(Image: Bruce Harrell campaign)
Seattle political veteran Bruce Harrell will have quite the entourage as he prepares to staff his administration and begin his four-year term leading the city.
The mayor-elect has announced a record-setting transition team with 150 members helping the incoming administration make key hires and set priorities across everything from “Arts, Culture, and Nightlife” to “Sports and Mentorship.”
Harrell, who grew up in the Central District, handily defeated City Council president Lorena González earlier this month in the most expensive mayor’s race in Seattle history.
“We are building a one-of-a-kind, diverse, and skilled team, filled with the energy and expertise needed to ensure our administration hits the ground running,” Harrell said . “With this transition team in place, we have the opportunity in front of us to thoughtfully develop the urgent and forward-looking agenda that will restore our City and propel Seattle forward. I look forward to taking this team’s input and recommendations and putting them into action as we determine our 100 Day and Year One agenda, rebuild trust in City government, and chart Seattle’s future.”
The twelve transition groups are organized around the following focus areas: Arts, Culture, and Nightlife; Climate and Environment; Education and Youth; Government Operations; Housing and Homelessness; Labor and Workforce; Philanthropy; Public Health; Safety and Justice; Small and Local Business; Transportation and Land Use; and Sports and Mentorship.
The team will be chaired by will be chaired by former United States Secretary of the Interior Sally Jewell, Equal Opportunity Schools Interim CEO Eddie Lincoln, Uwajimaya President and CEO Denise Moriguchi, and Sea Mar founder and CEO Rogelio Riojas, “along with twenty-three co-team leads, and nearly 150 overall members.”
The teams represent an interesting diversity of Seattle leadership including current City Councilmember Teresa Mosqueda (Public Health), 43rd District rep Nicole Macri (Housing and Homelessness), and musician Duff McKagan (Arts, Culture, and Nightlife).
The Small and Local Business team includes Louise Chernin, former president and CEO of the GSBA and Linda Di Lello Morton of Capitol Hill restaurant Terra Plata and the Seattle Restaurant Alliance.
The full transition team roster from the announcement is below.
Transition Team Chairs
Sally Jewell, Former United States Secretary of the Interior
Eddie Lincoln, Interim CEO, Equal Opportunity Schools
Denise Moriguchi, President and CEO, Uwajimaya
Rogelio Riojas, Founder and CEO, Sea Mar
Arts, Culture, and Nightlife
Kate Becker, Creative Economy & Recovery Director, King County
Sung Yang, Former Deputy Executive, King County
Royal Alley-Barnes, Interim Director, Seattle Office of Arts & Culture
Manny Cawaling, CEO, Inspire Washington
Duff McKagan, Musician
Dr. Quentin Morris, Musician and Associate Professor, Seattle University
Constance Rice, Civic Leader
Climate and Environment
Jessyn Farrell, Former State Representative
Ken Lederman, Environmental Attorney; Washington Conservation Voters Board
Joanna Grist, Environmental Advocate
Jessica Finn Coven, Former Director, Seattle Office of Sustainability and Environment
Sally Jewell, Former United States Secretary of the Interior
Joyce Kelly, Former Executive Staff, Region 10 EPA
Hamdi Mohamed, Port Commissioner-Elect
Eric Salathé, Associate Professor and Climate Scientist, University of Washington
Paula Sardinas, Consultant
Clifford Traisman, Environmental Advocate
Education and Youth
Alexes Harris, Professor of Sociology, University of Washington
Eddie Lincoln, Interim CEO, Equal Opportunity Schools
Janie White, Vice President, Washington Education Association
Sally Clark, Former City Councilmember, City of Seattle
Tracy Flynn, School Inclusion Consultant
Brandon Hersey, School Board Member, Seattle School Board
Dr. Brent Jones, Superintendent, Seattle Public Schools
Dr. Shouan Pan, Chancellor, Seattle Colleges
Margaret Shepherd, University of Washington Administration
Vivian Song Maritz, School Board Member-Elect, Seattle School Board
Sharon Tomiko Santos, State Representative
Government Operations
Tim Ceis, Former Deputy Mayor, City of Seattle
Hyeok Kim, Former Deputy Mayor, City of Seattle
Mike Fong, Former Deputy Mayor, City of Seattle
Calvin Goings, Director, City of Seattle Finance and Administrative Services
Kimberly Loving, Director, City of Seattle Department of Human Resources
Robert Nellams, Director, Seattle Center
George Northcroft, Retired Regional Administrator, US General Services Administration
Housing and Homelessness
Marco Lowe, Housing and Education Leader
Nicole Macri, State Representative
Marc Dones, CEO, Regional Homelessness Authority
Angela Dunleavy, CEO, Farestart
Leo Flor, Director, King County Department of Community and Human Services
Lindsey Grad, SEIU 1199NW
Paul Lambros, CEO, Plymouth Housing
Patience Malaba, Director of Government Relations and Policy, Housing Development Consortium
Daniel Malone, Executive Director, Downtown Emergency Service Center
Barb Oliver, Director of Operations, Sound Foundations NW
George Scarola, Former Director of Homelessness, City of Seattle
Leslie Smith, Vulcan
Anthony Wright, Chief Operating Officer, Pioneer Human Services
