[ 02 ]
Balducci sworn in
Former Mayor Claudia Balducci is sworn in on the King County Council
Education [ 03 ] Project to go to space
BELLEVUEREPORTER.COM
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BELLEVUE
REPORTER FRIDAY, JANUARY 8, 2016
Stokes, Chelminiak sworn in as new city leaders council member Jennifer Robertson had three votes to Chelminiak’s four in the deputy mayoral vote. Bellevue’s council members nominate who they would like to vote for in the position, then a paper ballot is submitted. Previous elections were decided by going around the council and asking each member to nominate a candidate and then having a vote. If that nominee was not
BY RYAN MURRAY BELLEVUE REPORTER
In majority votes, council members John Stokes and John Chelminiak were sworn in Monday night as mayor and deputy mayor. Former deputy mayor Kevin Wallace finished second in the mayoral race behind Stokes’ four votes with three of his own. Newly-reelected
elected, it passed to the next councilmember to nominate a member. It could be a lengthy process. “This was a smooth vote and a good meeting,” Stokes said. “I’m still getting used to the title.” Stokes has been on Bellevue’s City Council since taking office in 2012 and in that time has
Anti-toll group looks at WSDOT’s 405 data
Open Window School students to send project to space through special program
News
SEE LEADERS, 6
[ 07 ]
Bellevue ranks high
BY RYAN MURRAY BELLEVUE REPORTER
brought to the Bellevue School Board’s attention in November, when teachers spoke of the impact on standard and speciality educators. “I have seen teachers be evaluated on their teaching skills when teaching one and a half classes on a moment’s notice. I’ve seen administrators be frequently torn away from other
A community group opposed to the newly instituted Express Toll Lanes on Interstate 405 claims they were vindicated by a blog post from Washington State Department of Transportation, and are using the post as supposed proof the toll lanes were ill-advised. Stop405Tolls.org cites a Nov. 18 post penned by the department’s toll spokesman Ethan Bergerson on WSDOT’s Blog in which traffic data is explored. WSDOT has since updated its data and claim the traffic rates are right on schedule. The resulting information from the Nov. 18 post revealed that particularly on the weekends, traffic times have actually increased since the opening of the lanes in September. “What drivers have been telling us is true - weekend congestion has increased since the I-405 express toll lanes opened,” Bergerson writes. “Based on data from October 3- November 8, travel times between Bellevue and Lynnwood are generally up to 5 minutes longer throughout the weekend, with up to a 10 minute increase northbound on Saturdays.”
SEE SUBSTITUTES, 9
SEE TOLL, 7
Bellevue named one of most LGBT-includive cities in the country
Sports
[ 10 ]
Wolverines are victorious
Photo courtesy of Marcus Donner
John Stokes, left, and John Chelminiak were sworn in as mayor and deputy mayor at Monday evening’s council meeting. Stokes has been on the council since 2012 and Chelminiak joined in 2004.
District facing problem with unfilled teacher absences be found to cover a teacher’s courses for the day — increased from 1.8 percent to 5.8 percent, according to district data. The district added 60 additional substitute teachers to their rotation this year, but still have a gap in covering teachers’ fall absences, which increased by 12.12 percent from 2013 to 2015. Concerns over the substitute shortcomings were first publicly
BY ALLISON DEANGELIS BELLEVUE REPORTER
Bellevue improves its record to 11-0 with win against Inglemoor
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Despite what the district calls its aggressive hiring and recruiting of substitute teachers, the Bellevue School District is facing increase in unfilled teacher absences in schools across the city. Between 2013 and 2015, the rate of unfilled absences — those where a a substitute could not
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