City Council Faces Voter Backlash
Everett council members are accused of ignoring neighborhood ward clubs and killing a streetcar ordinance, a move that may seal their political fate.
The story, cleaned up
A cleaned-up reading of the newspaper page: spelling and layout repaired, one story lifted off a crowded page. It follows the original closely but it is not a transcription. The original page is below; read it if a detail matters.
Thumbs down was the unit of the city council Monday evening on the street car ordinance. The real interest of the Stone-Webster Co. and the fancied interests of the street car employes put in the scale against the wishes of the people killed the ordinance. No surprising thing about it—the council hasn't shown that very much is to be expected of it. Do the statesmen in the city hall realize that they are digging their own political graves? They appear to hold the ward improvement clubs in supreme contempt and are doubtless laughing in their sleeves. They don't seem to realize that the ward clubs came into being primarily because the people grew tired of being misrepresented in the city hall. He laughs best who laughs last, Mr. Councilman, and the voters may have cause for laughter after the next municipal election.
“Do the statesmen in the city hall realize that they are digging their own political graves?”
The frustration with 'backroom' municipal decision-making and the role of neighborhood advocacy groups is a dynamic that remains central to Everett's local civic politics today.
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