Lame duck Seattle City Council president Sara Nelson is introducing new legislation as she heads for the door that takes a swipe at the city’s professional political consultants — and possibly reveals some of the fractures between Nelson and Mayor Bruce Harrell as they both prepare to exit City Hall.
Nelson’s proposed ethics bill is set to be debated Thursday afternoon in a special meeting of the council’s Governance, Accountability, and Economic Development Committee.
“The bill, which builds upon similar regulations in Portland and San Francisco, amends the ethics code by establishing reporting and disclosure requirements for political consultants, bans working on political campaigns and city consulting at the same time, and requires a one-year ‘cooling off’ period between consulting work and political campaign services,” the council’s announcement of the proposal reads.
The proposed bill will:
- Create reporting and disclosure requirements for political consultants contracted with elected officials or election campaigns, similar to lobbyists.
- Prohibit consultants from working on city projects while concurrently providing services for an election campaign for city office or ballot measure.
- Establish a one year “cooling off” period after termination of a city consulting contract before the consultant can provide political consulting services.
The Seattle Times reports the possible last swing from Nelson before she leaves office is a swipe at a Harrell ally after the mayor hired his campaign adviser for years as “a city-paid consultant.”
“This is about repairing public trust in local government — that’s the foundation of good governance,” Nelson said. “My proposed legislation puts clear, new rules in place to reduce the potential influence of consultants’ political or financial interests on public policy.”
In November, Nelson lost her citywide seat on the council after serving only one term as nonprofit executive and former community organizer and policy advisor Dionne Foster scored a surprisingly comfortable victory over the incumbent as part of a progressive sweep of the city’s races that will alter the political makeup of the council in 2026.
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