Regarding the City Council meeting on July 2, I was looking forward to listening and hopefully being able to speak about the cannabis topic that action was undoubtedly going to take place before the meeting was over.

But, alas, I wasn’t even able to stay longer than the salute to our nation’s flag. An important phone call pulled me away immediately. Later on, I did watch most of the debate on the issue on the YouTube channel for council meetings.

It was my opinion the council vote would result in the issue being placed on a ballot for the residents of Federal Way to cast their vote. I have written about this subject previously.

In all fairness, I think the comments were genuine by council members regarding their reasons for why they cast their vote the way they did, including council member Hoang Tran’s well-spoken opposition.

It should be the council’s position on matters of policy to place issues like this on a ballot for residents to vote for or against. I suspect there are others reading this that would disagree.

However, when it comes to taxes, there exist opportunities to allow raising our taxes that were included in specific legislation passed by our state Legislature. There are matters of taxation that many believe should also be placed on ballots to allow those same residents an opportunity to flex their muscles to raise their own taxes or not. The recent utility tax on Lakehaven water and sewer comes to mind.

One last word on the subject, come this November, do not forget to vote. We have plenty of choices to make, from electing council members to cannabis stores.

Roger Flygare

Federal Way