People To Watch In '95

Forget 1994, folks. It's history. Time to look to the future - and the people we expect to be writing a lot more about in the months ahead. Some are familiar, but will be doing new things. Others we're sure you've never heard of. So as a sneak preview, here, in no particular order, are 33 people we think you'll be seeing in these pages in 1995. They may be making laws or making music, making money or making waves. But in one way or another, we expect them all to be making news in the new year. ----------------------------------

---------- GREG ROACH ---------- Pulling us into the action

Among high-tech's people to watch, you think of Bill Gates, Paul Allen, Craig McCaw. Now add Greg Roach, the father of the interactive movie - where the viewer, sitting at a computer, influences the plot and character as the story plays out on a CD-ROM disc.

Roach, 34, recently licensed his technology - which he calls Virtual Cinema - to the accounting firm of Arthur Andersen & Co. If it becomes the standard, Roach, 34, who's been called the Steven Spielberg of interactive movie-making, will soon find others being compared to him rather than the other way around.

Working out of Belltown headquarters in Seattle, Roach heads HyperBole Studios, a collection of 26 creative types producing CD-ROM titles at an alacritous rate. On the way is a twice-yearly "digital storytelling" disc called "HyperBole: The Magazine," and "Portals," a collection of film shorts, including "The Wrong Side of Town," a pioneering Roach work designated by the American Film Institute as the first interactive movie.

This month, he will appear at the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas and a New Media Alliance forum in Japan. Then he'll spend six months on creative projects and pulling together Lumiere, an interactive-film festival he wants to hold in Seattle in late 1995 or early 1996.

------------ KITTY HARMON ------------ Celebrating a Northwest passion

If Bibliomania, a forward-looking Seattle book festival, becomes reality, the city will have Kitty Harmon to thank.

The 34-year-old publishing veteran - she's been with industry giant Bantam Books in New York and regional powerhouse Sasquatch Books in Seattle - is creating from scratch a high-tech festival that should draw thousands of our legendary bookophiles (and more than 200 authors) to Pier 48 on the waterfront for three days in late October to see everything from old-fashioned books to newfangled multimedia CD-ROMs. "It's just high time that Seattle had this sort of thing," says Harmon, who has been working with a volunteer board of trustees and advisers since last May. "It's time that there was this recognition of what a wonderful reading-and-writing city this is, and time that we recognized what wonderful book people we have right here."

------------ DALE FOREMAN ------------ Playing with power in Olympia

The double Harvard man - undergrad and law degrees - has an intellect and low-key nature that are rare in the state Capitol. Often, the low-key ones have minds to match. But Dale Foreman, 46, a Republican from Wenatchee, set himself apart from other lawmakers soon after his election as a state representative in November 1992. Now that his party will run things in the House, he is set to be a power player in the dome when he starts his second term this month - and GOP types say Foreman should look seriously at the '96 governor's race. (Their only worry? Foreman's a bit, well, not boring, but let's say serious.)

His title will be House majority leader. But he's also the GOP's best numbers man. Already, he leads party discussions about who should get tax breaks, . . . and it's likely no move will be made on taxes without his OK first.

------------ DOMICO CURRY ------------ Energetic activist on behalf of youth

His passion cannot be dismissed as youthful optimism. When Domico Curry walks into a legislative hearing, or a police meeting, or a classroom or street-corner crowd, the conviction in this 21-year-old is obvious. It's also taking him places.

A former gang member, Curry now serves on nine youth-related agencies in Seattle, stressing the need to get kids involved before they stray. Listen for his voice to be raised against the growing trend to punish delinquents; he argues that preventive measures are more appropriate and will have more impact.

And for those who are incarcerated, Curry will be lobbying legislators this year to create a place for young offenders who are in transition out of prison, so they won't quickly return.

-------- IDA COLE -------- Finding a life after software

Ida Cole, a former Microsoft vice president, took a comfortable early retirement five years ago. After realizing a short list of dreams (a trip to France, purchase of a Queen Anne home), she's director of the Seattle Landmark Association. She bought the landmark Paramount Theatre and, with some help from friends, is spending an estimated $35 million turning it into a first-rate theater complex.

