Many Lakewood residents are unhappy. You can’t really point to one reason why they are unhappy. Some are unhappy because they just don’t see the point of a city. They think government is bad, period. And they think that even though in their hearts they know a city needs police protection, parks, and even other services.
Some people would rather Lakewood stay part of Tacoma. Other people feel Lakewood should be left as part of the county that had wanted to locate a jail here. Others worry that a city could ruin their situation – maybe provide more public access to lakes, or put roads through their property, or what have you.
History now tells us that there were only four of these people.
They met at the Tacoma County and Golf Club the morning after the vote. But they quickly agreed that what they had to do would require secrecy. They needed a much more discreet location.
So they went to the quiet, low-key and average home of an average Lakewood couple: Wayne and Wanda.
After going back and forth, Wayne and Wanda had themselves voted for cityhood. This morning, they sat at the breakfast table as four men gathered in the adjacent living room.
WANDA: Wayne, who are those nice men over there?
WAYNE: They said they wanted a place to meet to talk about this whole cityhood thing, dear. I hope you don’t mind.
WANDA: Oh, that’s fine, dear, I can ignore them. I can’t imagine anything they are saying has anything to do with us.
MAN1: Thank you all for joining us. As I see it, we have three choices.
MAN2: Excuse me, but I just want you to know I am against anything constructive.
MAN1: Uh, right, well, anyway .. As I see it we have three choices.
MAN2: Hey, would anyone like to go in with me to build another strip club?
MAN3: Would you shut up? OK, please continue, Man1.
MAN1: OK, so these are our choices, as I see it. First, we form a committee to campaign for disincorporation. We campaign to shut the city down.
MAN2: Could we have private rooms for lap dances?
MAN1: It has nothing to do with your strip club, you idiot. Disincorporation means that a city that has approved cityhood will later vote to take it away. In our case, that would mean all of Lakewood’s decisions are made in Tacoma again.
MAN3: I don’t like the idea of any sort of campaign. We finally got out-organized by the people who wanted cityhood. Well, either that, or they just wore us down. Trying to fight it now would just look like sour grapes. And the people who proposed cityhood would argue that we did not give it a fair chance.
MAN2: Hey, would anyone like to buy some wrecked cars and park them in front of my neighbor’s yard? I love that guy’s expression. He really whines, like all the rats are really going to go bite his kids or anything …
MAN1: Well, that brings me to my recommendation.
MAN2: So if you don’t want to spend money on a strip club or wrecked cars, how about we buy up more homes in Tillicum and move in some meth makers? Those guys pay in cash! We need to act fast before the city has its own police department, or does anything to clean up that part of the town.
MAN1: Would you stay on the subject? Anyway, here’s my plan: we give them enough rope and let them hang themselves. And then we make sure to be there to tighten the noose.
MAN4: I like the sound of that. What does it mean?
MAN1: Cancer, my friend, Cancer.
MAN2: I have a dancer in my club named Cancer. Or Candy. I’m not sure. She changes it every time she gets out of jail.
MAN1: OK, I am just going to keep going. Maybe cancer is the wrong period, because that's a serious physical disease. But I like the metaphor. Maybe we call it internal bleeding instead.
MAN3: That all sounds gruesome. What are you talking about?
MAN1: Simple. Think of the illness as guerilla warfare from within. The city will begin to do things that will attract attention. They will close down Man2’s strip club, shut down his meth lab, and tow his wrecked cars.
MAN2: The scum!
MAN3: Surely, along the way, the people who forced cityhood on us will do things to anger people who did not much care either way. The people who approved cityhood will do things wrong. They'll restrict business signs right away without seeking the opinion of Man2. Maybe they'll like build roads and sidewalks the wrong way. Look at this couple, Wayne and Wanda. Suppose the city tells them that the city can’t afford the streetlight that they want. Or maybe they will blame the city because somebody puts a new house next to them.
(He pauses to think)
If we are really lucky, the city people will make mistakes. Maybe they will try to stuff all the strip clubs into one part of town.
MAN4: I wish they would try to put those clubs into just the Korean-owned areas. That would sure anger people.
(Laughter)
MAN1: I doubt if we will get that lucky. You might as well wish that they put up an inexplicable road project where people would drive through it every day. Or you might as well wish the city would put up an extravagant-looking city hall that would look wonderful on anti-city campaign literature. But I doubt if the pro-cityhood people will help us that much.
(Laughter)
The point is, whatever they do, they are bound to anger people along the way.
MAN2: I’m already angry! Why would they close down a strip club where hard-working single mothers can sell drugs?
MAN1: Right, uh, so to continue, people will be angry at the city.
MAN4: I see your point. Why should we work against the city, when the city by definition will work against itself?
MAN3: But I fail to see how this helps us. We lost. Cityhood won
MAN1: Not necessarily. Think about what will happen when the city makes its mistakes.
MAN3: Well, people will get angry. If their concerns are not addressed, they will run for the City Council.
MAN1: Exactly! And what kind of people will run?
MAN3: It would be people who don’t like government. It would probably be the angriest people.
MAN1: EXACTLY! People who don’t like government. They will run against government, and against the people in that City Hall. They could be so angry they will demoralize the city. And suppose we help them? Suppose we tell our friends to vote for them?
MAN3: Well, then they might win.
MAN1: Exactly. But even if they do not win, our trap will spring. We’ll get these winners to tear apart the government. We will get them to try to cut the salaries of the Lakewood employees so nobody wants to work here. We will try to get them to rip the heck out of the employees for any reason at all to try to chase the good people away. We’ll get them to question even something as obvious as whether those employees can take vacations. There are a lot of people who think government is an easy life. Read the papers. Lots of people think government people are lazy. We just play to the stereotype. We embrace the cartoon.
MAN2: What would all that do?
MAN1: Well, it would take many, many years. We might not see an effect until, oh, just to guess wildly, maybe 2006 or 2007. But as the guerilla campaign got stronger, the pro-cityhood people would lose their positive energy, and the city might at least sometimes have to hire less experienced people to work at the city. In general, those inexperienced people might make more mistakes as part of their learning curve. And all that, in turn, would lead to more problems and make us stronger.
MAN3: I think your plan is brilliant. We simply let the city make mistakes, and then we help the people who exploit those mistakes into creating an even worse situation.
MAN1: Exactly. Lakewood is so large, I doubt if we could ever force … I mean, campaign for disincorporation. But I bet we could cripple their operations.
MAN2: And then I can run my strip club!
MAN4: Well, you yourself might be better off moving to Parkland, Man2, but the plan is brilliant. I remember when my wife and I first got married. My mother gave my poor wife an incredibly hard time, and it really demoralized her. My mother would nag and nag and nag like she just could not control it. And you know, my mother wasn’t evil. She really, really cared, and nagging was how she showed it.
MAN2: Hey, maybe we can give this group of guerilla anti-cityhood warriors a name, like, uh, Lakewood NAGS.
There is silence.
MAN2: Lakewood WHINES?
MAN1: Well, hopefully they can come up with a better name on their own. We just write the plan.
The men get up from Wayne and Wanda’s table. They walk out the door.
WANDA: Wayne, did you hear anything?
Wayne looks up from his paper.
WAYNE: What did you say, dear?