HorsesAss.Org

Yesterday I went down to Olympia to support legislation that would authorize State Auditor Brian Sonntag to conduct independent, comprehensive performance audits on state agencies. Today I am heading back to the Capitol to support legislation that provides similar oversight of tax exemptions.

The House Finance Committee is meeting at 1:30 today for a public hearing on HB 1069, HB 1094, and HB 1096. It’s time we demand the same kind of accountability from tax exemptions as we do from other government programs.

With the Legislature struggling over whether to raise some taxes in their efforts to close a $1.6 billion budget gap, one thing neither party seems to want to discuss are the billions of dollars of tax exemptions currently in place — an amount that actually exceeds the size of the budget itself. And of course, much of the lobbying that goes on in Olympia, is on behalf of millions of dollars in new exemptions.

If people like Tim Eyman really cared about giving taxpayers the most bang for their buck, he’d be down there with me, fighting to assure that our existing tax exemptions are actually producing the social and economic benefits that they promised. Otherwise, all this talk about performance audits on government expenditures, while allowing zero accountability on “tax expenditures”, comes off as just a load of partisan hooey.

I’ll post a full report tonight.

I’m trying to wean this blog from “all election contest all the time”, so that I can cover some issues that are actually important. But I couldn’t help notice a curious thing about the trickle of new information coming from Dino Rossi’s legal team: the more errors they uncover, the less it may help their case.

Much of the manufactured outrage has focused on Democratic stronghold, King County. The county has especially been taken to task for the 348 provisional ballots that apparently were improperly fed into scanning machines at the polling place. To hear some on the right-wing blogs tell it, this is a “smoking gun” that proves gross negligence, if not outright fraud.

Hmmm. But a number of similarly mishandled provisional ballots have now turned up in a few other counties, with more likely to come: there were 6 in Jefferson, 77 in Pierce, and 12 in Stevens. And when we calculate these numbers out as a percentage of total ballots cast in each county, we find that King’s performance was rather middling:

Stevens:	.058%
King:		.038%
Jefferson:	.033%
Pierce:		.024%

In fact, if Stevens performance was extrapolated out using Kings 900,000 ballots, it would have had over 520 improperly canvassed provisional ballots.

As I’ve said before, the only thing extraordinary about this election was its closeness. But now I’ll add a corollary: the only think extraordinary about King County is its size.

Errors occurred throughout the state, as they do in every election. It wasn’t due to fraud or negligence… just honest mistakes. Indeed, considering how much effort has been put into uncovering illegal votes — and how little the Rossi/BIAW/GOP folks have to show for it — this is turning out to have been a remarkably clean and well run election.

Can we do better at running our elections? Absolutely. Can we achieve perfection? Not in this world.

If this election were to be set aside based on the evidence made public thus far, then every close election will find itself in court. And that’s a precedent the court simply doesn’t want to set.

“My name is David Goldstein. I’m a citizen activist and a blogger, and if I’m going to sit at my computer criticizing the legislative process, I feel I have the obligation to come down to Olympia and engage in it.”

That’s how I opened my testimony today before the House State Government Operations & Accountability hearing on HB 1064, “Improving government performance and accountability” (Performance Audits). In case you’re wondering, I testified in favor of the bill.

I also attended the Senate Government Operations & Elections hearing, and curiously, Tim Eyman was nowhere to be seen at either… despite being so passionate about the issue, that he’s willing to spend $600,000 of other people’s money to get it on the ballot as an initiative. Instead, he just sat at home and sent out another fundraising email attacking the bill as a “cheap substitute.”

For my fellow lovers of fiction who also subscribe to Tim’s email list, let’s set the record straight on some of his comments:

I-900 allows true independence. All other proposals require the state auditor to beg and plead each year for funding FROM THE VERY PEOPLE HE IS GOING TO AUDIT.

Um… it’s not the Legislature that will be audited… it’s Executive branch departments and agencies.

And while it is true that HB 1064 does not have a dedicated funding source, other proposals do, such as SB 5083. If Tim bothered to attend the hearing, he could have suggested adding such a provision, although he might have chafed at SB 5083’s $2.5 million a year appropriation — a quarter that of Tim’s initiative. But then, what do you expect from the bill’s ultra-liberal sponsor: the Evergreen Freedom Foundation?

