Organizers of the Monday, July 26, 2021 Burien City Council Candidates Forum released their ground rules for the event, which we’ll also be live-streaming via our Facebook page.

The in-person forum will be held from 6 – 8 p.m. Monday night at Highline United Methodist Church.

If you’re unable to attend in person, you can watch a live stream on The B-Town Blog Facebook page (“Like” us here to get a notification for when we’re live). We’ll also post an edited version after the event.

Here are the rules from forum organizers:

July 26 Burien City Council Candidates Forum: Transparency and Fairness Important to Left and Right

On behalf of Community Visions, The B-Town Blog, the Housing Action Fund, Washington Low-Income Housing Alliance, and Transit Riders Union, we’d like to warmly welcome people of all political stripes and no political stripes to the Burien City Council Candidates on Monday, July 26, 2021, from 6 – 8 p.m. at Highline United Methodist Church.

Your questions should be answered!

Eight candidates have formally accepted:

    • John White
    • Krystal Marx
    • Alex Simkus
    • Sarah Moore
    • Georgette Reyes
    • Jimmy Matta
    • Charles Schaefer
    • Hugo Garcia

Two candidates, Martin Barrett and Stephanie Mora, expressed interest at some point, and organizers hope they will join.

All four races have at least one challenger, except for the Position No. 1 seat (Garcia, Barrett, and Mohamedhaji).

We’re please to announce that BOTH winners of this year’s Burien Citizen of the Year Award will play a leading role: Don Berg of Transform Burien will be Master of Ceremonies, and Roxana Pardo Garcia of Feeding El Pueblo will be Moderator.

This is how it will work: When you (guests) arrive, you will write your questions individually on cards that will be picked up, submitted, and sorted into six Topic baskets: Public Safety, Affordable Housing, Homelessness, Business/Economic Development, Youth Issues, and the Environment. These are the issues we all know can’t be left out of a fair Q and A forum in Burien. A miscellaneous basket will include your other questions for a final round, as time permits.

The Emcee, Don Berg, will not only explain the process at the beginning of the night, that each of the candidates will have exactly one minute to respond to each of the seven questions, but the Emcee will also draw out one question from each basket in full view of the audience, at the moment it will be read. He will then hand the question over to Roxana Pardo Garcia, the Moderator, who will read out the question. A timekeeper will be keeping time and will announce when time is up for each candidate.

Before the cards are all sorted, the Forum will kick off with one question on housing, and/or homelessness.

This is your Forum, to answer your questions.

Make democracy thrive.

– Community Visions Forum Committee

Highline United Methodist Church is located at 13015 1st Ave S.:

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