Seattle City Councilmember and former council president Nick Licata has made official what many people expected: He will not run for reelection in 2015, retiring after 18 eventful years on the City Council.
Local politicos immediately pivoted to speculation on this year’s council races. Licata and sometimes-ally Mike O’Brien both live in the same district, so Licata’s retirement allows O’Brien to run in his district and for both to avoid running against a fellow incumbent for an at-large seat.
But before immersing themselves in this year’s horse-race speculation, our city’s political class would do well to stop and pay homage to one of the most significant and effective council members in modern Seattle history.
An exception to political rule
I’ve known Licata for more than two decades, since well before his election to City Council in 1997. Over the years, I haven’t always agreed with him. But I’m comfortable that I’m separating both my friendship and my politics out of the equation when I say the following: Nick Licata is the best elected official I have ever known at any level.
Despite having been the most left-leaning council member for most of his tenure, Licata has more high-profile accomplishments than any of his colleagues. (Do you like that Seattle requires paid health leave for our city’s businesses? Thank Licata.) But most of what has separated Licata from any other elected official I’ve ever seen is the stuff behind the scenes.
Before his election to council, Nick worked writing insurance policies. As it turned out, that’s ideal training for serving on the City Council, especially in Seattle. Much of the job is dull, and much of the way our city’s economic elites feed at the public trough is buried in the details of legislation that doesn’t make news: zoning changes, city budget-line items and other bills that are genuinely soporific bedtime reading.
The devil, in Seattle politics, is almost always in the details: Licata has been masterful at getting language changes that make decent proposals good and awful ones less awful. In the perennial political struggle between ideals and effectiveness, he does the best job I’ve ever seen of managing to serve both.
More than that, Licata is the exception to the Seattle political rule that co-opts even the best new legislators. (Does anyone remember that pro-business stalwart Margaret Pageler was originally a reform candidate? Or that Richard Conlin, when he was also first elected in 1997, was affiliated with the Green Party?) Licata has kept his priorities — and his commitment to openness and to treating people decently — long after most politicians abandon such things.
And he has had a remarkable ability to go into a room with opponents, find common ground and hash out a compromise that still serves his priorities. Licata is both on the side of the angels and has remained singularly effective — an impossibly rare combination, even while serving for nearly two decades on a council dominated by business-friendly nonentities.
Three friends of mine helped Licata in that original 1997 campaign. He hired each on his staff when he won, and 18 years later, each one — Lisa Herbold, Newell Aldrich and Frank Video — remain on his staff, each beloved in their own right in local progressive circles. It’s a measure of how Licata treats people that after 18 years he has retained his entire original staff — that’s also unheard of.
Licata says he will remain active in local politics. He’s played a significant behind-the-scenes role in mentoring both O’Brien and Kshama Sawant to become more effective council members and has personally been hugely helpful as one of the only council members willing to actually talk with and listen to his constituents — hundreds, if not thousands, of people over the years. That generosity of spirit surely won’t change in his well-earned retirement.
And with district elections this fall, Seattle has an unusual opportunity to elect a whole new generation of progressive political leaders.
Hard to fill his shoes
But I’ll miss Licata in office. I’ll miss the poetry readings, I’ll miss the openness and accessibility, and I’ll miss the sheer decency. Seattle City Council will be a lesser place without him, no matter who gets elected this fall.
For most of my life, I’ve agitated for, written and talked about politics. Most of the news, most of the time, isn’t especially good; it’s easy to get cynical. A lot of people within our political institutions are well-intentioned, but there are very few whom I genuinely admire. Licata tops that list.
Seattle’s civic elite likes to name things after its political champions. Licata doesn’t qualify on that score, which is exactly why he should be honored. Hopefully, we’ll name something after him, and it’ll be an institution that helps people. He deserves it.
GEOV PARRISH is cofounder of Eat the State! He also reviews news of the week on “Mind Over Matters” on KEXP 90.3 FM. To comment on this column, write to MPTimes@nwlink.com.