I-900 requires public exposure of the audit reports and ensures public involvement. … The audit proposals in Olympia keep the audit reports secret, hidden from the public, and released only to legislative leaders.

Yeah, that’s true… as long as your idea of a “secret report” is HB 1064’s requirement to post it to the Internet. Also secret I suppose, is the bill’s Citizen Oversight Board, that collaborates with the State Auditor on all audits.

I-900 holds all levels of government accountable. Under current law, the state auditor can conduct FINANCIAL AUDITS of state and local governments in Washington. … I-900 simply expands this existing authority so that the auditor can also do PERFORMANCE AUDITS of state and local governments.

First of all, Tim… STOP SHOUTING.

Second, State Auditor Brian Sonntag, to whom Tim wants to grant the independence to perform these audits, clearly stated his opinion about the initiative before both committees: “It is not the approach I prefer. I prefer a legislative and collaborative process.” Indeed, the idea of mandatory performance audits of all local agencies and accounts is so silly, that I actually provoked chuckles by mentioning the notion of auditing cemetery districts.

I should also note that while I-900 appropriates $10 million a year, the Auditor’s office estimates that it would actually cost $90 million per biennium, and take twelve years to ramp up his office to meet the initiative’s requirements.

And finally…

Democrats are falling all over themselves to get in front of I-900’s speeding train.

Eat me.

Performance audits represent a bipartisan issue that, in one form or another, has passed the House several years running, only to be blocked in the Senate by Republican Pam Roach (who by the way, showed up for the hearing an hour and fifteen minutes late.)

So Tim, don’t give me any shit about Democrats following your lead. Rep. Miloscia has been pushing performance audits for six years, and with 46 co-sponsors, HB 1064 is sure to sail through the House once the language is finalized. Sen. Kastama plans to fast-track a companion bill through his committee, and there is no doubt that the final version will come to the Senate floor for a vote.

There is certainly some institutional resistance from the governor’s office, state agencies, and even the Joint Legislative Legislative Audit and Review Committee. So it may yet take a little arm-twisting to ease a bill through the Senate.

If Eyman really cares about performance audits, instead of just grandstanding the issue for personal gain, he’ll join me in twisting a few Senators’ arms once the time comes. But that seems unlikely, considering that nobody pays him to lobby the Legislature. (At least, not that he’s reported to the PDC.)

HB 1064 enacts comprehensive, independent performance audits, and has broad bipartisan support. If Tim Eyman has an ounce of integrity in his body, he’ll join me in helping State Auditor Brian Sonntag get the bill he wants.

If I’m gonna talk the talk, I better walk the walk, so I’m heading off to Olympia this morning to attend a couple hearings on performance audits. But if I see Senator Don Benton (R-Vancouver) coming my way, I’m keeping my hand on my wallet.

According to Peter Callaghan in the News Tribune, Sen. Benton is developing an online newsletter called todayinpolitics.com, which he hopes to hawk to Capitol lobbyists and other courtiers. The newsletter, which costs $565.00 a year, will compile links to newspaper articles written about government and politics. (Hey… great idea! It’s called Google.)

The Legislature pays crap, so seeking a little side income, Sen. Benton sent out an email recently soliciting subscriptions.

But among those receiving the come-on were lobbyists who represent clients in front of the Legislature, including committees that Benton serves on. Legislative ethics generally restrict lawmakers from soliciting business from lobbyists. That’s because you can never be sure if they buy because they want to or because they feel like they have to.

“What will it cost you NOT to subscribe?” Benton wrote. “That could be a princely sum indeed!”

Yikes. That’s an unfortunate choice of words.

The newsletter is scheduled to start February 1… just in time to include links to news stories concerning his inevitable ethics board hearing.

In my previous blog entry I talked about the financial troubles of two rural, Douglas County towns, Bridgeport and Mansfield. But according to the AP’s David Ammons, prospects for the majority of Washington’s cities and towns are also bleak. [State’s cities awash in financial problems]

The news comes in the annual State of the Cities Report to the Legislature. The percentage of the population being served by cities is up, while per capita revenues are down across the board. And with health care costs for city employees rising 15 percent a year, more service cuts are inevitable.

