Michael J. O'Brien (born March 2, 1968) is an American politician and former member of the

Seattle City Council The Seattle City Council is the legislative body of the city of Seattle, Washington. The Council consists of nine members serving four-year terms, seven of which are elected by electoral districts and two of which are elected in citywide at-lar ...

who represented District 6 in northwest Seattle. He was first elected in 2009 to a different, city-wide council seat. He was the leading proponent of the opt-out list for the

Yellow Pages The yellow pages are telephone directories of businesses, organized by category rather than alphabetically by business name, in which advertising is sold. The directories were originally printed on yellow paper, as opposed to white pages for ...

. He was the only opponent of the proposed deep bore tunnel under downtown

Seattle Seattle ( ) is a seaport city on the West Coast of the United States. It is the seat of King County, Washington. With a 2020 population of 737,015, it is the largest city in both the state of Washington and the Pacific Northwest regio ...

on the city council. He was chair of the local chapter of the

Sierra Club The Sierra Club is an environmental organization with chapters in all 50 United States, Washington D.C., and Puerto Rico. The club was founded on May 28, 1892, in San Francisco, California, by Scottish-American preservationist John Muir, who be ...

before running for office. In this capacity, he was one of the leading opponents of the 2007

Roads and Transit Roads and Transit was a ballot measure in the U.S. State of Washington concerning transportation, that was sent to voters in the Snohomish, King, and Pierce Counties for approval on November 6, 2007. It was defeated by a margin of 56% to 44%. In ...

ballot measure.

Early life and career

Mike O'Brien was born in Seattle and raised in the Eastside suburb of Clyde Hill. He holds a

bachelor's degree A bachelor's degree (from Middle Latin ''baccalaureus'') or baccalaureate (from Modern Latin ''baccalaureatus'') is an undergraduate academic degree awarded by colleges and universities upon completion of a course of study lasting three to six ...

in economics from

Duke University Duke University is a private research university in Durham, North Carolina. Founded by Methodists and Quakers in the present-day city of Trinity in 1838, the school moved to Durham in 1892. In 1924, tobacco and electric power industrialist James ...

and a

M.B.A. A Master of Business Administration (MBA; also Master's in Business Administration) is a postgraduate degree focused on business administration. The core courses in an MBA program cover various areas of business administration such as accounti ...

in finance from the

University of Washington The University of Washington (UW, simply Washington, or informally U-Dub) is a public research university in Seattle, Washington. Founded in 1861, Washington is one of the oldest universities on the West Coast; it was established in Seattle a ...

, where he also earned a certificate in

environmental management Environmental resource management is the management of the interaction and impact of human societies on the environment. It is not, as the phrase might suggest, the management of the environment itself. Environmental resources management aims ...

. O'Brien joined Seattle-based corporate law firm Stokes Lawrence as

chief financial officer The chief financial officer (CFO) is an officer of a company or organization that is assigned the primary responsibility for managing the company's finances, including financial planning, management of financial risks, record-keeping, and financ ...

in 1998, where he met lawyer and neighborhood activist

Mike McGinn Michael McGinn (born December 17, 1959) is an American lawyer and politician. He served as mayor of the city of Seattle, Washington, and is a neighborhood activist and a former State Chair of the Sierra Club. In what was characterized as a "s ...

, who would become O'Brien's friend and mentor.

Political activism

O'Brien was invited by McGinn to the Seattle chapter of the

as a volunteer treasurer, despite his previous lack of interest in politics. O'Brien became politically involved with the group and was elected as political chair of the Seattle chapter and chair of the Washington state chapter. During the 2007 election, O'Brien served as the group's spokesperson in the debate over the

proposition, which would have bundled

Sound Transit Sound Transit (ST), officially the Central Puget Sound Regional Transit Authority, is a public transit agency serving the Seattle metropolitan area in the U.S. state of Washington. It operates the Link light rail system in Seattle and Tacoma, r ...

projects with road expansion and was opposed by the Sierra Club. The ballot measure was defeated and a transit-only version,

Sound Transit 2 Sound Transit (ST), officially the Central Puget Sound Regional Transit Authority, is a public transit agency serving the Seattle metropolitan area in the U.S. state of Washington. It operates the Link light rail system in Seattle and Tacoma, r ...

, was proposed for the following year with the support of the Sierra Club. Mike O'Brien was a representative of the Sierra Club on the Alaskan Way Viaduct Replacement Project Stakeholder Advisory Committee in 2008. During the 2008 campaign, O'Brien left Stokes Lawrence to be a full-time volunteer for the Sierra Club and was encouraged to run for office by McGinn and others in the environmental community. O'Brien is currently on the Board of Directors and is the treasurer of the Sierra Club.

Political career

2009 election

In February 2009, O'Brien announced his candidacy for a city council seat that incumbent councilmember

Richard McIver Richard McIver (June 14, 1941 – March 9, 2013) was a member of the Seattle City Council. He was selected from 114 applicants to fill a vacancy on the Council in January 1997, was elected to the position that fall, and was reelected in 2001 ...

planned to not run for. During the August primary for Position 8, O'Brien advanced with 35 percent of votes and was set to run against second-place finisher Robert Rosencrantz. O'Brien won the general election with 58 percent of votes and was sworn-in on January 1, 2010, alongside newly-elected mayor Mike McGinn.

2015 election

O'Brien ran for the newly created District 6 position for the

, primarily covering Ballard, Fremont and Green Lake. He won the primary and defeated Catherine Weatbrook in the November general election. During his term as the District 6 councilmember, O'Brien attracted criticism for his positions on transportation, housing, homelessness, policing, and taxes. At an after-party event following a gala for the

Nordic Museum The Nordic Museum ( sv, Nordiska museet) is a museum located on Djurgården, an island in central Stockholm, Sweden, dedicated to the cultural history and ethnography of Sweden from the early modern period (in Swedish history, it is said to be ...

on May 5, 2018, O'Brien was reportedly asked to leave and subsequently forcibly removed by members of the Pacific Fishermen Shipyard (where the event was being held). O'Brien has attracted criticism from the group for his position on the extension of the Burke-Gilman Trail in Ballard. Facing unfavorable polling results and opposition from groups like the Metropolitan Chamber of Commerce, in February 2019 O'Brien announced he would not seek reelection to the Seattle City Council.

Electoral history

2009 election

2013 election

2015 election

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Obrien, Mike 1968 births Living people Seattle City Council members 21st-century American politicians People from Clyde Hill, Washington Duke University alumni University of Washington alumni