Labor and Workforce
Katie Garrow, King County Labor Council
Kenny Stuart, IAFF 27
Monty Anderson, Seattle-King County Building Trades
Marsha Botzer, Pride at Work
Karen Estevenin, Protec17
Samantha Grad, UFCW 21
Zenia Javalera, SEIU 6
Steve Kovac, IBEW Local 77
Chris Lampkin, SEIU 1199NW
David Rolf, SEIU 725 (former)
John Searcey, Teamsters 117
Mark Watson, Washington State Council of County and City Employees
Philanthropy
Katherine Cheng, Sustainability, Social Impact, and Philanthropy Leader
Andi Smith, Executive Director, Ballmer Group
Connie Ballmer, Co-Founder, Ballmer Group
David Bley, CEO, Seattle Foundation
Gordon McHenry, President and CEO, United Way King County
Darrell Powell, Chief Finance Officer, YMCA of Greater Seattle
Dennis Quirin, Executive Director, Raikes Foundation
Alice Shobe, Global Director, Amazon in the Community
Neal Myrick, Vice President Social Impact, Tableau (Salesforce)
Public Health
Rogelio Riojas, Founder and CEO, Sea Mar
Dr. Ben Danielson, UW Medicine
David Frockt, State Senator
Libby Gates-McPhee, Behavioral Health Leader
Hilary Godwin, Dean, University of Washington School of Public Health
Sterling Harders, SEIU 775
Teresa Mosqueda, City Councilmember, City of Seattle
Dr. Paul Ramsey, CEO, UW Medicine
Mary Ellen Stone, Executive Director, King County Sexual Assault Resource Center
Fred Swanson, Executive Director, Gay City
Dennis Worsham, Interim Director, Public Health – Seattle & King County
Safety and Justice
Kim Bogucki, Seattle PD Detective and Co-Founder, The IF Project
Hon. Bonnie Glenn
Monica Alexander, Interim Executive Director, Washington State Criminal Justice Training Center
DeVitta Briscoe, Executive Director, Not This Time
Tim Burgess, Former Mayor and City Councilmember, City of Seattle
Mo Classen, Former Prosecutor, King County
Gabe Galanda, Attorney
Erin Goodman, SODO BIA
Darrah Hinton, Deputy Prosecuting Attorney, King County
Renée Hopkins, Alliance for Gun Responsibility
Aleksa Manila, Drag Queen and Behavioral Health Counselor
David Perez, Attorney
Harold Scoggins, Fire Chief, Seattle Fire Department
Small and Local Business
Ollie Garrett, President and CEO, Tabor 100
Rachel Smith, CEO, Seattle Metropolitan Chamber of Commerce
Rita Brogan, Founder, PRR
Louise Chernin, Former President and CEO, GSBA
Joe Fugere, Small Business Owner, Tutta Bella
Shelley Gaddie, Founder and President, ProjectCorps
Taylor Hoang, Amazon
Carmen Mayo, President, The Links Seattle
Nate Miles, Civic and Business Leader
Denise Moriguchi, President and CEO, Uwajimaya
Linda Di Lello Morton, Small Business Owner, Terra Plata
Tom Norwalk, Visit Seattle
Kylie Rolf, Downtown Seattle Association
Peter Schrappen, Northwest Marine Trade Association
Brad Silverberg, Business Leader
Barb Wilson, Microsoft
Transportation and Land Use
Genesee Adkins, WSP
Rob Johnson, Former City Councilmember, City of Seattle
Derrick Belgarde, Executive Director, Chief Seattle Club
Adiam Emery, Division Director, Seattle Department of Transportation
Chris Gregorich, Seattle Department of Transportation
Ada Healey, Vulcan
Ben Maritz, Housing Leader
Chris Thomas, Lyft
Javier Valdez, State Representative
Terry White, General Manager, King County Metro
James Wong, CEO, Vibrant Cities
Sports and Mentorship
Gerald Hankerson, President, Alaska, Oregon and Washington State Area Conference of the NAACP
Dawn Trudeau, Seattle Storm
Laurie Black, President and CEO, Boys and Girls Clubs of King County
Beth Knox, President, Seattle Sports Commission
Peter Lukevich, Attorney and Sports Field Advocate
Maya Mendoza-Extrom, Seattle Sounders FC
Eric Pettigrew, Former State Representative
Fred Rivera, Seattle Mariners
Wally Walker, Former Player and Executive, Seattle SuperSonics
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Denise Moriguchi and Sally Jewel are reasonable people, and have some real life work/business experience. Something we don’t see much of in government these days. Don’t know about the rest of them. Thankfully Bruce seems to be surrounding himself with mostly pragmatic people. There are a few crazies in there but that’s to be expected. Overall feeling pretty optimistic about Bruce and his team.
I’m impressed! A bit heavy in some areas and light on others. The Labor and Workforce comes to mind that is totally dominated by organized labor reps. And the Housing/homelessness has but one, the Vulcan rep, who is not part of the homelessness bureaucracy.
But let’s hope some good comes of this and that the new Mayor will take advice but make up his own mind, which I am optimistic about at this very early phase.
The entire effort looks collaborative and has some high quality people in the room.
Seems like having organizations that fight for employee rights is exactly who should be on the Labor and Workforce team. Would you rather have Jeff Bezos or some other anti-worker corporate shill on the team?
Looks like we got ourselves a Dori Monson fan here!
Are you saying it’s good that the homelessness transition team hired a representative from the one of the largest for-profit developers in the city, who are responsible for displacing many low income residents, thereby directly contributing to the number of homeless?
Your ideas are intriguing to me, and I wish to subscribe to your newsletter!