The cities and towns aren’t keeping up with the population boom, particularly since state voters capped property-tax growth and abolished the car-tab tax, said Mary Place, Yakima councilwoman and president of the Association of Washington Cities.

“The fact is, most cities across Washington state have been caught in the perfect financial storm,” she said. “At the same time Washington’s population has been growing and moving to our cities, we were hit by a severe recession, skyrocketing costs, more unfunded mandates and tremendous cuts in state funding from initiatives.”

The survey said that cities face a $3.4 billion gap in meeting basic transportation needs over the next six years. Deferred maintenance has left streets and bridges in disrepair, and traffic is getting so bad it may choke off economic growth.

Welcome to libertarian utopia.

A quick pointer to the excellent AP story running in today’s Seattle Times, that tells the tale of two rural, Douglas County towns struggling to survive in the wake of Tim Eyman’s ill-conceived initiatives. [Rural towns feeling the pinch]

In Mansfield, population 325, the town’s two full-time employees (superintendent and clerk-treasurer) have taken on custodial duties, vacuuming and cleaning bathrooms to save money. Council members have discontinued their $30-a-month salaries, and the mayor now only earns $50. Because they can’t afford the overtime, snow is only plowed during weekday offices hours… by the superintendent himself.

18 miles away in Bridgeport, population 2,100, they’ve closed their 2-year-old public pool because the city can’t afford the $30,000 in annual operating costs. The city also abolished its municipal court, cut its contract with the county sheriff from $98,000 to $73,000, and retired a firetruck to stay within the department’s $11,000 annual budget.

And these cuts have all occurred while both towns were still draining their financial reserves. While the article doesn’t specify, it seems likely they have also exhausted their “banked levy capacity” to help cushion the crisis.

Come 2006, the real hardship sets in.

While there was certainly some legitimate anger over the state’s high MVET tax, much of the revenue was dedicated to sales tax equalization payments to rural towns like Bridgeport and Mansfield; by reducing car tabs to a flat $30, I-695 eliminated this state aid.

Unlike big urban and suburban cities, rural communities don’t have the base to collect a significant amount of sales tax.

“There are no new businesses. No new revenues. No new industries,” Snell said of Mansfield. “The wheat industry is all that we have.”

Bridgeport doesn’t have an industry. There are no major retailers. Mom-and-pop operations

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The next big thing in Washington politics is an old thing: “property rights.”

As reported yesterday in The News Tribune, Oregon’s new anti-growth-management law, that requires financially compensating property owners for potential losses due to zoning or land-use restrictions, has spurred interest in Washington from the usual suspects. [State might copy Oregon property rights plan]

On Friday, some of the state’s most powerful interest groups met in Olympia to discuss acting on that inspiration by running an initiative similar to Oregon’s Measure 37, either this fall or in 2006.

“The conclusion was the time was ripe for such an initiative,” said Gary Tripp of a group called Bainbridge Citizens United. “We are going to draft an initiative ASAP.”

Tripp organized the meeting, which was attended by several building groups and initiative veterans, including the Building Industry Association of Washington, the Washington State Grange and Tim Eyman.

That’s right, the BIAW and Tim Eyman.

And the Grange…? Well, I’m still not sure what to make of them, but they’re beginning to piss me off.

Not that any of this should come as a surprise. Environmentalists have been expecting a copy cat initiative, and those of us on the Eyman-watch have been wondering when Tim would abandon his dead-in-the-water performance audits initiative to pirate this potentially more lucrative issue.

But being alert and being prepared are not the same thing. Those of us who believe that rational growth management policy is absolutely necessary to maintain our region’s quality of life, must start organizing, working the media, and raising money… now. For all of Eyman’s bluster and self-aggrandizing, all it really takes to get an initiative on the ballot is half-a-million dollars worth of paid signatures. There’s a ton of money to be made by builders and others from unconstrained development, and you can be sure that they are ready to invest millions at even the hint of electoral success.