The grand reopening of the Paramount in March is just one place you'll see her in the news in 1995. Among other things, Cole also now heads Transactive Technologies, which is developing SuperTerminal, an ATM-style kiosk at which people will be able to do banking, buy theater tickets and look up schedules for public events.

Speaking at a recent CityClub forum, Cole, 47, said: "I always thought I'd want to do something for the city when I died. Then I thought, `Why wait until I die?' "

---------------------------------- KEMPER FREEMAN JR. AND BRUCE LAING ---------------------------------- Regional transit: Fast track or sidetrack?

Watch this matchup as Puget Sound voters consider the largest bond issue in local history this spring: It's Bruce Laing, the mild-mannered King County councilman who often rides the bus to work, versus Kemper Freeman Jr., the Bellevue Square developer who favors cars.

The stakes: whether to build a $6.7 billion light-rail system for King, Pierce and Snohomish counties.

Oh sure, there will be more than just these two Eastside Republicans duking it out for the two sides. But the debate may best be summed up in the personalities of Laing and Freeman.

Laing will lead the good-government, civic and business types favoring the plan.

Freeman will help finance the opposition, arguing that the system costs too much - and does too little.

On March 14, voters will have their say.

------------------------------ JOHN ELLIS AND KEN GRIFFEY JR. ------------------------------ If the strike ends, they hold the hopes of the Mariners

Outfielder Ken Griffey Jr. is the Mariners' MVP on the field. Chief Executive Officer John Ellis is the MVP off the field. Both are at the top of their profession - and both set high standards for others.

Griffey, 25, could be spending his last season in Seattle, even though his contract runs through 1996. He wants to play for a contender, and the Mariners, with their sad history and conservative budget, just aren't cutting it. If the team doesn't win this season, Griffey might demand a trade.

That's particularly important because the club is trying to get a new stadium. The Mariners tout the appeal of Griffey as a major reason for the public and private sectors to get behind the project, which they consider essential to their survival.

Ellis has laid the groundwork for the stadium push, stating ownership's position in unambiguous terms: The club won't sign a new long-term lease beyond 1996 unless a new ballpark is built. He's willing to work with the the King County Stadium Alternatives Task Force. But things are bound to get stickier. Ellis wants a yes or a no this year on the stadium; if the community makes anything less than a firm commitment to build it, he says the owners will prepare to sell (and probably move) the team.

------------ JAMES KRIDER ------------ A prosecutor with a special agenda

In November, James Krider edged out 12-year incumbent Seth Dawson for the job of Snohomish County prosecutor. The win brings him into the public eye after 28 years of relative obscurity as a local attorney. More important, it sets up a confrontation between the county and the state.

The Snohomish County Property Rights Alliance, a group that helped get Krider elected, maintains that Snohomish County's home-rule charter conveys a legal right to disregard the mandates of the state Growth Management Act. Krider, 52, has vowed to uphold that charter - and he's expected to lead a fight against the state's land-use mandates.

--------------- JONATHAN SHAMES --------------- Taking up the baton

The young conductor now has in his hands one of the region's most important arts-educational institutions: the Seattle Youth Symphony Orchestra and its four training orchestras, as well as its summer Marrowstone Music Festival on the Olympic Peninsula. Also a noted solo concert pianist and a duo pianist (with his wife, Stephanie Leon), Jonathan Shames, 37, already has begun to make a mark on the musical life of Seattle. His podium debut with the Youth Symphony in November offers hope that he can successfully carry on the tradition established by the Youth Symphony's long-term maestro, Vilem Sokol.

--------------- HERMAN MCKINNEY --------------- Getting down to business - for the neighborhoods

As the Greater Seattle Chamber of Commerce's vice president of urban affairs, a new post, Herman McKinney, 56, will expand his efforts to create business and jobs in some of Seattle's most depressed neighborhoods.

The goal is to help create jobs for residents by providing education, training and technical and financial assistance to medium and small businesses.

"We want to provide wealth and opportunity and if it works, crime and other problems should be reduced," McKinney said. "We don't want to find ourselves in an urban crisis like in some other cities."

The Central Area and Rainier Valley have shared the focus so far. Now McKinney wants to broaden the scope to include communities such as those around South Park - and even downtown.

