Priorities

Keith is the only candidate in this race who has delivered affordable housing and emergency shelter, working with my colleagues in Shoreline, nonprofit providers, and regional partners to expand options– but we need a lot more.

Existing programs increase the rate of rental housing affordable to working people, but not to the extent needed to meet urgent needs. The state has taken important steps to mandate needed density, but Keith will take needed next steps, including tax credits and subsidies for extremely low income rental housing, streamlining permitting, and exploring creative solutions like land trusts–where the land is jointly owned and held in trust, but people own their individuals homes to expand home ownership opportunities.

It’s time to bring Keith’s experience and commitment to Olympia.

Keith is a Shoreline Public School dad and father of a public school teacher. He cares deeply about our kids, educators, and the opportunities that must be available for all Washington learners.

In 2012, the Washington Supreme Court issued the McCleary decision, mandating the Legislature fix disparities between schools in wealthy and economically disadvantaged areas. A new funding model tried to fix this problem by increasing state funding overall, but limited how much money schools could raise locally to pay for things like teacher salaries, insurance, educational materials, and other basics.

A result of this lack of funding is that now no district has enough money to operate, and too many are forced to cut staffing and programs to cover rising costs.

To find a solution, Keith has met with parents, teachers union leaders, school board members, and more– and all agree the state simply has to dedicate more money to fund schools.

In the House, Keith will advocate for dedicated revenues, including a share of the proposed tax on millionaires and other progressive sources, along with allowing districts more freedom to raise funds to meet specific local needs.

Keith is a longtime conservation leader who has fought for climate friendly state and local policies, expanded transit access in Shoreline, and protected parks and open space. He is a champion for a clean Puget Sound.

While the state has set admirable goals to reduce carbon emissions, not enough is being done. With our vote, Keith will apply his passion and proven leadership to:

• Continue our push towards 100% sustainable energy. He will clean up and streamline permitting for solar and wind projects, and invest in researching other forms of clean energy, like geothermal, small modular nuclear, and small-scale hydropower. That’s the state’s job, and we need to do better at it.
• Maintain the Climate Commitment Act and make sure the dollars are spent wisely.
• Preserve our existing forests and support reforestation, urban forestry, and afforestation efforts.
• Expand clean water protections and riparian vegetation buffers to keep our waterways healthy and supportive of salmon populations.

Keith will take the action needed to make real progress.

The State budget has gone dramatically up every year for the last decade. Those increases mean the legislature has raised taxes every year, sometimes with new taxes, sometimes by increasing existing tax. We can’t budget that way if we want a sustainable economy.

On the Shoreline City Council, Keith has stayed within budget parameters and kept healthy reserves–even during the pandemic–to guard unexpected downturns. He will bring that level of responsible leadership to Olympia.

Every day we are confronted by headlines of Trump Administration violence and abuses, and local families and communities are feeling the impacts of his abuse and threats to our rights and laws. To call this an unprecedented time is a profound understatement.

Early in his legal career, Keith prosecuted war criminals for the United Nations. Holding the light of truth and law to those violating human rights is our best defense. We need his experience in Olympia to fight against federal overreach in the courts and in our laws.

Our Attorney General and Governor have done fantastic work challenging Trump’s illegal actions. We need to keep funding those efforts, and make sure our laws protect our rights. An example of that is banning masked law enforcement, and preventing out-of-state national guard from deploying here without the governor’s authority.

If Trump federalizes the National Guard, invents a crisis, and deploys them in Seattle, we can mobilize in our communities, record their conduct, and hold individuals who commit crimes in the name of law accountable.

We must also ensure that basic needs are being met in the face of federal cuts and threats to Medicaid, affordable healthcare, the CDC, disaster relief, and even funding for roads and bridges. We have to do the work to ensure we don’t let intentional federal neglect create unintentional crises here.

There is never an excuse for antisemitism, Islamophobia, or any other kind of bigotry. How do we fight this? First, by calling it out whenever we see it. But that’s not enough. We need to make sure that we teach the historical truth behind episodes like the Holocaust and the civil rights era and that our schools help children understand why hate speech and acts of bigotry can rapidly expand into violence and dehumanization.

Washington has a strong hate crimes law and we need to make sure it is vigorously enforced whenever a crime is motivated by bias. Crimes like spray-painting a swastika on a synagogue or putting a noose on someone’s lawn are far more than vandalism and we need to make it clear that those kind of actions are simply not tolerated here.

Finally, the freedom of religion doesn’t mean much if religious gatherings are targeted by violence or unlawful disruption. We need strong laws protecting freedom to worship in peace.

Passing the Millionaire’s Tax should be the start, not the end, of tax reform. Olympia needs to rein in spending so we’re not dependent on ever-increasing taxes to fund a budget that grows dramatically every year. And then we need to focus on replacing regressive taxes like sales, B&O, and property taxes with progressive ones, not just layering new taxes on top. Don’t get me wrong: The Millionaire’s Tax is a step in the right direction. But it shouldn’t be the end of the conversation.

AI is a tool. It can be a benefit but it will never be a replacement for human interaction or the need for humans in jobs. Keith favors limited, responsible regulation of AI. AI doesn’t belong in schools or replacing medical professionals. You should always know when you’re interacting with AI rather than a human and it shouldn’t be interacting with children in pretty much any setting. AI doesn’t belong operating anything dangerous—especially vehicles on public roadways—without a human to step in. And we must ensure that the data centers that power AI are only built if we have the clean energy and environmental protections in place to make sure they don’t become the coal-burning factories of today.