The Seattle City Council fired off a testy press release last night, supposedly outlining a funding proposal to replace the downtown seawall. It cites a combination of revenue sources (which I wrote about yesterday): a ballot measure asking for more property taxes, taxes on certain businesses on the waterfront, and a commercial parking lot tax. All of these are reasonable ways to fund the seawall, which will cost about $240 million, while paying for a parcel of other obligations in rebuilding the waterfront.

But the meat of the release wasn't about why the plan makes sense as an alternative to a property tax measure on the ballot that pays for all of it, as the mayor has proposed. Instead, half of it consisted of a barrage of petulant quotes from the city council attacking the mayor. More bizarre: The council cried that the mayor wasn’t involved in the seawall funding discussion even though—riddle this puzzle—they cribbed the mayor’s January proposal for a ballot measure. Let’s start with Sally Bagshaw:

“It’s unfortunate that the Mayor wants to spend all of his time in a fight with the State, rather than working with us to define funding options for the Seawall and viaduct,” commented Councilmember Sally Bagshaw. “We need responsible statesmen with sound judgment to work together. It’s time to learn the lessons from our decade-long debate and get to work and we invite the Mayor to join us in that.”

So the mayor hasn't done anything? Let’s examine Bagshaw's claim that the mayor spends "all" of his time fighting the state and none of his time working on seawall funding. On January 14, Mayor Mike McGinn* announced a funding plan for a ballot measure; on January 19, McGinn briefed the council about it; on March 2, he transmitted the legislation; for the next three months, the city budget office worked with council staff; on June 8, the mayor’s office recommended using parking-lot taxes for funding part of the Mercer project; and on July 9, the mayor made a presentation to the council about debt capacity, relating to a bond measure to pay for the seawall.

I contacted all the city council members who took a potshot in the release (Bagshaw, Tom Rasmussen, Jean Godden, and Richard Conlin) to follow-up on their claims. For instance, what has Bagshaw done since the mayor's last several briefings to show "sound judgment to work together" with the mayor? But none called back to answer. I even sent a second email to council spokeswoman Laura Lockard today asking if she could clarify some of the council's declarations, but she said, "I will let you know what I hear or you will hear from them directly." Now it's the end of the day and the council refuses to talk.

Think about that: Issuing a press release and then refusing to talk about it.

The full release and the mayor's take after the jump.

The council also says that the mayor's seawall proposal was a bad proposal:

“This is a potentially difficult time to raise fees or taxes, but it is urgent that we take care of the City’s obligations on the seawall replacement with this necessary increase in the CPT,” said Councilmember Tom Rasmussen, Transportation Committee chair. “The Mayor may seek to submit a much bigger property tax measure to the voters for this purpose this year, but this is the wrong time to do that.”

Here's what Rasmussen is apparently saying: Given the poor economy, a bigger property tax measure would be onerous. That would be odd, because the measure proposed by the council right now would cost 50 percent more per year than the mayor’s levy ($75 per year compared to $50 per year, according to records at last night’s briefing).

Meanwhile, Godden took a shot at McGinn because he's suggested using the parking-lot tax to shore up an $8 million shortfall at SDOT. And Conlin argues, "We are nearing the deadline for ballot proposals" and "we have not heard from" the mayor since June 9. I asked Godden's office what alternative she would use to pay for SDOT's shortfall, but she hasn't replied. As for Conlin—did he try to reach McGinn after he made several proposals to the council? He didn't reply.

This all to say that the council is trying to stir up a controversy—to claim that the mayor is MIA while they toil in the trenches—which is a fake issue fabricated by the council.

I contacted the mayor for his take.

"I realize that the politicians really care about who gets the credit for an idea," McGinn says. "But the public just wants to see us working on solution and the council has now come to the table with their idea for a seawall. It’s not exactly what we proposed, but we recognize that we will have to ask voters to support the major infrastructure investment."

How does he respond to the notion that he did nothing at all, as Bagshaw claims?

