Greg Nickels - Political Career

Political Career

Nickels was legislative assistant to Seattle City Council member and future mayor Norm Rice from 1979 to 1987. Nickels was elected to the King County Council in 1987, defeating longtime incumbent Bob Grieve, and reelected in 1991, 1995 and 1999. In 2001, he was elected Mayor of Seattle and was re-elected in 2005. Nickels ran for a third term in 2009, but he failed to advance to the general election after coming in third place in the primary election held in August 2009.

Nickels has had several notable events during his tenure as mayor of Seattle. In 2003, he helped to break ground for the Sound Transit Link light rail project in November, and signed an executive order in 2004 giving equal rights to everyone who is married and works for Seattle city government regardless of sexual orientation.

Nickels' popularity began to decline in July 2008, when the Seattle SuperSonics NBA franchise relocated to Oklahoma City, Oklahoma after a lawsuit against the team's ownership group was settled out of court – an outcome in which Nickels' administration, as well as Washington State lawmakers were faulted by many Seattle sports fans for not doing enough to keep the team in Seattle.

In December 2008, Nickels was criticized after an unusual snowstorm blanketed the city with the greatest snowfalls it had seen since 1996. The Seattle "snowpack," which began accumulating on December 13, did not melt until December 27, the longest period of time snow had remained on the ground in Seattle since the mid-1980s. Seattle did not use salt to clear its roads, citing environmental concerns, which led to severe problems with the city's public transit system.

Due to disapproval of Nickels' handling of illegal tent cities in Seattle, a tent city community in the Seattle area is known colloquially as "Nickelsville".

A late 2008 poll of likely Seattle voters reflected dissatisfaction with the incumbent mayor, showing that 31% approved of Nickels's performance as mayor while 57% disapproved. Nickels' low popularity numbers did not recover by August 2009, when he was defeated in the primary election in his bid for a third term as Seattle's mayor. In Nickels' concession defeat, he thanked Seattle voters and noted, "Twice they gave me the honor of doing this. They want a new generation of leadership."

Nickels left Seattle to pursue a teaching position at Harvard University.

In 2012, Nickels ran for Washington Secretary of State as a Democrat. He received 20.98% of the vote, behind Kathleen Drew (D) and Kim Wyman (R).