The Seattle City Council's decision last week to indefinitely table discussion of a resolution supporting a $2 billion bid for the 2012 Summer Olympics--a decision that has probably killed the bid--is a watershed moment in the recent history of Seattle politics.

With the decision by council president Sue Donaldson, the resolution would need to be reintroduced by three council members, none of whom can currently be found. There appear to be at least five solid votes against the resolution. The U.S. Olympic Commission decided last Friday to extend their original deadline to get letters of support from the mayor and city council, from Sept. 30 to Dec. 31; however, Donaldson is quoted as saying that the serious questions council members have about the bid almost certainly cannot be resolved in the next three months.

This is momentous stuff. Never in the last generation or so has a populist movement been able to derail one of downtown's grandiose plans before it got out of the box. There have been occasional victories after long and contenious struggles--the Seattle Commons and villages, for example. There have been any number of bitter pills--two stadiums, parking garages redux, and so on. And most commonly, the battle was over, and the surgically precise extraction of public money completed, before anyone knew it had been joined--PacMed and Port of Seattle terminal expansions being recent examples.

The arrogance of that assumption--that the public till is available for any old grandiose, chest-thumping public-private partnership that comes along--is typified by Olympic bid co-chair Paul Schell, who was so unworried about the normally pro forma role of a pliant City Council that he was in Europe for the preceding three weeks. The forces of Darkness and Boosterism may, in the future, actually be expected to make a case that their schemes are good public policy, not just good personal investments for their friends.

This sea change in the role of city council is directly traceable to the election of three new voices last fall, and particularly to the work of Nick Licata. Licata led the Olympic opposition, asking the hard questions about costs, social displacement, and taxpayer liability. While Olympic backers were croaking paeans about tourism and regional unity, and playing to Seattle's shopworn insecurities about being a "world class" city, Licata's office commissioned a poll, and publicized the results, suggesting widespread public concern: about traffic, housing ripoffs, and the anti-terrorist security that would turn Seattle into a miniature police state. Most of all, Licata gave a focus and a forum to people who are still bitter and seething about over $1 billion in publicly funded sports stadiums, approved for the wealthy over the widespread opposition of Seattle residents.

One of the concerns that accompanied the election of three "outsider" candidates to Seattle City Council open seats last November was how effective they could be while still hanging on to their principles. It's the age-old political balancing act: getting something that's not exactly what you want (i.e., being a "pragmatist"), or insisting on what's right ("hopeless idealist"). Politics, being considered the art of compromise, values the former. The public, conversely, is convinced that all politicians would sell their mammas to a public-private partnership in exchange for a surprisingly small amount of money and/or votes.

Of the new faces on council, both Peter Steinbrueck and Richard Conlin have had their shining moments. But in his rookie year, Nick Licata has done an astonishing job of managing both the idealism and the pragmatism. Put simply, having Licata on Seattle City Council has made an enormous difference. For the better. There have been a lot of little touches, where people previously shut out from City Hall now found they had a voice, or at least a representative. But now Licata has a major apparent victory to show for his efforts.

"Apparent," of course, because Olympic bid backers insist they still want their games, and history is on their side. Kathy Scanlan, Seattle Bid Committee president, wants to keep her job--hence her idiotic comments (see "Quote of the Week") which suggest that the people of Seattle don't matter, that we shouldn't rightfully have any say in how our tax dollars are spent and what priorities our leaders choose. The days of that sort of insensate arrogance are, hopefully, over.