Mayoral candidate Joe Mallahan wants a tunnel to replace the Alaskan Way Viaduct, thinks the city budget can be trimmed to avoid new taxes and to add 100 more police officers and to be accountable to the voters for his stewardship of the city for the next four years.
What he did not say in an interview but was revealed in a financial filing last week was he is in the hole by $95,000 and has outspent opponent Michael McGinn by more than 5-to-1.
Mallahan is a vice president for T-Mobile and has made good money and has a good reputation as a business executive. "As a young man, I always planned on entering public service," he said.
He said he first thought of attending law school because of his public-service interest, but he said a man who worked for former state Rep. Al Swift (D-Bellingham) told him there were many lawyers in politics and that if he wanted to get ahead in that field, he should prove himself in business. Mallahan earned an MBA and then 20 years in business.
As the politics bug reasserted itself, he said he considered running for a legislative seat, but his wife reminded him that he was more used to running things and wasn't cut out to be in a legislative role.
"I was cut out for an executive role," he explained. "The reason I got into this race was I felt that City Hall had become so inefficient and so ineffective in delivering the basic services, that we were risking going backward."
Since running a city may not be analogous to running a private business, Mallahan admitted he needs to learn a lot more about running a city.
"People all the time are asking me what I am going to do about X or Y, and I have to learn more. I have a few key things that I strongly believe in," he said.
"I strongly believe that we have moved backward when it comes to public safety. I believe that is because of bad decisions we made in the last budget crunch [in 2002]. We disbanded the Gang Unit, which was very effective, and, for budgetary reasons, the city started [using] the Families and Education Levy where there was money available."
That means some youths were no longer covered because of age or because some funds were eliminated, he said.
The community policing plan, slated to go into effect next year, calls for 605 police officers, but there are only 500 now.
"I plan to add more police officers," Mallahan said, noting a current plan proposed by outgoing Mayor Greg Nickels and adopted by the City Council would add only 20 officers per year.
"It will cost $12 million to get to 605 officers, and $12 million is a lot of money. But $12 million is between 1 percent and 2 percent of the general fund," Mallahan said, adding that cuts can be found.
Mallahan said he will use his technology management experience to also find ways to improve the way the department operates. For example, if high-tech equipment could be provided that would allow officers to do their work more efficiently and thus remain in the field more, he said, the city should invest in it.
"There may be operational efficiencies, but my feeling now is 100 more officers are needed. We need to fully staff the Gang Unit and go back to the outreach model we had in 2002," he said.
A small dust-up with his opponent recently developed over the search for a new police chief to fill the vacancy created when former Police Chief Gil Kerlikowske left to become President Barack Obama's drug czar. Current Mayor Greg Nickels asked Mallahan and Mike McGinn if they approved of a 24-member search committee to get on with its work. While McGinn said yes, Mallahan said that he did not want the police chief search to become involved in politics.
But Mallahan thinks the new chief must be pragmatic and someone on the front line and who makes himself available to the community, particularly for communities such as White Center and Rainier Valley and where crime is a growing problem.
"People don't want a chief who is in the ivory tower; they want a chief who supports them and is behind them," Mallahan said.
On the Alaskan Way Viaduct replacement, Mallahan said he is as frustrated as anyone that it has taken eight years to come up with a solution for replacement of viaduct.
"But my opponent is proposing a big, fat scheduling delay" by opposing that the tunnel be built, noting that $2.4 billion of state taxpayer money has been committed "to our transportation solution.
He also said he opposes the financing of Mercer Street redevelopment - not the project itself.
Mallahan said no new taxes are needed. "I believe there are efficiencies that can be driven in the operations of the city's general fund so that we do not need to increase taxes to do the basics of delivering public service," he said.
At the same time, Mallahan opposes the latest Tim Eyman initiative that will be on the November ballot. Initiative 1033 would limit revenue increases for governments, including Seattle's, to the rate of inflation and population growth. Additional money above the limit would be used to reduce property taxes.[[In-content Ad]]