"Look, we made a seawall funding proposal in January. We gave them the legislation in March," McGinn says. "We did it again in June. We are glad they are finally paying attention to the seawall."

The council is also claiming credit for something that wasn't their idea. That's par for the course. Like last night at a meeting discussing the deep-bore tunnel, when council member Tim Burgess said, "Some individuals in this building have held a lot of press conferences, but council has been in the trenches negotiating this contract." He didn't mention that most of the contract on the tunnel was negotiated by SDOT, under the mayor's oversight, along with the city attorney's office. On Twitter he wrote that the effort to "derail [the] project will fail." Again, he wasn't mentioning public momentum in the polls against the council's position and in favor of an initiative are in line with McGinn. And last, the council issued another press release last night on their tunnel resolution—an nonbinding city measure—that claimed, "The State accepts full responsibility for all costs of the tunnel project." Neither state law nor any contract the state has signed says anything like that; the state says the city must pay cost overruns.

Next time we hear that the mayor is the one kicking up conflict at City Hall while the city council—a seasoned band with a steady hand on the city tiller—charters the politically choppy waters, remember what's really going on: The Seattle City Council is playing soap opera while leaving the heavy lifting to others.

* People might say we are pro-McGinn. We endorsed him, it's true, and we support plenty of things he's done (and criticized other things he's done). This isn't about defending the mayor; it's about calling bullshit on the council's soap-opera politics that rely on demonizing someone they should be working with.

Here's the release:

Seattle City Council today introduced a funding package for replacing the Seawall and funding other City responsibilities relating to the Alaskan Way Viaduct. The package includes raising the existing 10 percent commercial parking tax to 12.5 percent. The additional 2.5 percent commercial parking tax (CPT) will be used to finance the work needed on the Seawall and related projects in 2011 and 2012. The Council is also preparing a ballot measure in 2011 to complete the funding package for the Seawall replacement.

“This is a potentially difficult time to raise fees or taxes, but it is urgent that we take care of the City’s obligations on the seawall replacement with this necessary increase in the CPT,” said Councilmember Tom Rasmussen, Transportation Committee chair. “The Mayor may seek to submit a much bigger property tax measure to the voters for this purpose this year, but this is the wrong time to do that.”

The CPT is an existing 10 percent tax that raises approximately $21 million per year to fund transportation infrastructure as part of the “Bridging the Gap” program to restore Seattle’s streets and bridges. This additional 2.5 percent is expected to raise approximately $5 million per year, which will support bonds for the approximately $61 million budget for the Seawall and related projects in 2011 and 2012. State law requires that the CPT can be used only to fund transportation projects.

“The Mayor has suggested that he might propose a much larger CPT increase with his 2011-2012 budget to support other transportation projects,” said Councilmember Jean Godden, Chair of the Finance and Budget Committee. “We must reserve this tax for the urgent task of replacing the Seawall and limit the increase to what is absolutely essential for that work.”

“The Council has proceeded to create our own funding plan for the Seawall because the Mayor has been missing-in-action on this issue,” said Council President Richard Conlin. “The Mayor held a press conference on June 9, proposing a November levy for the Seawall. We are nearing the deadline for ballot proposals, and we have not heard from him since.”

Councilmember Bruce Harrell added, “We recognize that we must balance any increase in the CPT with the needs of our public to shop and support our commercial infrastructure and this proposal recognizes this balance and allows our public to support these efforts in 2011.”

“It’s unfortunate that the Mayor wants to spend all of his time in a fight with the State, rather than working with us to define funding options for the Seawall and viaduct,” commented Councilmember Sally Bagshaw. “We need responsible statesmen with sound judgment to work together. It’s time to learn the lessons from our decade-long debate and get to work and we invite the Mayor to join us in that.”

The Council’s funding package also includes a Seawall ballot measure that the Council expects to put before voters in 2011. The final element of the package is a Local Improvement District that would be implemented in 2015, and support development of the Waterfront Open Space.