HistoryHistory of SEAMEC
Being an ordinary citizen and meeting and evaluating those who yield power is an important opportunity not to be missed by anyone in a community often overlooked and degraded. It is a time to reflect on ordinary citizens aspiring to a mission of public service and the experienced office holders who seek to retain power. SEAMEC volunteers are often witnesses to a remarkable diversity in emotions from laughter to tears as they take part in a candidate interview. “SEAMEC interviews provide an opportunity to "plant seeds" in the minds of policymakers and aspiring policymakers as to how they can use their power to make their communities safer and more welcoming of LGBT people,” says Sarah Luthens, a member of the SEAMEC Steering Committee since 1999, and its current secretary.
SEAMEC was born 30 years ago in a time of ill wind for the LGBT community. From Miami to Eugene, Oregon, Anita Bryant was singing to the world that “there is nothing like the love between a man and a woman,” while cranking out a message of hatred to a homophobic world. Seattle’s Initiative 13 in 1978 became the first and most memorable test for SEAMEC’s strength. Unlike other cities that swept out LGBT rights, Seattle defeated Initiative 13 with 63 percent of the vote against.
SEAMEC did not lead the fight against the initiative to repeal the city’s infant ordinance banning discrimination against gays and lesbians in housing and employment. There were a number of organizations — like Citizens to Retain Fair Employment — that took on the challenge. It was SEAMEC; however that opened the doors to electoral power for the LGBT community by seeking out and questioning candidates for mayor and City Council in 1977 — including then Seattle Mayor Wes Uhlman — on issues important to the community. Opening the doors to City Hall, was as significant to this community as the opening of Ping Pong diplomacy in China had been to America just a few years before.
It took a few determined pioneers to make it so. Among them, was Roger Winters, who had served as office manager for Seattle’s Dorian Society, one of the city’s first gay rights organizations. “It took quite a mix of people to put SEAMEC together,” Winters says. “There was a drag queen, a utility worker, a Hispanic, and even a Republican.”
Among the original team of SEAMEC volunteers was Tom Rasmussen, today an openly gay member of the Seattle City Council. SEAMEC was a place to launch political careers for many early volunteers, Winters said . For many years, political careers for folks in the LGBT community were limited to the perimeters of campaigns, not front and center in the candidate’s circle.
Winters worked on the first SEAMEC questionnaire that wasn’t much different from the one in use today. The original questionnaire was modeled after one already in use by Seattle’s Municipal League. Originally, candidates were given a numerical rating between 0 and 4, a rating that went from openly hostile to highly rated, and completely supportive.
In the questionnaires (both written and oral) candidates are asked about issues important to the community. The questionnaires took time to develop as the committee learned that sharing an orientation does not mean uniform agreement. As it does today, the Steering Committee determined the final form of questions, and the result of the ratings.
In the interviews, candidates are also asked if they have any regular contact with members of the LGBT community. As history has shown, knowing someone from the community goes a long way to understanding.
Today, candidates both openly gay and openly minded seek the SEAMEC Holy Grail that now comes in the form of a ratings grade not unlike those earned from a secondary school teacher. Ratings range from A to F, the latter meaning openly hostile. Candidates must endure several levels of testing that begins with a written questionnaire and ends with a series of presentations from volunteer interviewers before a steering committee session that selects the final winner. In between are the volunteers from all walks of the community, who begin by writing oral questions that assess a candidate’s sense of LGBT awareness, history, and support. For the most part, candidates do give honest answers — even if sometimes the answers demonstrate a benign neglect of subjects like gender identity or even how someone is infected with the HIV Virus.
Sometimes, candidates give answers that they believe SEAMEC volunteers want to hear. The most recent case caused the SEAMEC steering committee to rescind its 2006 endorsement of state Supreme Court incumbents Barbara Madsen and Charles Johnson (http://www.sgn.org/sgnnews34_32/page3.cfm ) after the pair voted against marriage equality in the state in a highly unexpected decision. The candidates’ written decision strongly countered the answers that they had given to SEAMEC interviewers.
Herb Krohn, who has served on the steering committee since the 1980s, recalls a Republican Primary race for King County Executive in 1984, when liberal Republican then-city comptroller Tim Hill defeated Port Commissioner Jim Wright. Wright had given SEAMEC all the answers it wanted to hear, Krohn says but weeks after the interview, Wright advocated what the community looked as a “concentration camp” for victims of AIDS.
AIDS took a toll on SEAMEC as well during the 1980s. A large number of volunteers and steering committee members were lost, among them was SEAMEC’s first co-chair Dr. James Hughes. The organization was hit hard as the 80’s faded, but Winters says “it was more decimation than devastation.” In other words, the ranks were thinned, but the organization stood strong.
The organization was boosted even more by the establishment of a permanent home in the same building as the Seattle Gay News on Capitol Hill. More importantly, SGN Editor-in-Chief George Bakan made it possible for SEAMEC to hire its first Interview Coordinator, a position that continues to exist. The Interview Coordinator sets up candidate interviews before the Primary and General elections and coordinates the participation of Interview volunteers.
As SEAMEC enters its fourth decade of operation, challenges continue to face our community. Seattle has become known as a place “very friendly” for those of us who don’t follow the straight and narrow road. That didn’t happen by accident. It happened because a few pioneers believed it was possible to work within the system and create change. The next generation of volunteers may see a time when like the voters of New Hampshire, we see a steady stream of presidential candidates volunteering to be interviewed. (Written questionnaires went out to all the candidates in the 2000 Presidential Election, according to Herb Krohn. Democratic candidate Al Gore did not respond, but interestingly, Republican George W. Bush did.)
It’s therefore crucial for SEAMEC to call on a new generation of volunteers. “It’s the most valuable work you can do for such a short duration of activity,” says Winters.