Welcome to My Website!
Thank you for the personal and professional honor of serving as your state senator! It is inspiring to partner with our community to tackle the pressing public issues facing our state. I ask, with deep appreciation for the opportunity to serve our district and state, for the honor of your vote in 2018.
Our citizen legislature enables real people living real lives to serve as your voice state government in Olympia. As a husband, father and technology entrepreneur I believe in the powerful idea that citizen legislators bring something special to the public policy table. We are often more focused on outcomes and results than inputs and process. We strive to use the public’s resources wisely and deliver value regardless of partisan interests. We believe with special fervency that public issues deserve a fair hearing free of special interest interference.
As your citizen legislator, I’m honored to be running for re-election to the State Senate in 2018.
My wife Wendy Carlyle, MD, and I live on Queen Anne with our four children and are deeply connected to the 36th District neighborhoods of Belltown, Queen Anne, Magnolia, Ballard, Greenwood and the rest of our community.
I’m running for re-election to continue to tackle major challenges. Our city and region is exploding with growth and change. Yet our public policy approach to education, transportation, mental health, environment, public safety, affordability and so many other issues too often lags behind our potential.
We are an innovative and engaged community—the home of Amazon, Starbucks, Microsoft, F5 Networks, Expedia, Gates Foundation, PATH, Port of Seattle, the biotech and biomedical community, maritime sector and so much more. Yet our public policies often fail to reflect the energy of our most innovative entrepreneurs. Neither government nor business has the answers, but we can build a 21st Century quality of life by demanding the best from both.
I believe the people of our district first elected me in 2008 to vigorously seek intellectual independence from stale orthodoxies and rigid partisanship.
Since first joining the state House in 2009 I have tackled major structural and systemic issues. As chair of the House Finance Committee in charge of tax policy, I worked hard to raise the level of intellectual, analytical and financial rigor of critical tax decisions. Because of my work the public is allowed, for the first time in state history, access to information about the value of a tax preference to individual companies and industries.
As a budget writer I focused on investing the public’s hard-earned tax dollar in education from early learning through K-12 and higher education. I have led the charge to make Washington number one in the nation in the educational success of foster youth. I have helped deliver for our community including resources to reopen Magnolia Elementary School, invest in Phinney Ridge Neighbor Association, Taproot Theater, Pacific Science Center, Woodland Park Zoo, Metro bus service and so much more.
On a broader level, I’m committed to focusing on large ‘systems’ issues: The shift from manufacturing to service economies means loss of wages and buying power; a lack of educational rigor and quality from K-12 through higher education to enable young people to compete globally; an inability for the middle class to afford health care, housing and other staples of life; the difficulty of small business to succeed against bureaucratic barriers; the lack of common sense coordination and efficiency between disconnected city, county and state governments; a need for new thinking about clean energy and environmental strategies. I hope to continue in the senate to tackle the major issue of full funding of public education.
In the years to come we have millions of new residents coming to the Puget Sound region. We’re not ready. We face an affordability anxiety that is off the charts. We need our elected officials to focus on the education, infrastructure, transportation, human services and financial integrity of our state so we can ensure our children’s children enjoy the quality of life we too often take for granted.
As your senator, above all else, I am committed to building and strengthening our region’s quality of life for generations to come.
Please call me at (206) 286-9663 or email at: reuven@www.reuvencarlyle.com. Please visit my personal blog at: reuvencarlyle36.com. Please reach out as a friend on Facebook and follow me on Twitter.
Thank you for your support, vote and commitment to our community’s future!
Your partner in service,
