1. Name as it will appear on the ballot
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First Name |
Middle Initial or Nick Name |
Last Name |
2. Office sought (include office, jurisdiction, position/district number):
3. Are you the incumbent? Yes
4. How long have you resided in this district/city?
5. How long have you resided in King County?
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33 years |
6. Is the office sought partisan or nonpartisan? Nonpartisan
CAMPAIGN CONTACTS
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1. Beginning with the most recent position, please list public offices which you have held. Include positions on appointive Boards or Commissions.
2. If you ran for public office but were not elected, please list those races below:
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Office Title |
Year of Run |
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Board Director,
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State Representative Position#1, 32 nd District
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In this section, we are seeking responses that reflect the four ratings criteria: involvement, effectiveness, character, and knowledge. These are defined as follows:
1. In a page or less, why are you running for this office? (Note: the interview committee will be given a copy of this statement before your interview; at the beginning of your interview you will have the opportunity to expand on this statement in any way you wish.)
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I have spent the last twenty years representing and leading my community in local office of School Board for 8years, and concurrently for Park & Recreation district commissioner for 12 years, and now for 8 years as a City Councilman of a new city. I wish to see to completion the many projects we have started and that are so significant to the future of the City of Shoreline.
We started with an idea of creating an incorporate City and brought it to an incorporation vote which past on the first ballot at 75%. I was then elected to the City Council to build that City from nothing with no employees, revenue or buildings into an organization with a $45 million budget that has 220 regular and contract employees providing services to a City of 53,000. We have been fiscally prudent having one of the lowest per capital expenditures allowing us to put over $20 million into reserve and special project account in 8 years . Our actual property tax rate as dropped and the public pays much less property tax rate to us (1.43/$1000 AV) than the County Road fund (which was $1.68/$1000AV). We have NO DEBT for our city, and reserve accounts of $20 million.
We wanted to enhance and control the "Quality of Life" in shoreline through our own Parks, Recreation, and Cultural Services department. We took over 25 parks for 342 acres plus three more since then. We have done an extensive improvement program to pool service doubling the attendence, park maintenance has increased 10 fold from mowing the lawn twice a year to 10 times per year, ball fields are maintained so use could increase 50%, we are funding a Arts council at $63,000 per year plus addition support on specific programs, and provide similar support to the Museum so they have a full time director and seed money for grants.
We wanted the drug sellers out of our community and the lowering of crime in our neighborhoods. We created a street crimes unit that closed 185 drug houses so we can not find anymore and drastically reduced the selling of drugs to our children. Crime is down 20% and burglary is donw 50%. We have 45 uniformed officers, instead of the County's 21, our own uniforms, cars and police station for about the same money.
Public Works has increased the maintenance of roads so potholes and road problems are fixed promply, surface water flooding is being stopped through catchbasin cleaning and construction of new drainage systems.
We have several new public works projects in progress to address the infrastructure of the city including the Aurora Corridor project which is a federal highway and our main business district, the interurban trail, and the North City Business district project. We our working on several major Park master plans and upgrades as well.
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2. Describe your most important personal characteristics or traits as they relate to the office you seek.
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I am a easy going gregarious person that enjoys working with people. I highly value education and information and tend to be described by my peers as the "file cabnet" because I will read and outline the entire file on a subject in one night to be ready to discuss it. I have testified in 950 court cases as an expert witness and this skill is related to that. I am goal orientated and work out immediate, one year, five year and twenty year goals. I measure success by accomplishments .
I describe things in behaviorally specific terms that can be easily judged as to whether it was accomplished or not. My education compliments this by a MS in educational psychology with an emphasis in "measurement and evaluation" (tests and program evaluation/statistics) and counseling with a emphasis on career/vocational and cognitive behavior therapy (or learning reinforcement theory that is conceptual or thought out); and also a MPA in Public Administration with concentrations in governemental fund accounting & budgeting systems, and public personnel management. I have personally done job audits on over 800 different occupations involving several thousand individual jobs.
I want to see that the public is represented and has the personal opportunity to express their case for something. I actively search out and lisen to different groups for their input.
I lobby persuasively and usually successfully for my constituencies causes. When the vote is taken I move on to the next topic and vote, rarely looking back and never holding a grudge. Todays opponent may be tomorrows ally.
My style has achieved more success than other council members. I see politics as the art of compromise and putting deals together to accomplish a common goal and good. |
3. Please describe in sufficient detail, one to three accomplishments or contributions of which you are most proud. These examples should illustrate effective skills and capabilities you think apply to the office you are seeking. These accomplishments may have occurred at any time in your personal, professional, or public life.
