Joel Connelly, considered by many to be the Dean of Seattle political journalism, died on April 15, the victim of a long battle with diabetes. He resided for many years in Madrona neighborhood and on Whidbey Island. Oddly, as a tough journalist, he was widely loved both by friends and sources, as well as by residents of Horizon House, and particularly his caretakers, where he courageously lived his last few years as his body wore out.
A working journalist right to the end, Joel’s last article of the 528 he wrote for Post Alley, was published on the last day of his life, just hours after he passed. He went out strong, relishing life and revered for his story-telling and amazing memory.
Connelly grew up in Bellingham, went to college at Notre Dame and the University of Washington. He worked for 47 years at the Seattle Post-Intelligencer, starting in 1973. As a reporter he interviewed four presidents and many prime ministers of Canada (a specialty), chronicled the preservation of wilderness (hiking much of it), and doggedly wrote about the failure of the Washington Public Power Supply System (WPPSS), a misbegotten effort to build nuclear power plants, for which he was a runner-up for a Pulitzer Prize.
His outspoken attorney and partner was the characterful Michelle Palethorp, and her children adored their stepfather. He was fiercely loyal to “Mickie,” the Catholic Church, Notre Dame football, classical music, his poodles, backcountry hiking with his friends, and (perhaps surprisingly) the Hearst Corporation, which owned the P-I. As a friend said, he was “a giant heart.”
I was a neighbor of Joel’s and his editor at Post Alley. He was a beloved mainstay of a Madrona institution, the years-long Tuesday breakfasts at the Hi-Spot Cafe. A highlight of each Christmas were the parties Joel threw at his jam-packed home, to which all kinds of politicians and journalists beat a path. As a friend observed, Joel was put on this earth to write and report, and a steady stream of contextual, sly articles flowed from him, right up to the last day.
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I will miss Joel’s articles very much. The best. the very best.
Joel’s last story for Post Alley yesterday was his third in four days, his 34th in 2026. He was not resting on his laurels, he was riding them hard. The hole he leaves is very much in the present, not just in his illustrious past.
I worked beside Joel for years. What a pain in the ass. He would grab a bone and chomp it to bits. A singularly focused drive to get to the story. His kind of reporter is so underappreciated by the cranky public complaining about headlines, delivery failures (oh my newspaper was so wet today). He took on the WPPSS story that many of you kiddies may never have heard of. (Washington Public Power Supply System). It was a bold and ill-conceived plan to build four nuclear power plants all at the same time. The legacy is those giant, inactive concrete cooling towers down on the Satsop River watershed. If people had read and paid heed early on, Whoooops a Daisy fraud might have cost us far less. The dead and gone Senator Henry “Scoop” Jackson was responsible for driving WPPSS to “amost” fruition. He might have seen farther down the road that fossil fuels were possibly the end of us. A former aide made a pile of money pushing WPPSS bonds. Result? Biggest bond failure in our state history. Joel had been pounding away on the story for years. There was bond default but it probably cost us less than if another few billion bucks had gone into the whoooops debacle. Joel, you were indeed a pain in the ass. We need more like you hot on the trail of truth.
Thank you for loving tribute to Joel, David. He will be so missed.
Way too soon. ConnelLey was my introduction to the NW. Thanks for giving him a voice via POST ALLEY.
In the two years I served as the Post Intelligencer’s City Editor, Joel was one of 39 reporters on our excellent news staff. Among that group about eight or nine were the standout stars. Joel’s quiet, dogged professionalism required virtually no supervision. His natural instincts for politics enabled him regularly to scoop other political writers in the region. His coverage was honest, probative, and framed in the appropriate context.
Indeed, Joel was the dean of political writers in the Pacific Northwest. That is true because sources often came to him with news tips knowing that if Joel pursued the story it would come with legitimacy and effect. But he was no patsy. Joel knew the wheat from the chaff. As editors we valued his sense of what constituted real news over fluff.
It’s important to note that Joel did not care so much to be liked, as he cared about being taken seriously as a journalist in the context of freedom of the press. It turned out, as David Brewster so accurately put it: Joel was recognized as “. . . a tough journalist, [and] he was widely loved both by friends and sources . . .” Such wide-spread regard only occurred because Joel Connelly earned it.
I too thank you, David, for this wonderful and deserved tribute. My condolences to Joel’s family, his many colleagues and friends.
Joel’s passing truly marks the end of an era in Pacific Northwest journalism. He was a walking encyclopedia. Few, if any, could or will match his knowledge and understanding of its issues and personalities. He informed and explained. And earned the respect of both his colleagues and generations of politicians. Thanks, Joel.
Exactly.
Oh my, what a loss for northwest journalism.
Joel was always the writer that I went to first, and I never missed his columns.
Joel was so readable, clear, always provocative, and humorous. One could sense that he just emerged from the smoke-filled room where real politics happened and was on a mission to explain it to the world.
David Brewster, thank you for a remarkable eulogy.
Joel, Mike Layton, Shelby Scates – what a newsroom to wake up to.
Yes, I still miss the PI
I vividly remember sitting in a Montlake Ale House booth across from Joel in early 2009, right after the print P-I went dark, and it had been announced that a small rump editorial staff, Joel included, would be staying on to write for the online SeattlePI.com.
