The West Seattle Transportation Coalition (http://www.westseattletc.org) in October 2013 issued a call to action from the offices of Washington State Governor Jay Inslee, King County Executive Dow Constantine, then Mayor Mike McGinn and then Mayoral candidate Ed Murray, and City Councilmember Tom Rasmussen.

West Seattle, unique to all other regions of King County, faces up to 27% transit cuts due to the current funding crisis in Olympia that special sessions of the State Legislature were unable to overcome. The rest of King County faces only 17% cuts. In addition, West Seattle faces the impending removal of the SR-99 Viaduct, our main avenue to reach downtown Seattle. With the Seattle deep bore tunnel drilling project increasingly behind schedule with the discovery of steel pipes left behind a decade ago from a previous WSDOT project, our situation has grown even more complicated. Our circumstances and geography leave us with few obvious mitigation options as a community around these problems.

On January 14th, 2014 at 6:30pm, we will host a Q&A Panel with various levels of government in response to these issues, and to see what can be done, in a live event.

The West Seattle Transportation Coalition will be joined by the following:

Charles Knutson, Senior Policy Advisor to Washington State Governor Jay Inslee.

Chris Arkills, Transportation Policy Advisor to King County Executive Dow Constantine.

Andrew Glass Hastings, Transit and Transportation Advisor to Seattle Mayor Ed Murray.

Tom Rasmussen, Seattle City Councilmember and Chair of the City’s Transportation Committee.

The event will be held at the Youngstown Cultural Arts Center, 4408 Delridge Way SW, in West Seattle, in the Thelma Dewitty Theater. The event will run from 6:30pm to 9:00pm. The West Seattle Transportation Coalition has provided to each attendee a list of 7 to 10 questions, and will be following up with each for full answers, for publication after the event. The West Seattle Transportation Coalition will cover 3-5 questions with each attendee on January 14th, as time permits.

Event details:

Q&A Panel about West Seattle transportation issues with the offices of Washington State Governor Jay Inslee, King County Executive Dow Constantine, Seattle Mayor Ed Murray, and City of Seattle Councilmember Tom Rasmussen.

Date: January 14th, 2014

Time: 6:30pm-9:00pm

Location: Youngstown Cultural Arts Center, Thelma Dewitty Theater, 4408 Delridge Way SW, Seattle, WA 98107