Talk:Port of Seattle

Neutrality - January 2012

Unfortunately, there are several of the descriptions of the holdings of the Port of Seattle that read more like a sales brochure than an encyclopedia article. I really don't think it would take too much time to fix these points, but I don't have time to do it myself right now. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 63.226.108.225 (talk) 00:34, 20 January 2012 (UTC)

Untitled

I just picked up a book on the history of the Port, and I have a list of the Port commissioners from 1911 to 1974. Is this of interest? I know there has been some discussion about minor characters not needing pages so I wouldn't create pages for them all, but thought the list itself might be useful. Chadlupkes 02:18, 24 March 2006 (UTC)

• Please add the list! --Lukobe 06:19, 24 March 2006 (UTC)

External links modified

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External links modified

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I have just added archive links to one external link on Port of Seattle. Please take a moment to review my edit. If necessary, add {{cbignore}} after the link to keep me from modifying it. Alternatively, you can add {{nobots|deny=InternetArchiveBot}} to keep me off the page altogether. I made the following changes:

• Added archive http://web.archive.org/web/20160304060641/https://www.portseattle.org/About/Organization/Executives/Pages/Tay-Yoshitani.aspx to https://www.portseattle.org/About/Organization/Executives/Pages/Tay-Yoshitani.aspx

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Archived Link Update

Checked botlinks, both were Wayback snapshots taken too late - they already had a 404 error. I corrected them. Fa toren (talk) 08:45, 17 July 2016 (UTC)fa torenFa toren (talk) 08:45, 17 July 2016 (UTC)

Pier relocated??

I cannot make any sense of, "In 1993 the Bell Street Pier, constructed in 1913-1915, was relocated." How would you "relocate" something the size of a city block and several stories high? It came into the article with this unreferenced edit. User:Bhunacat10 has not edited here in several years. - Jmabel | Talk 22:32, 13 February 2023 (UTC)

• I'm just going to rewrite as if that weren't there. - Jmabel | Talk 01:17, 18 February 2023 (UTC)

Orphaned references in Port of Seattle

I check pages listed in Category:Pages with incorrect ref formatting to try to fix reference errors. One of the things I do is look for content for orphaned references in wikilinked articles. I have found content for some of Port of Seattle's orphans, the problem is that I found more than one version. I can't determine which (if any) is correct for this article, so I am asking for a sentient editor to look it over and copy the correct ref content into this article.

Reference named "FAA":

• From Boeing Field: FAA Airport Form 5010 for BFI PDF. Federal Aviation Administration. Effective November 15, 2012.
• From Paine Field: FAA Airport Form 5010 for PAE PDF, effective September 13, 2019.
• From Seattle–Tacoma International Airport: FAA Airport Form 5010 for SEA PDF, effective December 30, 2021.

I apologize if any of the above are effectively identical; I am just a simple computer program, so I can't determine whether minor differences are significant or not. AnomieBOT⚡ 00:32, 15 February 2023 (UTC)

What needs clarification?

@SounderBruce: you placed a "clarification needed" tag in the article, but I can't tell what you think needs to be clarified. Could you, um, clarify your request for clarification? - Jmabel | Talk 22:50, 16 February 2023 (UTC)

I don't think "passim" would qualify as a valid citation. It might be better to shuffle things around so the article doesn't have to link to itself as well. SounderBruce 02:29, 17 February 2023 (UTC)

I could avoid passim by listing all the pages cited in the other section, where I go into detail, but I think it would be a less clear citation, because there would no longer be a link to where you can see what statements are validated by what citations.

I think there is a lot of value in separating the story of the growth of the facilities from the political aspects, and I would not want to see them stitched back together in a single chronological narrative. - Jmabel | Talk 20:09, 17 February 2023 (UTC)

