Just a quick note to give followers a bit of the sausage making in those whole boring process of SB5370.
One nice thing about State business is that even the Executive Sessions are available on video. Ironically, this is one of their arguments against having full transparency of all documents. At the municipal level, a city council executive session is truly private. Basically, all politicians want private spaces to get the ‘real business’ done.
So the Vice Chair of the Transportation committee (Senator Saldaña, 37th District–Seattle), after getting feedback from the Port Of Seattle, now is comfortable supporting this bill. And so… it passes through to the next phase (Rules Committee).
Well, that’s a relief.
It’s times like this I wish I knew how emojis work. You know, like that eye rolling thing.
Now this thing was headed to the Rules Committee anyhow. But it’s telling that the Senator wanted to get it on the record to all her colleagues that she had gotten the OK from the Port.
I understand why she wants to protect her constituency. A properly competitive second airport could potentially be a real threat to businesses in her district over the long term. But why people in our neck of the woods are being so nice to the Port when the Port is so mean to us in return? That’s a story for another day.