As I’ve often complained, the initiative process tends to suck all the nuance out of public policy debates, throwing extreme proposals at complex issues. But as James Vesely points out in today’s Seattle Times, this is an issue worthy of further discussion:

The required 10-year review of the growth-management practices kicked a moribund engine into life. That engine is the desire of small property owners to develop their land, if they wish. The big question is: How can we accommodate them to avert a property-rights rebellion without changing a region’s core beliefs?

Good question. And perhaps in the comment thread of this blog entry we can thrash out some answers.

Unfortunately, an initiative won’t afford voters such luxury; they’ll simply be allowed a thumbs up or down on a radical piece of anti-growth-management legislation. In 1995 voters rejected a similar Referendum No. 48 by a healthy margin, 59% to 41%. But that was the result of an intense, well-organized campaign… an effort we need to duplicate, and quickly.

Just thought I’d give you all a heads up.

My regular readers know I don’t much care for the Bastards Building Industry of Association of Washington (BIAW). My first introduction to the BIAW was their Orwellian initiative to ban state ergonomic rules (“Workers Against Job-Killing Rules” my ass,) which earned them a top spot on my list of political windmills. But now that they have so openly become the power-behind-the-power-behind-the-puppet — subsuming the official Republican Party in their efforts to unseat Governor Gregoire by any means — it looks like my quest may not be so quixotic after all.

Ah yes… The Seattle Times reports today, that Democratic legislators are preparing to tie off a couple of the udders on the government sponsored cash cow the BIAW milks to feed its viciously partisan political operations. [Bill to cut income of political foe]

Here’s how it works:

State law allows businesses to form workers’-compensation pools to share insurance risks. The BIAW, which operates the state’s largest such pool, gets refunds from the state every year its premiums exceed claims.

The BIAW keeps 20 percent of the refunds and gives the rest to members who participate in its workers’-comp pool. The association’s take in 2004 was more than $5 million, half of which went to its 15 local chapters.

Under the legislation introduced this week, House Bill 1070, groups like the BIAW could keep no more than 10 percent of their refunds. In other words, the BIAW’s income would be cut in half.

The BIAW’s is the largest, but there are nearly 60 such workers’-comp pools in the state, covering 16,000 employers. While the BIAW skims the maximum 20% currently allowed by law, many other pools charge less.

There is no doubt that the “retro rebate” program has been a modest success, and the BIAW and others deserve credit for efficiently managing their pools. But the program was intended to reduce claims and save employers money, not as a means of exploiting inefficiencies in the workers’-comp system so as to permanently fund partisan political activities.

The beauty of the Democratic proposal is that it is “win-win”: it is both good policy, and good politics. It sends more of the refund money back to businesses (where it belongs,) who will reinvest it in creating jobs for real people… not just right-wing Republican politicians.

Rep. Cary Condotta of Wenatchee complains that the bill is a “blatant political attack.” Well, duh-uh! But so is the $750,000 of workers’-comp money the BIAW spent on Dino Rossi prior to Nov. 2, and the untold hundreds of thousands they have spent since, running deceptive TV and radio ads, and dedicating their entire staff of 30 employees to sifting through voting records and felons lists.

The BIAW has not been shy about threatening to pass a “right to work” initiative, effectively defunding organized labor, one of the Democratic Party’s most steadfast allies. I suppose the Dems should just sit back and whine “Gee… that’s not fair,” as they watch a government sponsored monopoly be used to fund a relentless effort to turn Washington into a one-party state along the lines of Texas?

“They’re just mad because we compete with them in the political arena,” BIAW spokesman Erin Shannon said.

Yeah… well, that’s not exactly how she phrased it to The Seattle Weekly in the heady days immediately following the Nov. 2 election, when she gloated:

“We are kicking their ass. How many years have we whipped labor?”

At the time, Erin also described the past election as “a big ‘Fuck you!’ to all the liberals out there.” Sounds like somebody may have finally washed her potty-mouth out with soap.

