Political outsiders flex muscle

Tuesday’s historic recall of Mayor Jim West may signal more than just a change in City Hall.

The successful campaign to oust a candidate backed for a quarter-century by the city’s business-political establishment – without the help of that establishment after it asked him to leave and he declined – could change Spokane’s political equation.

Call them the populists, the grass-roots activists, the blue-collar activists or the “outs.” By any name, the people who ended West’s service midterm were not part of, nor financed by, the power structure that usually weighs in on the city’s political issues.

“It says we need to have our antennae up to the signals of people who are grass-roots activists,” said Don Barbieri, a former chairman of the Spokane Regional Chamber of Commerce and former Democratic candidate for Congress. “I think it will be uplifting to people to see that it isn’t necessarily the backrooms that make the decisions. It can be activists.”

The chamber, the Economic Development Council and the Convention and Visitors Bureau did ask West to resign – once it looked like the mayor could not ride out the scandal and once becoming a punch line delivered by Jay Leno seemed to threaten a nascent economic revival, with the business establishment and the mayor exchanging press releases.

Forcing out the recalcitrant West, however, fell not to a business executive or a political leader, but to a divorced North Side mother, a former floral shop owner struggling to make ends meet.

In a town with no shortage of lawyers and more than a few public relations specialists, Shannon Sullivan had to learn on her own, and quickly, about state statutes and dealing with the news media. At each milestone in the process, whether it was navigating a court hearing, withstanding an appeal or collecting signatures, Sullivan asked – sometimes she begged – for help from the people who had called for West’s resignation. Help for legal fees. Help for printing costs. Help to gather signatures on petitions.

Attorney Jerry Davis volunteered his time. Pig Out in the Park organizer Bill Burke donated booth space, and Sherry Young, a North Division property owner, gave Sullivan space in a parking lot. An eclectic group of volunteers, including retirees, moms with kids in tow and teenagers, manned petition booths; some political candidates stopped by, although not all of them were willing to be seen.

But the groups that had called for his resignation in May – the downtown business groups as well as the local Republican Party – were conspicuously absent.

When Sullivan and her volunteers delivered far more signatures than the law required in far less time than the “experts” said would be needed, she tossed the recall campaign into the air, and no one from the political establishment was interested in catching it. The campaign went to an eclectic coalition of people with some campaign experience but short political resume.

The city’s political patricians stayed away, and the usual sources of campaign money held tight their wallets.

“When people ask why this town is the way it is, partly it’s a result of the self-appointed leadership that doesn’t feel they have to do the tough things that leaders usually do,” said Tom Keefe, a former U.S. Senate aide and unsuccessful congressional candidate who joined the recall campaign.

David Bray, chairman of the recall committee and a former City Council candidate, is even more scathing in his criticism of the lack of support from institutions that had called for West’s ouster but failed to act: “It says they’re somewhat morally compromised. They give lip service, but when it comes to writing a check, they’re hiding in their closets.”

Chamber President Rich Hadley said he’s heard similar criticism but rejects most of it. The business groups stepped up early – before the City Council or the local GOP – in calling for West’s resignation, he noted.

“I think the business organizations stepping out as they did at that time was a significant use of political capital,” agreed Chris Marr, a former Chamber chairman.

Sullivan deserves credit for her efforts when West refused to resign, Hadley is quick to add.

“Shannon Sullivan did a wonderful job in terms of standing up and representing people who didn’t want to stand up,” Hadley said.

Chamber leadership discussed whether to get financially involved in the recall campaign. But while the chamber and some of the other groups have contributed to campaigns for local issues such as bond issues or tax increases over the years, they don’t give to candidates. The recall issue in their view was akin to a candidate race. Giving to the campaign for or against the recall was left to individuals, not groups, Hadley said.

The fact that most normally politically active people and companies didn’t give to the recall campaign is only one side of the ledger, he argued. West had run six-figure campaigns for mayor and the state Senate in recent years, with significant support from the business community that now wanted his resignation.

“If in the past, people who may have supported him withdrew that support. That, too, is an action,” Hadley said.

Barbieri, who gave $350 to the recall campaign, agreed that donations to either side should have been left up to the individual person or business, although he was surprised at the lack of financial support. “I felt I should give, and I did. I think probably others should have.”

In the wake of the recall’s overwhelming victory – citywide, nearly two in three voters supported West’s ouster – some are arguing the campaign didn’t really need money because the result was decided months earlier when The Spokesman-Review began reporting allegations about the mayor’s alleged misuse of office.

“I think it’s Jim’s actions that caused the result,” said Hadley, not anything that either side did in the weeks leading up to the election.

The magnitude of the recall’s victory makes this easy to argue either way. Precincts that backed him with 70 percent of the vote two years ago called for his ouster by that margin in the recall. Was that because the activists did so much with so little, or because there was little they needed to do?

A bigger question may be: How does the political establishment mesh with the upstart activists and coalesce behind a leader?

Already there are some questions of whether the mayoral heir apparent, City Council President Dennis Hession, is tied so closely with the old guard that the new activists will get short shrift.

When Hession named his transition team the day after West lost, it was carefully balanced along traditional lines: one councilmember from each of the city’s three districts; one Democratic legislator and one Republican legislator; one former council president and one former mayor; a leader from one of the city’s unions that had supported West; the government relations director for Avista, the community’s source of electricity and gas.

Absent from the list is anyone involved in the recall petition drive or the later campaign. Asked about that omission at his press conference, Hession replied: “It’s neither a conscious decision to include them or exclude them. As I went through my list of people I interact with and have influenced me and have provided me with counsel over time, these are the ones I chose.”

Recall campaign chairman Bray, who believes the council should consider others for West’s permanent replacement, said the public needs a chance to participate in the choice of its next mayor.

“This is a bad start,” Bray said of a transition team he dubbed “an example of elitist mentality and political favoritism.”

Hadley, who is on Hession’s transition team, argues the city does not need a protracted search for a new mayor after the protracted ouster of the old one. Under the current city charter, Hession automatically is the only other person elected citywide, and automatically fills the mayor’s job temporarily.

While the city’s economy doesn’t hinge on who is mayor or on the council, “stability in leadership will be helpful,” said Hadley.

West, who questioned Hession’s ability to lead the city, also suggested during his post-election press conference the council open the process to “good leaders in the community who could step forward with the expertise necessary” to run the city and its staff of 2,000 people.

Asked later if he thought the city faced a leadership void in his absence, West replied: “No more than the last 30 years.”