the revenue to go to schools. Those promises should be reflected in the law, not just in the pitch.

Washington needs a predictable, sustainable budget that funds essential services without placing a disproportionate burden on those least able to pay. This tax alone does not get us there and leaves Washington one of the most regressively taxed states in the nation.

Beacon:  Ferry reliability, as demonstrated in the Oct. 5 “sick out” from the engineering crew, remains a major issue for Edmonds residents. What specific actions would you support to improve Washington State Ferries service?

Scully: Ferries aren't a luxury for Edmonds. They're part of our highway system, and residents and businesses depend on them every day.

The recent sick-out wasn't an accident. It was a coordinated labor tactic, and it left commuters, workers, and families stranded. I'm proud of my support from organized labor, and good relationships between the state and its workers are the foundation of reliable service. But a good relationship includes clear expectations on both sides.

The state owes ferry workers fair wages, safe conditions, and good-faith bargaining. In return, the public is owed boats that sail on schedule. Disputes belong at the bargaining table, not on the dock.

Beyond labor relations, I'd support two things. First, crews: fund recruitment, paid training, and apprenticeships for deck and engine positions so a few absences don't cancel sailings. Second, boats: much of the fleet is past its expected service life. The Legislature should keep vessel replacement, including the new hybrid-electric boats, funded and on schedule, and fully fund maintenance.

As a city councilmember, I've learned that deferred maintenance only gets more expensive. In Olympia, I'll prioritize maintaining the system we have, ferries included, over new highway capacity.

Noble: Ferries are essential transportation, not a luxury. People need to know they can get to work, school, access medical services, and get home again. I would support planning that connects reliable funding with clear goals for staffing, vessel maintenance, and replacement.

That means planning for workforce needs before shortages become service disruptions and addressing maintenance before breakdowns force cancellations.

Accountability matters, too. Washington State Ferries should report clearly on these areas with independent audits to identify problems and track improvements. Riders deserve reliable service, and workers deserve reasonable staffing and compensation, and we all need honest information when something goes wrong. I am committed to having my positions informed by talking to people who rely on and work on our ferries.

Beacon: Do you believe state government has struck the right balance between encouraging housing density and preserving local control over zoning? Why or why not?

Scully: Not quite. Housing in the 32nd District has become unaffordable for working families, and decades of local resistance to density are a big part of why. The state's job is to set clear minimums for housing, including real density near transit, and to enforce them. But cities need the discretion to decide where and how to meet those minimums, and House Bill 1110 gives them the least of it where it matters most.

Cities can exempt up to a quarter of their single-family lots from the law, but generally not within a half mile of a major transit stop, and the highest density minimums apply across a quarter-mile circle around each stop. When Shoreline upzoned around our two light rail stations, we drew our own lines.

We added density where it made sense and left out environmentally sensitive areas, including buffers and natural areas. The result is thousands of new homes in walkable neighborhoods, with those areas protected.

That's the balance I'll bring to Olympia: firm statewide floors, local judgment on the details.

Noble: Not yet. The legislature has a role to play in preparing the state for growth and make housing more affordable. But statewide requirements need to leave room for local conditions.

We should reduce unnecessary permitting delays and costs that make housing harder to build. We also need to ensure that new housing is supported by transportation, utilities, schools, and other services.

Knocking on doors across the 32nd District, I hear how much people value their communities and I experienced the distinct characters of our cities. Our communities differ in geography, infrastructure, and housing needs. The state should establish clear housing goals while giving cities meaningful flexibility in how to meet them. We need more homes and thoughtful local planning, not a choice between the two.

Beacon: What role should cities like Edmonds have in making land-use decisions versus mandates from the Legislature?

Scully: Cities should lead, and the state should set the floor.

I've spent 15 years on local land-use decisions, first on Shoreline's Planning Commission and then ten years on the City Council, including as Mayor. Cities know their neighborhoods, their infrastructure, and where growth fits best. Decisions about where density goes, how neighborhoods are designed, and how to protect trees and natural areas should be made locally, with real community input.

But under the Growth Management Act, cities also have obligations to their region. When a city refuses to allow enough housing, everyone pays: higher rents, longer commutes, and more sprawl into farms and forests. That's why I support statewide minimums like ADU and middle-housing laws. I'd rather see cities lead with their own upzones, and many have. Where they won't, the state needs to be able to require it.