---------------- PATTY STONESIFER ---------------- Bringing Microsoft home

As head of Microsoft's giant Consumer Division, Patty Stonesifer will lead perhaps the single largest push in the software industry this year: her employer's biggest move ever into the home-computer market.

For Stonesifer, 38, that means heading a staff of 600 people that will release several dozen new software products and that's expected to form new alliances at the dizzying rate of at least one a day - alliances that bring content to Microsoft programs, like 1994's deals with Walt Disney and Scholastic (publisher of the Magic School Bus book series).

This year Executive Female magazine named Stonesifer, who came to Microsoft six years ago from a company that publishes software books, one of the country's 50 most powerful women managers.

------------ DEREK HORTON ------------ A one-man cultural explosion

Don't call Derek Horton a man with an identity crisis. Think of him as a Renaissance guy.

In 1994, this dynamic 33-year-old singer-songwriter-actor-director was all over the Seattle arts map. Musician Horton's acoustic punk/hip-hop/Western swing band Johnny Webeloe played everywhere. Actor Horton drew raves as a burned-out rocker who gains redemption in "The Salvation of Iggy Scrooge," a rollicking holiday musical at the Empty Space Theatre. And director Horton enlivened the fringe drama scene with an impish low-budget version of "Ubu" for the Velvet Elvis Arts Lounge in Pioneer Square.

What's next for Horton, a Texas native and Cornell grad who's lived here three years? Cutting the first Johnny Webeloe CD - and getting actor pals together to concoct a new theatrical-religious choir "with the complete works of William Shakespeare as our Bible." Amen, and hallelujah!

------------- JENNIFER DUNN ------------- Out of the shadows

Just as great baseball players sometimes spend their entire careers on teams that never make it to the World Series, standout politicians can languish in a minority party, their potential never realized.

Until November, it looked like that could be the fate of Jennifer Dunn, Washington state's lone Republican member of the U.S. House of Representatives. She was articulate and intelligent, and in her signature big-flowered dresses, she was recognizable in the House of gray suits. But her party had been in the minority so long it had a reputation in the House as being irrelevent.

Now Dunn, 53, is likely to be one of the biggest beneficiaries of the Republican landslide. Conservative to the core (she named a son after Ronald Reagan), she will help to lead the upcoming reforms in Congress. She is precisely the kind of person House Speaker Newt Gingrich wants leading his revolution, and she recently was rewarded with a position on the Ways and Means Committee, which sets tax policies and must originate any measure that raises revenue.

Dunn also has positioned herself to lead Washington state's delegation in the House, lobbying hard to get its new members assigned to committees that would help their districts and the state.

Her own district east of Lake Washington should be hers for as long as she wants to remain in the House, and statewide she's known from her 11 years as chairman of the party. Especially if her party holds its majority, Dunn seems poised to do whatever she wants with her political career.

------------ PAMELA EAKES ------------ Fed up with youth violence

Pamela Eakes, Tipper Gore's deputy chief of staff during the 1992 election campaign, seems to turn up every time the hot-button issue of youth violence surfaces.

A year ago, the Mercer Island mother and former ad executive founded Mothers Against Violence in America (MAVIA), a nonprofit, nonpartisan educational organization to reduce violence and promote the safety and well-being of children. Now a local brainstorm has turned into a national groundswell. MAVIA now has 35 state chapters, one will soon open in California and 15 other states are in the developmental stage.

As for Eakes - she's hard at work on Gov. Mike Lowry's Council for Youths, Families and Justice, which will suggest reforms of our juvenile-justice laws.

"I believe in the power and perspective of mothers and others to bring solutions to the problems of youth violence," Eakes says.

----------- PAT CASHMAN ----------- A bright face on the radio

Until late last summer, Pat Cashman labored in relative obscurity as the morning guy at low-rated news-talk station KING-AM (1090). When KING went all-news, KIRO-FM (100.7) hired him to jump-start the revamped talk station. On the FM band, where more people might find him, Cashman, 44, could catch fire. His quick wit and skill in audio editing make for a funny, fast-paced talk show.

