Smith on Politics: Shoreline, Lake Forest Park Republican Caucuses at Nazarene Church

All Republican precinct caucuses for Shoreline and Lake Forest Park will be at the , just off the North 175th Street intersection with Interstate 5 near the Shoreline Library.

The caucuses are scheduled for Saturday, March 3, at 10 a.m. at the church, which is at the northwest corner of North 175th and Meridian Avenue North, across 175th from Meridian Park School. The address is 1900 175th St., Shoreline.

Each precinct will caucus separately, but County Republicans have decided to pool precinct caucuses at a few locations to help avoid confusion.

Precincts in the Snohomish County part of the District will caucus at the Snohomish County Public Utility District building in Edmonds.

Voters who want to participate in the caucuses need to show a voter identification card and photo identification.

Those who don’t have their voter registration cards can do one of three things: 1) Ask King County Elections officials to send a new card, 2) print out the registration information from the voter guide widget on the County Elections website or 3) ask caucus organizers to look it up at the caucus, a process that might require caucus goers to stand in line.

People at the precinct caucuses will elect delegates and alternates to the 32nd Legislative District caucuses and the King and Snohomish county Republican conventions.

Legislative district caucuses, scheduled for dates between March 17 and April 21, send delegates and alternates to the State Republican Convention, which sends delegates and alternates to the Republican National nominating Convention.

The King County Convention April 28, with delegates from the 32nd and 15 other legislative districts, also will send representatives to the State convention and will adopt a County Republican platform. 

The State convention, May 30 to June 2 in Tacoma, will elect three delegates and three alternates from each congressional district, and 10 at-large delegates and 10 alternates to the National Convention in Tampa, Fla., Aug. 27-30.

GOP using old districts, Dems new 

The Republican precinct caucuses March 3 and Democratic caucuses April 15 will be in old precincts rather than the ones that the County will redraw over the next few months. The parties will use the old precincts because new precincts may not be set until May.

However, when the legislative district caucuses come along, and when the parties select delegates from congressional districts to their national conventions, Republicans will use the old districts, and Democrats will use the new ones.

So, Republican delegates from Lake Forest Park precincts will go to 32nd Legislative District caucuses, and Democratic delegates from Lake Forest Park precincts will go to 46th District caucuses.

Republican delegates from precincts in Shoreline, Woodway and south Edmonds will caucus with delegates from Lake Forest Park, Kenmore and north Kirkland of the old 32nd District. Democratic delegates from precincts in Shoreline, Woodway and south Edmonds will caucus with delegates from Lynnwood and northwest Seattle of the new 32nd District. 

A 32nd Legislative District Democratic official told me last spring that the Party would use the old districts, but when I checked back with him in January, he told me that Democrats would use the new districts. King County Republican Chairwoman Lori Sotelo said last week that with Republican caucuses coming early, the Party didn’t have time to organize around the new districts.