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Wednesday, May 13, 2009

City Drago Deciding Within the Next 10 Days "At the Outside"

Posted by Erica C. Barnett on Wed, May 13, 2009 at 7:14 PM

Just got off the phone with potential mayoral candidate (and retiring city council member) Jan Drago, who says she'll decide within a week to ten days "at the outside" whether she'll challenge two-term mayor Greg Nickels. Drago's polling shows that she wins 45 to 24 in a two-way lineup with Nickels. Nickels' campaign spokesman Sandeep Kaushik criticized the poll results Drago released, noting that they didn't include other primary candidates or the results of "uninformed" voters (i.e. voters who weren't told about Drago's long history on the council, the fact that she would be the only female mayor in 80 years, or that she'd been a small business owner). Drago's response: "The purpose of the poll was to determine if I was a viable candidate and clearly the answer to that is yes. And it also showed that the mayor was weaker than previously seen. Not only has he not gotten, stronger or stabilized, his numbers continue to decline." As for the lack of questions about other candidates, Drago said: "Fair enough. It was not an expensive poll and we didn't ask a primary question with the whole field. .. This was only to find out what my viability was." On that front, Drago says, she's encouraged. "I am very, very gratified by the results." She says she'll make her decision in "max, ten days."

Comments (10) RSS

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My problem with Drago is the same problem I have with Nickels: she likes the deep-bored viaduct.

At least both are qualified. McGinn is completely unqualified, and should be running for city council or something.

Posted by Max J on May 13, 2009 at 9:40 PM

@1
It's not a deep-bored viaduct, it's a deep bored tunnel to replace the viaduct.

Posted by andrew

on May 13, 2009 at 9:41 PM

@1: Mike has a long history of working with broad-based coalitions to get things done at both the community and City level (see the Parks Levy, Great City, the defeat of Roads and Transit and his work in Greenwood). He has a strong vision and understands the policies needed to get it acomplished. Sure, he's never worked in served in elected office, but I'll take his experience and convictions over the T-Mobile millionaire, the Nickels machine and Drago any day.

Posted by CMB on May 13, 2009 at 10:28 PM

Sorry for the typo, long day.

Posted by CMB on May 13, 2009 at 10:30 PM

I'd love to hear Drago tell us where she differs from Nickels. No, wait, I'd rather she just go away and take her corporate pandering cadre with her.

Posted by Boo on May 13, 2009 at 10:40 PM

@3
I agree that he has a long history of standing in the way of things, and don't get me wrong, that's a good thing, but that has nothing to do with running a city.

Posted by Max J on May 13, 2009 at 11:14 PM

Junket Jan, as she is known at City Hall, is already in retirement mode, as the attached report attests:

http://tinyurl.com/pg9orb

Posted by As I recall, the reporter was indignant on May 14, 2009 at 6:15 AM

What had Nickles run before being mayor? He was a county council member. He still has never run anything.

Drago has never run anything but an ice cream shop and a council office.

Posted by abc on May 14, 2009 at 8:18 AM

Anybody but Nickels.

Posted by Trevor on May 14, 2009 at 8:26 AM