The Oregon native also is a prominent writer and performer for the Saturday night comedy show "Almost Live!" on KING-TV (Channel 5). He is exploring other TV projects for 1995.

----------- WILL STELLE ----------- Playing advocate for the fish

The Clinton administration's point man on the Northwest salmon crisis, Will Stelle came to Seattle late last year from the White House, where he was associate director of the environmental-policy office. Now, he's in the key position of regional director of the National Marine Fisheries Service.

Stelle, 44, a UW law school grad and longtime congressional staffer, already has become a forceful advocate for changing Columbia River dam operations to provide more water for endangered fish. This year, his agency plans to decide what other salmon and steelhead stocks warrant protection under the Endangered Species Act. The first decision, for coho salmon, should be announced later this month.

------------------------------ BRUCE BROOKS AND ANNE LEVINSON ------------------------------ Norm Rice's one-two punch

Her record as an effective, behind-the-scenes facilitator is unsurpassed in local government. He comes loaded with private-sector contacts plus a knack for analyzing capital projects and financial issues.

A new world order debuts at Seattle's City Hall this month, when Anne Levinson and Bruce Brooks team up as Norm Rice's co-deputy mayors - the mayor's two new right hands, replacing Bob Watt, who resigned.

Because of her work in the public eye and on political campaigns, Levinson is the better known of the two youngish-looking 36-year-olds. Brooks, a Harvard grad (undergraduate and law school) who left a junior partnership at Perkins Coie, was an unexpected pick.

A key member of the Rice Cabinet from the outset, Levinson's experience in city government dates to the Royer administration. At Perkins - the firm representing Boeing and Puget Power, among other big-league corporate clients - Brooks specialized in labor and employment law. Exactly how the dynamic duo will divvy up duties remains to be seen - except that it's bound to be with high energy.

----------- GEORGE KARL ----------- Explosive - in more ways than one

Call it a make-it or break-it year for Sonic Coach George Karl, 43, both for his job security and for his personal sanity. Watching him operate the team and its egos is like waiting for Old Faithful to erupt. He lost control of the team last year as the Sonics did a nose dive in the playoffs after achieving the best regular-season record in the NBA. Owner Barry Ackerley has shown he will take strong measures to win a title, and his window of opportunity is closing.

-------------- TOM VANDER ARK -------------- Education, Inc.: Will it work?

One of the themes of the year, from the U.S. Capitol down to the smallest town hall, promises to be whether government can be run like a business. Tom Vander Ark already is hard at work to prove it can.

He's young, a former businessman. And until he became the head of the Federal Way School District, his kids went to private school. At Federal Way, he was greeted by a teachers' strike.

Vander Ark, 35, left his Denver corporate vice presidency last fall to take over the state's seventh-largest school district, becoming what may be the only superintendent in the state who didn't come up through the ranks. Skeptics wonder if unfamiliarity with teaching, unions, bureaucracies and everything else that make up public education will be liabilities. Supporters hope he'll deliver fresh ideas, new coalitions and better ways to spend money.

---------------- PHYLLIS CAMPBELL ---------------- A finger in just about every pie

Phyllis Campbell, 43, has lived in Seattle only five years, but she's wasted no time taking on community leadership roles in addition to her job as chief executive officer of U.S. Bank of Washington, one of the state's largest banks. If she's not known already, her name will become familiar this year in business, education and civic circles. Count on Campbell to find ways to create backing for programs that support young people.

A self-described workaholic, Campbell in April will become president of the Washington State University Board of Regents. Through October, as chairman of the state's biggest business lobby, the Association of Washington Business, she'll be a regular in Olympia seeking a more business-friendly regulatory climate. And in September, she's in line to become chairman of the Greater Seattle Chamber of Commerce. Spare time? "I'd like to get better at my golf game."

------------ DOUG WHEELER ------------ Inspiration in education - making it work

Doug Wheeler's belief in the power of values, discipline and love have made Zion Preparatory Academy a center of hope - and this year, with the school preparing to move to a big new campus in Columbia City, look for him to spread Zion's innovative ideas and good works further than ever before.