Notes toward sorting out when the Commission became five separate at-large seats

• In the 1960 election (which expanded the Commission from three seats to five), John M. Haydon and Gordon Newell won the two new at-large seats by being top two in a multi-candidate race. There was a separate vote for the representative of the First District. - "Incomplete County Vote". Seattle Times. November 9, 1960. p. 6.
• That situation is described explicitly at "New Port Commissioners Do Not Run By Position". Municipal News. Vol. 50, no. 12. Seattle. June 25, 1960. p. 86.
• In 1963, Substitute House Bill 99 was introduced in the State Legislature to allow "candidates for Port Commissioner in class AA counties to run at large but for numbered positions." - "Digest of Bills in State Legislature". Seattle Post-Intelligencer. February 20, 1963. p. 8.
  • It would be good to know the fate of that bill. Somewhere along the way it became law, but not necessarily that session.
  • Apparently that was sponsored by the Muni League: "League Has Been Active in Helping Promote Election Reform Legislation". Municipal News. Vol. 50, no. 12. Seattle. June 25, 1963. p. 3, 6. The… act would eliminate the requirement that three of the five port commissioners must file by district and would permit their election at large… The district restriction has prevented capable men who live in another district from running for an open position on the Port Commission. Also the law will provide that candidates for the port commission must run by position so that each port commissioner must defend his individual record and not campaign as a team.
  • And apparently this had not yet passed into law May 11, 1964: "Election of Port Commissioners". Municipal News. Vol. 54, no. 9. Seattle. May 11, 1964. p. 66. Based on a previous League recommendation the subcommittee urged continued support of the principle that residence requirements be eliminated and that all five Port of Seattle District Commissioners be elected at large by numbered positions…
• 1969 results are not by district, so the change had happened by then. - "How Seattleites Voted". Seattle Times. November 6, 1969. p. 1.
• 1967 results are not by district, so the change had happened by then. - "Seattle Results". Seattle Times. November 8, 1967. p. 41.
• (Not exactly what I was looking for, but interesting): "Port of Seattle's 1965 Volume—A 54-Year High". Seattle Times. May 22, 1966. p. 41. The Port of Seattle is governed by a five-man Port Commission, elected to six-year terms under a Municipal Corporation established in 1911 by King County voters. The present members are John M. Haydon, Frank R. Kitchell, Robert W. Norquist, president, and Merle D. Adlum and Miner H. Baker. This stands in contrast to the initial 3-year terms and the present 4-year terms so that's another thing that changed more than once.

Jmabel | Talk 18:26, 18 February 2023 (UTC)

I ended up just using some of this to say that the terms of office have varied over time; we already had citation for:

• originally having three commissioners, elected in districts
• the transition to five commissioners, with the additional two being "at large" in a "top two" election
• that now all commissioners are "at large", each seat is separate, and the term is four years.

If anyone could really pin down each time the term of office changed, that would be great. Ditto for when the three additional seats became "at large" (apparently between May 11, 1964 and the 1967 elections, but that's too vague to be worth mentioning in the article.) I don't plan further research on this front, but would welcome if someone else took it up. - Jmabel | Talk 05:40, 20 February 2023 (UTC)

Tay Yoshitani

I have a concern with the way material is presented here about Tay Yoshitani, especially given that he is a living person. We have "In 2007, Tay Yoshitani joined the organization as CEO. Major scandals soon followed the start of his tenure. The port police department uncovered a significant problem with racist and pornographic emails. After the hiring of a new chief, the organization began to regain its footing…" This wording suggests that Yoshitani was somehow responsible for the email scandal. As I understand it, the scandal occurred before his time as CEO, and was revealed by investigations for which he had at least indirect responsibility, but this wording makes it sound like the troubles occurred on his watch. Also, it suggests that somehow his retirement (seven years later, but the only place you would find that out is in an entirely different section of the article) was somehow related to this and occurred amid scandal. From what I remember (and I haven't researched this yet) the only thing approaching possible scandal about Yoshitani was accusations of conflicts of interest because he was simply too close to certain companies that did business with the Port. Not that those longstanding relationships were any secret, just that some people felt that they made him a bad choice for the job. - Jmabel | Talk 04:07, 20 February 2023 (UTC)

In fact, I now see that the wording about "hiring of a new chief" dates from this edit in 2012, when Yoshitani was still CEO. And the "new chief" was not a new CEO: it was a new chief of the Port police. Clearly this needs to be reworded!

It also turns out the the person who did these edits, User:Maddiejane14 is someone who has no other contributions to Wikipedia (or any other WMF project) beyond her edits to this article on a single day, in the course of less than an hour, so there's no point waiting for her to respond. - Jmabel | Talk 04:19, 20 February 2023 (UTC)

(Relevant passage now rewritten.) - Jmabel | Talk 05:32, 20 February 2023 (UTC)

Two passages still marked "citation needed"

I'm pretty much done with my current effort at rewriting the article. I have a little more I'm researching about Yoshitani, but that's about it.

There are two passages currently marked as "citation needed", both in the section Into the 21st Century:

• "Newly elected commissioners and CEO Yoshitani implemented a series of reforms, including increased commission oversight of port construction projects and consolidation of the organization's procurement activities into one division to afford better control."
  • I have little idea where one could go to cite for this. It was part of the edits by User:Maddiejane14, who was active on Wikipedia for less than an hour, and worked only on this article. I would guess it is true, but suspect it would take a lot of research to back it up. I'm inclined to leave it as is for now; it would be great if someone wanted to try to back it up.
• "However, increased container and cruise traffic has increased community concerns, just as the new runway did."
  • I'm guessing that would be relatively easy to cite for, if anyone wants to try. I'm just sort of running out of steam here.

Jmabel | Talk 05:52, 20 February 2023 (UTC)

State of article

I think my edits over the last week or so have left this in a lot better state than I found it, though still probably a bit below "good article" level. I don't currently plan to do any more major work on the article, though I may do some because I'm likely to work on related topics. (I'm stilll considering doing more on the illustrations, and maybe expand the "parks" aspect.)

I don't maintain a watchlist on the English-language Wikipedia, so if anyone wants to address me on anything about this article, please ping me. - Jmabel | Talk 05:57, 20 February 2023 (UTC)