most influential
Most Influential People of 2018 Nominations Now Open!
Nominate someone you think is making a positive impact in our city today.
Our city is undergoing tremendous challenges, many of them related to growing pains, even as the city—and country—continues to grapple with ongoing issues of race, inclusion, gender equity, gun violence, immigration and environmental concerns. In our annual Most Influential People story in our November issue this year, we want to celebrate the people who are…
Seattle’s Most Influential People of 2014
51 people (plus a machine, an ordinance and screaming fans) are making Seattle what it is in 2014
It’s been a year of superlatives–highest minimum wage! First Super Bowl championship! Biggest transportation boondoggle!–and behind each high point (and low ebb) are people turning the wheels of power or agitating at the grassroots. Ten years into Seattle magazine’s Most Influential list, we present our picks for the movers and shakers of the year. Love ’em…
Most Influential: Mike McGinn and Dow Constantine
Mayor McGinn and Executive Constantine made their mark
One sports a revolutionary’s beard, a feisty personality and a bike habit. The other evidences a Boy Scout mien, a let’s-get-along approach and a well-exercised iPod. Both have nearly one year in office, Mike McGinn as mayor of Seattle and Dow Constantine as King County executive. Each has made his mark—by notably different methods. First-time…
Most Influential: King-5 News Susannah Frame
King-5 News Investigative Reporter Susannah Frame
When Susannah Frame launched her “Waste on the Water” series in March, detailing a state ferry system financially running amok, she unleashed a wave of citizen ire seldom seen in Seattle. Among her revelations: a decades-long tradition of reimbursing some ferry employees—mostly relief and so-called “special project” workers—for their time and mileage to and from…
Most Influential: Partners on the Cascadia Center
Partners Miller Hull Partnership, Point 32, Schuchart, and The Bullitt Foundation collaborate to dev
The adage “If you build it, they will come” is in full experimental application at the corner of 15th Avenue and E Madison Street on Capitol Hill, where the city’s largest Living Building project is beginning to show signs of life. A collaboration among the Miller Hull Partnership (architect), Point32 (developer), Schuchart (general contractor) and…
Most Influential: Consultant Mike Donlin
Program consultant for Seattle Public Schools' prevention-intervention services, Mike Donlin spearhe
The Pew Research Center reports that 30 percent of U.S. teens say they have been affected by hurtful text messages, Facebook posts and the like. Mike Donlin wants to cut that number to zero. A program consultant for Seattle Public Schools’ prevention-intervention services, Donlin spearheaded creation of a new cyberbullying curriculum this year for Seattle…
Person of the Year: The Police Officer
We are not accustomed to seeing police officers as victims
We are not accustomed to seeing police officers as victims. Or as villains. But the past year in the Puget Sound region has focused our attention on law enforcement personnel so relentlessly, so vividly, that no year in recent memory can compare. Between October 31 and December 28, 2009, six officers—one from the Seattle Police…
Most Influential 2010: Dave Ross and Tom Douglas
Radio host Dave Ross and Restaurateur Tom Douglas show their patriotism and democracy
On April 1, Dave Ross, host of The Dave Ross Show on KIRO-FM, opened his morning broadcast with the news that One Reel, the nonprofit organization that runs the Fourth of July festivities at Lake Union, had failed to secure a corporate sponsor and was canceling the event. It was no April Fool’s joke. “It…
Most Influential: Real Change’s Tim Harris
People person Tim Harris is Executive Director of Real Change newspaper
Tim Harris is a people person. “I think that people are sacred,” he says. “When I see people being dehumanized, it pisses me off and makes me want to do something about it.” He founded Seattle’s Real Change newspaper in 1994 to advocate for low-income individuals and provide job opportunities by recruiting them to sell…
Most Influential: Co-founder Tad McGeer
Tad McGeer is Co-founder, President, and Chief Engineer of Aerovel Corp.
In aviation, big jets get all the glory, but Tad McGeer’s development of lightweight, unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) demonstrates not only that good things can arrive in small packages, but that they can do so safely and, if his latest project succeeds, economically and reliably. McGeer’s work with the In-Situ Group dramatically advanced the state…
Most Influential: F5 Networks CEO John McAdam
CEO John McAdams web traffics F5 Networks from shambles to fortune
When John McAdam became CEO of F5 Networks 10 years ago, the company was in shambles. Demand for its product, which helped manage Web traffic, plummeted after the dotcom bust, and its share price, which had reached a high of $160 the year before, had dropped to less than $10. McAdam reinvented the company, focusing…
Most Influential: Activist Keli Carender
Activist Keli Carender organizes protest at Westlake Park
“People credit me as the one who started the Tea Party,” says Keli Carender. “I feel like the tinder was already there, ready to burst into flames, and I just lit the match.” On Presidents Day 2009, Carender organized a “Porkulus” protest at Westlake Park downtown. Appalled by what she deemed excessive spending in the…
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