The school, which was started in 1982 with six students and just $13, now has 570 children in kindergarten through eighth-grade at its current campus just south of Jackson Street on 20th Avenue South. With the new campus, Zion - which has long waiting lists - will be able to accommodate nearly 200 more students and add a health-care facility to help with its program for drug-affected infants. Wheeler also wants the school to be a community center. There are also plans for evening parenting classes. In the long term, he envisions a high school and perhaps, even a college.

Wheeler has been principal from the beginning. His graduates are sought by elite private high schools, and his efforts have earned Zion the support of poor parents and wealthy businessmen - and teachers from other schools come to learn how Zion makes stars of children, including some who have been rejected elsewhere.

------------- CLYDE BALLARD ------------- He means business in Olympia

Clyde Ballard, a Wenatchee native, self-made businessman and conservative Republican will be the state's speaker of the House. He hopes to address several issues raised by the business lobby while struggling to keep in line the new Republican majority, most of whom have never served in Olympia - while simultaneously dealing with a liberal Democratic governor and a Democratic Senate.

Ballard, 58, says that for business, the two most pressing issues will be health-care reform and regulatory reform. "We'll roll back the employer mandate" on health care, he predicted, and he wants to reform a whole host of regulations that he says have made it difficult to do business in the state.

------------ LINDA CANNON ------------ Making a showcase for young artists

If you want to get an eyeful of the up-and-coming local artistic talent, you could do worse than a visit to the 3-month-old Linda Cannon Gallery on Second Avenue South in Pioneer Square.

Cannon, 30, plans to show work mainly by young Seattle artists whose works have been exhibited mostly in coffee houses and bars. A Seattle native with degrees in computer science and art history, she worked as an assistant to established Seattle gallery owner Linda Farris and then for Microsoft before opening her own gallery.

A great believer in Northwest talent, Cannon says she's finding more than enough creative young artists to fill her walls on a monthly basis. But with her interest in computers and the information superhighway, she also plans to start a Northwest arts network.

------------------ THE BROTHERS HUARD ------------------ High hopes as the Huskies return

The task of getting the University of Washington football team back to the top of the Pac-10 Conference falls largely on one home in Puyallup, where brothers Damon and Brock Huard could make Husky Stadium the House of Huard for the better part of the 1990s.

Damon, 21, who struggled this season as the Huskies went 7-4, returns for his senior season. It's also the first time he gets a chance to lead the Huskies to the Rose Bowl; the UW's two-year bowl ban expired after this season.

Before that, the Huskies must sign Brock, 19, the top-rated high school quarterback in the nation. He may decide as soon as this weekend between Washington and UCLA. If the Huskies get him, the rest of the decade looks much more promising for the team.

----------- JOHN HAYDEN ----------- Boeing's man in Washington, Olympia . . . and the world

John Hayden, The Boeing Co.'s vice president for government affairs, will be the man in charge of representing the aerospace giant's interests on major government issues at the state, national and international levels. Hayden assumes some of the duties formerly done by Boeing lobbyist Bud Coffey, who moves to another job at Boeing.

Hayden, 56, says his biggest challenge will be to develop a balanced approach for business and government on issues like health-care reform, labor, transportation, Export-Import Bank financing, taxes, defense, space and trade.

Hayden has been with Boeing since 1966. He was most recently based in Washington, D.C. He'll be traveling about half the time to Washington, Wichita, Philadelphia, Texas, Alabama and other areas where the company operates.

-------------- JEFFREY RHODES -------------- Visions of a revived downtown

Like it or not, the publicity-shy Jeffrey Rhodes, co-managing partner of the RGHK development partnership, will be in the spotlight in 1995 as he leads the $400 million redevelopment of downtown Seattle's retail core. Besides moving Nordstrom's downtown Seattle flagship store - and it's corporate headquarters - to the Frederick & Nelson building, the plan calls for adding retail, restaurants, parking, a multiscreen movie theater and possibly a midsized hotel, to the site of Frederick's former garage. It also would redevelop the current Nordstrom building, diagonally across Fifth and Pine from Frederick's, for new retail uses, and add a boutique hotel in the Seaboard Building.

Rhodes, 47, now a Seattleite, was chief financial officer for a major national developer, Chicago-based Urban Investment Development Co., and president of Los Angeles-based Miller-Klutznick-Davis-Gray, which managed the real-estate properties of 20th Century Fox.

