The Spirit of Washington Pavilion Event Center has probably never been home to more cheering than witnessed tonight. The Event Center was the venue for an election watch party for Denis Law, Marcie Palmer, Greg Taylor, and King Parker, and all of their campaign teams. At a few minutes past 8:00, as the first returns were coming in, it became clear that all four of them were winning, and winning big, in their respective races. For Mayor, Denis Law was easily beating incumbent Kathy Keolker with a 56 percent to 44 percent spread. On city council, Marcie Palmer ran away with her race, with nearly three quarters of the voters choosing to re-elect her. Greg Taylor was ahead in the polling for an open seat almost two-to-one. And King Parker was getting almost 60 percent of the vote in his race for a city council seat.  Along with all the other positive results, 17,000 residents of the Benson Hill neighborhood were electing to join the City of Renton in an annexation vote that was prevailing by 67% to 33 %. ( Interestingly, one of Denis Law’s adult daughters lives in this neighborhood….she could not vote for her father for mayor because she currently lives outside city limits, but she was able to vote to annex to the city of Renton which will make her father her mayor. )

The party of hundreds gasped and cheered as each set of fantastic results were shown on a big screen, which was linked to a bank of computers set up by Marcie Maxwell and some well-organized helpers. Along with cheering to raise the roof, glasses clinked, and people hugged, like midnight on new years eve in New York City.

The guests were all extremely well-fed compliments of the campaigns and Eric Temple’s excellent caterers from Spirit of Washington. And we all enjoyed acceptance speeches from the winning candidates, who were honored, humble, enthusiastic, appreciative, and extremely optimistic in their comments.

It was quite a night for everyone. But I can’t help feeling that I am one of the biggest winners of all, even though I was not even on the ballot. I now get to serve with a dream-team of city officials, in a city that is ready to truly bloom culturally and economically. If there was a way to buy stock in Renton, I would suggest you call your broker and purchase some right now…I am very, very bullish on our city’s future.

What a rush. I thank you all, dear readers and fellow Renton citizens, for making this night possible.

I’ll be getting some really nice pictures from Gary Palmer, but here are a few from my own camera to give the idea of the evening.  Below the pictures, you can find the latest numbers from the King County Elections office.