Democratic Senator Karen Keiser of Kent, who works in the off-season as communications director for the Washington State Labor Council, says the BIAW’s abuse of the workers’ comp-system to fuel their political agenda is “flat out corrupt and should be stopped.” She told the Times that she has no doubt the Democrat-controlled Legislature will pass a bill, and that Gregoire would sign it.

I sure hope so. This is political hardball… and if the BIAW insists on crowding the plate, they deserve to get beaned.

I’m slipping. The Seattle P-I wrote an editorial critical of an Eyman initiative, and I never mentioned it: “Initiative wrong remedy.”

The Legislature will pass performance audits legislation in the current session, and it has nothing to do with bullying by our friend Timmy. State Auditor Brian Sonntag has been pushing for such legislation for years, and leaders of both parties have committed to passing it.

Sonntag’s office says it’s there, and not in the proposed initiative, that the better prospects lie.

To do what the initiative proposes, Sonntag says, would require his department to “grow to at least four times its current size over the course of the next 10 to 12 years” and it would cost $90 million more every two years. And it would be “ill-advised,” Sonntag’s office says, for the state to conduct performance audits at the local level.

Those tempted to sign the audits initiative would do well to heed the auditor’s advice.

And Eyman would do well to find himself another initiative.

In analyzing Governor Christine Gregoire’s disappointing electoral showing in Pierce County, one overlooked factor may have been her stunning rejection by convicted felons known to have illegally cast ballots.

As first reported in The News Tribune on Jan. 8 (“A few felons voted in Pierce County“), investigative reporters could verify only seven of the 42 felons alleged by the BIAW to have voted illegally. And of the three who spoke with TNT reporters, two voted for Republican Dino Rossi, and one for Libertarian Ruth Bennett:

“I didn’t know that I couldn’t vote,” said Glen, 43. “I didn’t know any different. Is it the Republicans that are throwing a fit about it? Because I voted Republican

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On Wednesday, David Postman of The Seattle Times reported on the considerable resources the Building Industry Association of Washington (BIAW) has invested into putting Dino Rossi in the governor’s mansion [Governor’s race over, but the fighting isn’t.]

The BIAW’s Tom McCabe brags that he spent $750,000 on Rossi before the election, and God knows how much in the couple months since. A “Governor Rossi” would surely be grateful:

“There are a number of organizations that have been helpful, but as far as the money and staff resources spent, I don’t think there is one that has been more active than BIAW,” said Afton Swift, Rossi’s campaign manager.

Now that’s an understatement.

Rossi was the BIAW candidate at least as much as he was the GOP’s, and in the unlikely event he manages to get this election set aside, he’ll know who to thank. The BIAW has hired lawyers and handwriting experts, and has its entire staff of 30 employees sifting through election records and running the “re-vote” PR campaign. Their operations dwarf that of either of the official parties, and their partisan zeal is unmatched. And oh yeah… they are total bastards.

Ironically, the strongest testimony to the integrity of Washington’s elections is the relative dearth of dirt the BIAW has uncovered for all its expense of blood and treasure. Scouring the voter rolls for dead people and felons, the BIAW has generated more smoke than fire. In Pierce County, The Seattle Times managed to quickly rule out all but 19 of the 52 voting felons the BIAW originally claimed — and confirmed only two. And of the handful of votes from beyond the grave discovered statewide, two are known to have voted for Rossi.

And then there were the public hints the BIAW kept dropping that they had evidence of forged signatures on a number of the affidavits Democrats gathered during the first count… only later to describe it as potential signature fraud… and eventually just questions about signatures… before finally, well… I haven’t heard much about this “scandal” lately, have you?

All this might be evidence enough for the BIAW’s fans on the right-wing blogs, so tickled by happy dreams of putting Democrats behind bars that they’ve lost the ability to distinguish fact from fantasy. But Supreme Court decisions tend to be more reality based, and the reality is, these builders haven’t built much of a case.

The BIAW’s best chance of installing their hand-picked governor, was to bully a Democratic senator or two into breaking ranks during the procedural vote on certification. But having failed that, I still don’t expect them to give up their jihad any time soon. They hate government, despise Gregoire, and genuinely seem to relish playing the role of Republican-Party-by-proxy. (And did I mention the fact that they are total bastards?)