---------------- MICHAEL CAMPBELL ---------------- Sorting out the sports future

The Mariners want a new stadium. The Seahawks want a snazzier Kingdome. The Sonics want help selling luxury boxes in their new arena. And if professional soccer is ever going to thrive in this soccer hotbed, the sport is going to need a new, if more modest stadium of its own.

Michael Campbell, 49, isn't the point man on any of those projects, but as president of the Sports and Events Council of Seattle/King County, he's the one person on whose desk all of them will converge in the coming year. Although the council, an arm of the Chamber of Commerce, has no official powers, Campbell will be instrumental in generating support for a new infrastructure in Seattle sports.

He's also at the forefront of reviving Seattle's reputation as an event city - one with little scheduled after the NCAA Final Four basketball tournament is held in April.

--------------------------------- JONATHAN PONEMAN AND BRUCE PAVITT --------------------------------- A large new stage for the Seattle sound

Sub Pop brought the Seattle grunge sound into the world in the mid-1980s, when the fledging local label signed such now-famous bands as Nirvana and Soundgarden. Rock visionaries Jonathan Poneman, 35, and Bruce Pavitt, 34, founded the label on a shoestring and a firm belief that the Northwest was a hotbed of rock talent.

The success of the Seattle sound made Sub Pop the most powerful independent label in the world. But 1995 may be its biggest year ever. In December it aligned itself with industry giant Warner Music Group, with Sub Pop selling a minority interest to Warner for an undisclosed amount. Warner's deep pockets will allow Sub Pop to cast an even wider net for up-and-coming rock bands. The partnership "will help us achieve our goal of building Sub Pop into a label that combines the vision of an indie with the clout of a major," Pavitt said. It also virtually guarantees that Seattle will remain a center of rock-business activity into the next century.

------------ JENNY DURKAN ------------ High-energy help for the Gov

Drug charges dropped against Husky linebacker. A $600,000 award in recovered-memory sex-abuse case. Acquittal for Everett police officer accused of child molesting.

Jenny Durkan, 36, apparently has never lost a case at trial. Will her legal skills - she also represented the woman who first accused then-U.S. Sen. Brock Adams of sexual assault - transfer to government, where she's Gov. Mike Lowry's new executive counsel?

Politics is in the blood. Durkan is the daughter of attorney, lobbyist, Lowry mentor and former legislator Martin Durkan. In a job specially created for her by Lowry, Durkan already has taken a more visible role than any of the governor's other top aides. Her tough-guy rep will be put to the test in shaking up the governor's staff to see who can go the distance as Lowry looks to a tough '96 re-election campaign.

--------------------- KEN AND DAVID BEHRING --------------------- Time to turn a franchise around

How do you mess up a franchise that's been perennially sold out, where the waiting list for tickets extended into the next decade, where home games were regularly on local television, where the team was more popular than any other professional team in the area, where profits were all but guaranteed?

The Behrings, father Ken, 66, and son David, 39, just wrote the book. Attendance has slipped so low that many of the Seahawk home games were blacked out locally.

But the owners of the Seattle Seahawks now have the chance to rebuild the club. The first move came Thursday, when they fired Tom Flores as coach and general manager, as well as his entire staff. Next comes the decision on his replacements in both jobs.

The team needs quick improvement. Papa Behring has always been a bottom-line man, and empty seats are costing him money. He also needs a good team to generate public support for the $120 million in Kingdome renovations he has requested. ----------------------------------

CREDITS

These Seattle Times staff reporters contributed to the People to Watch feature: Karen Alexander, Paul Andrews, Melinda Bargreen, Misha Berson, Richard Buck, Tom Farrey, Donn Fry, Jean Godden, Mary Ann Gwinn, Linda Keene, Polly Lane, Jerry Large, Peter Lewis, Patrick MacDonald, Michele Matassa Flores, Nancy Montgomery, R.T. Nelson, Sylvia Wieland Nogaki, David Postman, Eric Pryne, Elizabeth Rhodes, David Schaefer, Barbara A. Serrano, Chuck Taylor and Robin Updike.