Why is the Sammamish landscape so cluttered these days with a multitude of red signs? Does anyone really believe that if one sign does not convince me of the merits of a candidate, then three will? Or is this just an arrogant partisan message to the people of Sammamish? A boastful signal that local residents are now inescapably under the control of political agents with generous external funding, doing the bidding of undisclosed, non-resident persons?

There is a strong smell of outside meddling in the affairs of Sammamish these days. As always, the old saying of “follow the money” applies: Who would benefit by controlling what Sammamish does with respect to its fire department/services? For example, why are firefighters unions contributing so much to the dissidents in the municipal elections?

Who should properly run the city of Sammamish, and for what purposes? Based on my own observations, it seems to me that the Vance/Cross ticket are the local team, and their challengers are “visitors” both in terms of funding and philosophy. So make your voting decisions carefully. Are you voting for your local government and benefit, or something further afield and perhaps not so well aligned with your interests?

Larry Gadallah, Sammamish