This take-no-prisoners approach has its risks… at least for Rossi. If the legal evidence doesn’t match the hype, voters will eventually grow weary of this election, turning some of their anger back onto the accusers, and potentially shredding the political career of the BIAW’s gubernatorial sock-puppet.

No biggie. Come 2008, they’ll just shove their fists inside another sock.

There’s been a lot of speculation that if when Dino Rossi’s election contest lawsuit fails, he will become an immediate threat to Senator Maria Cantwell’s 2006 re-election bid. But I’ve never been so sure.

As I wrote a couple weeks ago, other prominent Republicans may have designs on the nomination, including the politically-challenged George Nethercutt and the factually-challenged Chris Vance. I also suggested that Rossi might think twice before moving his young family to the other Washington.

But writing for the Rothenberg Political Report, (“Don’t Call Rossi ‘Senator’ Just Yet“), Political Editor Nathan Gonzales questions whether Rossi would even be his party’s best candidate:

It’s important to remember that Rossi’s candidacy for governor was fueled by one essential ingredient: Change. Democrats have held the top post in the Evergreen State for 20 years and voters looked anxious to mix things up.
….
But against Cantwell, Rossi’s change message is rendered meaningless and could even work against him. His party controls the White House, the U.S. Senate, and the U.S. House. Any change message that might develop in the next two years will surely benefit Democrats nationwide, not Republicans. And Washington remains a blue state, going 53%-46% for John Kerry over George W. Bush last November.

Rossi’s momentum is not necessarily transferable to a Senate race.

And that’s even assuming Rossi still has momentum coming out of an election contest where the legal evidence fails to live up to the hyperbole of his BIAW-backed PR campaign.

Gonzales concludes that Rossi’s best shot at high office may be to hold tight and run for governor again in 2008. Unfortunately for Rossi, a lot can happen in four years… for example, a successful Gregoire administration.

I was going to add a more narrative description of the Inaugural Ball, but there’s no need to duplicate David’s detailed comments in the previous thread. It was a lovely evening, and a good time seemed to be had by all.

The only thing I’ll add is how impressed I was with the renovation of the Capitol building. Perhaps our representatives’ level of political discourse will be elevated by their surroundings.

But the greatest impression I came away with last night is that Christine Gregoire is indeed, our governor. Not governor “elect”. Not a temporary governor, or an illegitimate governor, or weak or lame-duck or any of the more pejorative adjectives spat about on the right-wing blogs… but governor.

As one longtime political correspondent observed, Republican legislators can stand up in public and dutifully repeat the party’s talking points about a “stolen election”… but pretty soon they’ll be knocking on Gregoire’s door, asking the Governor to sign their bills.

And there ain’t nothing illegitimate about that.

I just got back from the Inaugural Ball and I really want to go to bed, but I know my audience expects a little inside dish, so here’s a taste of the type of probing insight and analysis you only get from HorsesAss.org:

Rep. Hans Dunshee showed up wearing a kilt, and of course only this intrepid reporter had the nerve to ask him the question inquiring minds want to know. The answer: boxer shorts. (So if you want to accuse a Democrat of cheating, that’s the best example I’ve found thus far.)

Other than that, the only scandal to report was the lack of a quality microbrew at an otherwise well catered affair.

In general, the spirit was boisterous and upbeat. Christine Gregoire certainly looked like the governor when she was trapped in the rotunda by a throng of well wishers for well over an hour. And while righties here kept snidely saying the event was undersold, it certainly seemed packed to me. I couldn’t imagine squeezing in a couple hundred more people.

Believe it or not, there was quite a bit of political talk going on, most of which I’ll cautiously keep to myself for the moment. But I can tell you, I didn’t find a single Dem who appeared genuinely concerned about Rossi’s lawsuit.

More in the morning….

Well, my fairy godmother just called and offered me a free ticket and a free ride to the inaugural ball, so not being one to turn down a free meal, I’ll be heading off to Olympia this evening.

If anybody wants to meet up, I’ll be the guy in the tux.

Okay… here’s what I look like, according to The Seattle P-I. (I’m the one on the right.)