King County Executive candidate Fred Jarrett said he thought the warring press releases between two other candidates, Susan Hutchison and Dow Constantine, were amusing .
But in a release on Sunday he repeated his call for candidates in the county executive race to fully disclose all policy questionnaires submitted to the various labor, environmental, political and civic organizations that play a role in this important campaign.
“Twice in the past 2 weeks, candidates Hutchison and Constantine have issued dueling press statements and staged press conferences to exchange charges about their respective positions on issues such as reproductive rights,” Jarrett said in the release. “While high in entertainment value, this kind of political theater does little to inform voters.
At a June 10th press conference, Dow Constantine said that Hutchison has ‘an obligation to voters to answer questions about her political positions. I couldn’t agree more, but that same standard applies to Dow and all other candidates,” he said.
Spokespeople for the other candidates did not respond to emails seeking comment.
Though his campaign denied the call was aimed at Hutchison , the front runner, in particular, it seemed that way given the story the PostGlobe broke last week about her refusing to answer the questionnaire sent her by the National Abortion Rights Action League.
“I have made my views on the choice issue abundantly clear throughout my career,” said Jarrett in the statement. “My involvement with reproductive rights dates back to my college days. My pro-choice position was one of the reasons that I decided to switch political parties in 2007. As a State Representative, I voted in support of medically accurate sex education and also directed a letter to the State Pharmacy Board encouraging them to require pharmacies to fill Plan B prescriptions. My Planned Parenthood and NARAL Pro-Choice Washington questionnaires clearly and unequivocally demonstrate my pro-choice position. I encourage voters to read those and other policy questionnaires on my web site and again call on my opponents to disclose their questionnaires.”
Many local organizations ask candidates to complete questionnaires on important policy issues. Responses to those questionnaires can do more to shed light on a candidate’s policy positions than choreographed press conferences. The following questions are typical of such questionnaires:
- What are the most pressing issues facing your jurisdiction?
- How would you solve the budget gap for 2010?
- How would you protect our health plans from erosion and fight efforts to shift health costs to workers and families?
- What do you think of the plan to charge county employees for a portion of their medical premiums?
- Where would you suggest budget cuts take place?
On June 11th , Jarrett took the unprecedented step of posting all of the candidate questionnaires on his campaign web site. Several days later Ross Hunter took a step in the direction of disclosure by posting six of his campaign’s 16 policy questionnaires. Candidates Constantine, Hutchison and Phillips have yet to disclose any policy questionnaires.
The attached Candidate Questionnaire Report shows what questionnaires have been disclosed by which candidates. It will be updated regularly and distributed to the local media.