Noble: Cities should have a meaningful role in deciding where and how their communities grow. Most importantly, residents need to be involved early, not after the major decisions have already been made.

Mandates don’t always translate to good outcomes. We have seen it in the way we fund schools with the prototypical model, assuming a one-size-fits-all approach that is too rigid to let local administrators make the choices best for their schools. Similarly, local governments should retain flexibility over implementation, including how growth fits with infrastructure, environmental constraints, and neighborhood needs.

Mandates without practical support are not enough. The state has to provide the funding for the infrastructure in roads and utilities, schools, and park to ensure cities can meet their responsibility to actually achieve creating housing people can afford. I support combining state expectations, local decision-making, and funding for the infrastructure that makes growth possible

Beacon:  Crime rates have improved in some areas, but residents remain concerned about retail theft, drug crime, and property crime. What additional public safety legislation would you support?

Scully: I've seen public safety from several sides: as a paramedic, as a King County deputy prosecutor who tried more than 30 jury trials, and as a city councilmember and mayor responsible for a police budget. People deserve to feel safe at home, in stores, and on transit. That takes both enforcement and prevention.

On enforcement, I support state funding to help cities and counties hire and retain officers and give prosecutors and courts the capacity to move cases. As mayor of Shoreline, I worked to fill police staffing gaps that had officers working untenable schedules. I'm committed to alternatives to detention where they work, but incarceration needs to remain an option at every level of crime, including for organized and repeat retail theft.

On prevention, much of what drives property and drug crime is untreated addiction and mental illness. I'd expand treatment capacity, including detox and behavioral health beds, so that when police or courts send someone to treatment, a bed is actually available. In Shoreline, we put mental health professionals in the field alongside police and fire and built a crisis receiving facility. That frees officers to focus on crime. I'd expand that model statewide.

Noble: Everyone deserves to feel safe in their communities. We are not there yet. My husband is a small-business owner who has had to spend $60,000 a year on private security. That is money he should be able to invest in his business and employees, not spend simply to keep workers and customers safe.

I support legislation that gives law enforcement the staffing, training, and investigative and judicial resources to address theft, trafficking, and gun violence, including the problems along Aurora.

We also need stronger community-based responses for people experiencing addiction or a mental health crisis, especially young people. Police should not be the default response to every unmet behavioral health need. Public safety requires both accountability for crime and effective intervention before someone’s crisis becomes a costly or tragic emergency. 

Beacon: What additional steps, if any, should the Legislature take to address wildfire preparedness, flooding and climate resilience?

Scully: I entered politics to protect the environment, and climate impacts are already here. Wildfire smoke costs us weeks of breathable air most summers. Flooding, unstable slopes, and rising water along the Sound and the BNSF rail line threaten homes and infrastructure. Stormwater carrying tire-wear chemicals is killing coho salmon in our creeks.

On wildfires, I grew up in a high fire-risk area, and my childhood neighborhood in Bonny Doon, California, has since burned to the ground. Washington needs to manage state forests for health, not just harvest: longer rotations, earlier thinning, and more prescribed burns. I'd also fund clean-air and cooling centers for older residents and others most vulnerable to smoke and heat.

On flooding and resilience, the state should help cities replace failing culverts and shift from piping stormwater straight into the Sound to rain gardens and natural detention, which reduces both flooding and pollution. Shoreline rewrote its surface water plan to do exactly that.

And we need to keep cutting emissions by speeding up permitting for clean energy generation, transmission, and storage, without gutting environmental review.

Noble: We need to prepare for disasters before they happen and make sure climate funding reaches the communities facing the greatest risks.

I support restoring Climate Commitment Act dollars diverted from their intended purposes and providing a clear accounting of how that money is spent. I also support working with the Office of the Insurance Commissioner and local governments to avoid public policies that encourage development in areas with high flood or wildfire risk.

We should invest in practical preparedness: forest management, flood protection, evacuation planning, and early detection. That includes carefully evaluated tools such as AI-assisted wildfire monitoring that is showing tremendous promise in pilot programs around the world.

Finally, we need guardrails on construction of data centers to make sure that they are serving Washington's working families, not just billionaires. We cannot let them damage our environment, drain our energy, and drive up our prices.

Nor should we stand for our public officials to negotiating these data center deals under nondisclosure agreements. I won’t let Big Tech get a blank check at the public’s expense.