I asked Joel how he was feeling about it all. His normally wryly detached, sometimes gruff exterior mask came down for a moment and he said to me, his voice cracking a bit with emotion, that it meant everything to him that he was getting the opportunity to continue reporting and writing and to have a platform for his work. I remember he said something really direct and intense: “Sandeep, I think my life would be over if I didn’t have a place to publish my writing.”
Joel Connelly was a journalist to the very essential core of his identity; he bled printer’s ink. I’m glad he got 17 more years after that night to practice his craft before ascending to the big newsroom in the sky.
Joel dined with me at my home Monday, the day before he was taken to hospital. He was my guest that evening because we both have long cared so much about Canada and were intent on seeing/hearing/reading the results (all good, as it turned out) of its parliamentary bi-election results from the “Frozen North,” as he would say.
Joel was totally himself. He was witty. And full of au courant jokes.
Before I knew Joel, I was a great admirer (and always in awe) of his renowned Time-Life-Sports Illustrated correspondent mother, Dolly Connelly, based in Bellingham. He honored her craft by practicing it throughout his career to our benefit with great professionalism and sometimes, discretion.
When Joel and I shared “information” (known in some circles as gossip) just days ago, he also wanted me to know about bequests in his will he had listed to be made. As I handed him off to his care team that evening, I should have realized he was preparing right then for his next journey, being, as he was, a person of faith.
Nice thoughts, Barb. The last time I saw Joel was in Virginia Mason ICU. We were due to lunch together at the Horizon House restaurant. I told him I needed another day to catch up on some tasks. That day began with me opening up my Seattle Times digital newspaper to see a tribute to the hours ago passed Joel from Gov. Fergy. I totally lost it.
I was to speak at Horizon House on the day he died. As I got off the elevator there was Joel’s photo facing me with the announcement. That was a very sad beginning to the evening.
These comments help understand why so many people admired and respected Joel.
As a long time reader of the PI, I have fond memories of Joel’s work and his impeccable and interesting storytelling. When I first heard that he was heading up the Post Alley, I signed up and have enjoyed his and other’s writings since that first day. He was unique as a writer, and compelling. We will all miss him tremendously. Rest in peace, Joel.
My favorite memory of Joel is from his 1980 WPPSS reporting. In explaining the cost overruns, he wrote that if each $1 of overrun were a Big Mac, they would stretch to the moon and back. Unforgettable. What a giant!
I didn’t get the chance to say goodbye to my friend Joel. This will have to suffice.
We fought (verbally) like cats and dogs. Our political arguments went on for days, sometimes in person, sometimes on Facebook, sometimes at meetings of our union, the Newspaper Guild, sometimes at political gatherings of one sort or another.
He called me a “leftist lemming,” marching in lockstep to doctrine. I called him a “pathological centrist,” living in the past and dwelling on “bothsidesism” and past anecdotes about hobnobbing with the rich and powerful.
But I loved him like a brother, and I told him so. We fed each other news tips. We consulted each other for information. We valued each others’ opinions, whether or not we agreed with them. We sharpened on each other the two basic questions all good journalists know to ask: “Oh, yeah?” and “Says who?”
Joel knew better than to rely just on sources who told him only what they wanted him to hear and believe. When I chaired the 34th District Democrats, Joel was a frequent attendee at our meetings, because he knew those questions would be asked, and that our membership of rank-and-file voters would demand answers.
Over at NPI, Andrew Villeneuve tells Joel’s story in more depth than I could, as one who worked with him right to the end. Their relationship has been one of friendship, and mutual respect and support. Joel was still hiking the journalistic trail, for NPI and Post Alley, right up till the day he died, and he leaves a big hole in the local discourse that will not be filled easily.
I’m REALLY sorry to hear about Joel’s passing, but glad to know that he lived so well. His work was an example of why postalley.org is a great publication.
I met Joel Connelly only once. It was at David Brewster’s birthday bash in October 2024. I realized that Joel was not very mobile, so I asked him if I could get his food for him. He said yes. I got a little of everything for him, also dessert later. I am glad he let me do that.
I could tell Connelly was a real journalist because he wrote many things I liked and some things I didn’t like, but they were all written well.
I worked briefly at the P-I when Joel was there, and I edited one or two of his stories. A class act and a must read. How sad to lose him so young. Our community is the lesser without Joel.
Long before it became fashionable to suggest that one’s opinions should require validation in “lived experience,” Joel Connelly had already set the gold standard. All of his favorite topics he had figuratively, and usually literally, walked across on his own two feet. This made his commentary on wilderness and the environment so particularly valuable, and far beyond that. Also, a wonderfully warm person. I’ll never forget one day probably 20 years ago, when I was a state official walking one morning down the hill on Boren Avenue, a car pulled over. “Jump in.” It was Joel, who hardly knew me, wanting to know where he could give me a lift.
“Sorely missed,” will not begin to measure our community’s loss, or our debt.
Joel Connelly was so many things, but first among his many best qualities I would name generosity. He was my senior in every way, and I deeply admired his knowledge and work. I so benefitted from his encouragement, which was frequent, important, and deeply influential. I will miss him hugely.
When we lost the P-I we lost a great deal. But we didn’t lose Joel, because he continued to give us his best work. I was proud to work alongside him for a few years and always respected and admired him. RIP Joel Connelly.