5 newcomers in race to replace Rep. Noel Frame for Northwest Seattle’s 36th District seat in Legislature

The race to replace Rep. Noel Frame to represent Seattle’s 36th Legislative District includes five longtime residents who are new to running for office but have a wide range of political and policy experience.

There’s no clear front-runner to represent the Northwest Seattle district, which includes Ballard, Queen Anne, Magnolia and Greenwood. The candidates all favor the Democratic Party and all are largely in agreement on issues like homelessness, housing affordability and preserving access to abortion resources. What sets each apart, they say, is their lived experience and professional backgrounds.

Longtime legislator Reuven Carlyle’s announcement this year that he wouldn’t seek reelection set off a cascade down to the state House of Representatives Position 1 seat. Frame, who has served as representative since 2016, said in April she would run for Carlyle’s spot. Liz Berry, the incumbent in the Position 2 seat, is running unopposed.

Ballots must be postmarked or dropped in a ballot drop box by Aug. 2. The two candidates with the most votes will move on to November’s general election.

Julia Reed, 35, is a consultant for Kinetic West, a social impact consulting firm. She worked for the Obama administration’s State Department and the Office of Management and Budget before returning to Seattle, where she grew up. In her hometown, she said she “fell in love with local policy and local government, and how the distance between idea and execution is so much smaller than at the federal level.”

Reed was a senior policy adviser to former Seattle Mayor Jenny Durkan, and though she acknowledged there were challenges in the administration, she said she’s proud of the work she did there with her involvement in efforts like wildfire smoke preparedness, helping organize the 2020 census and launching the Cultural Space Agency Public Development Authority to develop real estate for cultural purposes.

She pointed to her time in federal, state and local levels of government and her experience growing up as a biracial person in Seattle.

“Trying to figure out how you fit into the world, I think that gives you a lot of empathy for the struggle other people are going through,” she said. “It also teaches you the survival tactics and as a matter of practice, how to put yourself in other people’s shoes and see the other point of view.”

She’s raised $121,744, the most of any candidate in the race.

As a state administrative law judge, Jeff Manson says he sees how state laws and budgets can affect someone on a day-to-day basis, and “how a turn of phrase in a statute can affect the course of someone’s life.” In his role, he resolves disputes that people and businesses have with state agencies.

He gave the example of people who lose their jobs because they can’t find child care and often aren’t eligible for unemployment benefits. That’s a major loophole, he said, that he could speak to in the Legislature and work to close.

He supports funding more housing units and adding density in high-transit areas, though he doesn’t support eliminating single-family zoning, and would like to see more transportation and transit investments in the district.

He served on the King County Citizens Elections Oversight Committee, and as chair of the 36th District Democrats for eight years. Before he was appointed an administrative law judge, he worked as an attorney representing people with disabilities, and in 2017 was named by Gov. Jay Inslee to the governing board for Achieving a Better Life Experience, which creates tax-advantaged savings and investments program for people with disabilities.

“I have been advocating for the most vulnerable in our communities for many years,” Manson, 41, said. “I think that’s a perspective not a lot of people have in the race.”

He has raised $80,018.

For Nicole Gomez, the COVID-19 pandemic highlighted and exacerbated problems — health care costs, lack of mental health resources, homelessness — that she had been seeing for years while working in health care policy.

Gomez’s focus in Olympia has been on universal health care; she serves on the state Universal Health Care Commission and is co-founder of Alliance for a Healthy Washington, a nonprofit organization advocating for health care system reform. She is executive director of the Institute for a Democratic Future, a fellowship program for emerging Democratic leaders, and was chair of the 36th District Democrats.

If elected, her priorities would be health care policy, housing affordability and tax-code reforms.

“We have been hearing for years that we have declared homelessness a public emergency and it hasn’t been addressed, and part of it is because of lack of funding at the state level,” Gomez, 42, said.

She called Washington’s tax system “upside down,” and has been involved with the Balance Our Tax Code coalition’s policy committee. The efforts boil down to “The wealthy pay their fair share,” she said.

She has raised $18,344.

E. Tyler Crone, a public health advocate, previously served as the founding director of the ATHENA Network, an organization dedicated to gender equality, human rights and global health. Since the early 1990s, she has worked as a public health expert and adviser to governments and other agencies, specifically with the response to the HIV crisis.

Crone, 49, said she never expected to run for office, but decided to enter the race after seeing the disparate impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic and what she describes as a frustrating response from the government. She recalled not being able to find coronavirus tests when one of her daughters acquired COVID, right before her daughter was eligible for a booster shot.

“I could walk to the Amazon Spheres and Gates Foundation from our house, but we were haggling with neighbors to get more rapid tests,” she said. “I have training and expertise in law and public health, and that expertise is needed so that we save lives.”

If elected, her first priority would be upholding access to abortion in light of the Supreme Court’s overturn of Roe v. Wade.

“Washington state has a lot of great rhetoric around abortion rights, but we have huge challenges with access here at home, and we don’t have that federal backup,” she said.

She has raised $63,094.

Waylon Robert grew up in the 36th Legislative District and, at 25, is the youngest candidate, though he’s no stranger to politics. As a teenager he worked for former King County Councilmember Larry Gossett, and has worked in the offices of Washington Supreme Court Justice Steven Gonzalez and U.S. Rep. Derek Kilmer. He was a project manager for Forterra, a sustainability nonprofit.

His three main focuses, he said, are housing affordability, safety and protecting the maritime industry. He said he’s concerned about 911 response times and officer numbers; he applauded Mayor Bruce Harrell’s efforts for hiring bonuses for Seattle officers. He would like to invest more in Western State Hospital and mental health wards throughout the state.

He noted his work on both sides of the political aisle in the Legislature to lobby for funding for libraries and history education. As a college student, he secured funding to restore a library in Hoquiam; he began by cold-calling former politicians with numbers he found in a phone book.

“We have problems in this district, and we need someone who can build uncommon alliances,” Robert said.

He has raised $98,392.