4. Please list or describe your current and past activities in the community in which you have acquired skills that relate to the office you seek. Include your role in the activity and the year(s) in which you were involved. Involvement consists of many areas such as family, neighborhood, community, employment, or public life.
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The political committees was covered in question# 1 and included many groups over 25 years. The additional non-profit groups included the following:
1979 -2003 Northwest MultiService Center (six programs)/ now NW Child Nutrition (one program) was a $3.5 million program with six programs 1979-85, and is now a one program non-profit with a $3.0 million budget currently. I was the corp Vice President and then President from 1980-1985, and a Board member only from 1985 to 2003.
1981-1982 Mental Health Services of Snohomish County Non Profit with $1 million budget performing Mental Health Services (served 18 months).
1995- 2001 Cascade Youth Music Association a non-profit whos budget grew from $3 million to $5 million from 1995 to 2000 with 150,000 to 300,000 in net revenues for services, and then as it President & CEO 2000-2001 it grew from $5 milliom to $6 million and the net revenues rose from $300,000 to $450,000. It has a staff of 30, with volunteers supplementing that.
I was also a PTA School Vice President for Legislation at a unit and went to four state conventions from 1986-1991. My five children were heavily envolved in the school programs. They participated in Richmond Little League and North Shore Soccer, and School varsity Track and Cross country, and Swimming.
My five children had paper routs covering 18 years at the PI and the Seattle Times. All my children were nominated for Carrier of the year. Jeanne was the Carrier of the year for the PI in 1991(?), and Patricia was 1st runner up for the Seattle Times in about 1993. They won many awards and took many trips.
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A study of my 1000 hours of council work each year seems to divide as follows:
50% Council meetings, reading of packets or discussions and follow up with staff on agenda.
30% County/State (AWC) or National (NLC) committee meetings on policy positions and /or serving on committees on various topics (e.g. suburban Cities Law& Justice, and Jail Advisory; AWC nominating and Human Development/Services; NLC Human Development/Services-education, mental health (lead person), and immigration.)
20% constituency services - talking on phone, meeting with citizens and listening about concerns or following up on actions, and being present at community events and ceremonies.
The work basically is legislative and representative for the public, or managerial as the corporate policy making board for a $45 million business. |
EDUCATION BACKGROUND SUMMARY
The Municipal League’s Candidate Evaluation Report is distributed to voters in print and/or on our website. It includes a summary of the candidate’s education. Please summarize your education in 120 characters (letters, punctuation, and space all combined). The League will delete material that exceeds the space limit by beginning with the last entry. Suggested order is (degree) (subject) (school) (year, if desired).
Note: If this question is left blank the League will not include education information in your candidate profile.
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BS in Psychology; MS in Educational Psychology/Counseling, Portland State University; MPA in Public Administration, University of Puget Sound |
FOR PUBLICATION IN CANDIDATE EVALUATION REPORT
The Municipal League’s Candidate Evaluation Report also includes a summary of each candidate’s civic involvement. Please summarize your civic involvement in the space below. We will make every attempt to include the information in the Candidate Evaluation Report as submitted. Due to space restrictions in the Report, your response is limited to 500 characters (letters, punctuation, and spaces all combined). It is important that you list your involvement beginning with the most important and ending with the least important. If you exceed the length of response permitted, or if the League should find it necessary to shorten responses for publication purposes, deletions will be made beginning with the last item listed.
Note: This information will appear verbatim on the League’s Candidate Evaluation Report. If this question is left blank, the Municipal League will not include information on your civic involvement in the Report.
Check here if you would like the Municipal League to copy the first 500 characters from Question 4 to paste into this section.
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Mr. Ransom has been an active community servent both serving on many non-profit and community PTA type activities, as well as being on the Shoreline School Board for 8 years, the Shoreline Park & Recreating District commission 12 years concurrently, then serving for the last 8 years on the Shoreline City Council. In every case he has left a list of accomplishments behind for the community leaving the community better for his having been there. |
Finished!
If at all possible, send your response to the Municipal League electronically as an attachment, or insert it into an e-mail message (rebecca@munileague.org). Mail and fax numbers are listed below. If the League has not contacted you to schedule an interview, please call the League office at your earliest convenience.
Don’t forget to send the following to the Municipal League: a resume, a photo, campaign literature, and, if you are an incumbent, constituent newsletters and other materials. Please use the check-off list on the cover sheet of this packet to indicate which items you have sent.
Candidate Evaluation Coordinator: Rebecca Cooper
Seattle, WA 98104-1614 Fax: 425-671-0506 Website: www.munileague.org