The Washington State Republican Party has decided not to hold a regular convention in 2014, opting instead to employ a less expensive party meeting format.

By KELSEY WILSON
Freedom Foundation Intern

Washington State Republican Party leaders, citing cost and redundancy, have decided to cancel their state convention for 2014 and instead hold a statewide conference.

“It’s extremely expensive, there is no national race and no presidential election,” said Party Chair Kirby Wilbur. “It would be much better spending our time with campaign management and be available to anyone not just those elected to the caucus.

Kirby Wilbur

“A process that’s open to everyone who’s registered is a great idea,” he said. “The convention is not open to anyone. Everyone is going to be there. If it doesn’t work, we’ll change back in the year 2018.”

Wilbur said he doesn’t know how the grassroots will feel about this choice but, during a meeting of party officials in Whatcom County, a vote of 55-38 was on board with the idea.

“Most counties are relieved,” he said.

The platform is usually debated every two years. However, for 2014, Wilbur said the GOP will stick with the 2012 document.

“It’s actually not a bad platform,” he said, noting there’s no reason the party needs to change its priorities every year. “Once every four years, we don’t think this is an issue.”

Citing the convoluted process by which voters are currently attempting to recall the Pierce County auditor-treasurer and the city of Pacific’s mayor, the Senate Law and Justice Committee on Thursday held hearings aimed at establishing a coherent set of rules for removing a public official from office.

Because of a lack of clarity in the recall law, such efforts are frequently challenged to the level of the State Supreme Court before they ever go to the voters,  noted Law and Justice Committee Chair Sen Pam Roach (R-Auburn).

“The citizens should not have to finance a trip to the Supreme Court to effect a recall,” she said.

The key, Roach said, is to determine which misfeasance, malfeasance or other actions on the part of an elected official could meet legal criteria for a recall campaign.

Recall efforts, like the drive to remove Pacific Mayor Cy Sun from office, are rare in Washington state, but when they do happen, there needs to be a logical process followed, according to Auburn Sen. Pam Roach.

“Clearly, the triggers for a recall are not adequately defined,” said Roach. “The law should be more specific and easily understood when it comes to recalls. Elected officials need to be held accountable, and sometimes waiting for the next election is not soon enough.”

Moral turpitude, an example of which would be drunk driving, will also be discussed as a potential condition for recall.

Roach said she has had an interest in recall campaigns ever since the recall of former Senate Majority Leader Jim West from his subsequent position as mayor of Spokane.

The recall discussion, including a question-and-answer session, was prompted by difficulties citizens have had in putting together recall campaigns in King and Pierce counties. Roach noted the recall efforts against Pierce County Assessor Dale Washam and Pacific Mayor Cy Sun.

A Washington senator has proposed a plan by which the state could become a right-to-work state — as Michigan did last fall — in order to keep Boeing from locating production for the next generation of its 777 jetliner elsewhere.

For The Olympia Report

Sen. Michael Baumgartner (R-Spokane) on Wednesday announced a strategy that would help Washington retain and grow thousands of Boeing aerospace jobs by introducing legislation to make Washington a right-to-work state if worker’s compensation insurance rates continue to increase.

Baumgartner, who serves on the Senate Trade and Economic Development Committee, said the effort to ensure Boeing’s next generation 777 airliner is built in Washington requires actual steps to make the state’s aerospace industry more competitive, not platitudes and press conferences.

Michael Baumgartner

“It’s very clear that Boeing is choosing to expand into states that have more competitive labor environments, and that right-to-work states like South Carolina have a significant potential advantage,” said Baumgartner, who noted that over the last decade right-to-work states have seen 9 percent higher growth in manufacturing than other states, according to the U.S. Department of Commerce’s Bureau of Economic Analysis.

“Washington is a hub of aerospace,” he said, “and it’s clear that too many of our elected leaders aren’t taking real steps to keep it that way.”

Baumgartner’s proposed right-to-work bill would secure the right of employees to decide for themselves whether or not to join a union and make the paying of union dues optional.

“Every individual should have both the right to join a union and the right not to join a union should they so choose,” Baumgartner added. “It’s about basic human freedom.”

Under Baumgartner’s proposed legislation, Washington would become a right-to-work state if the state Department of Labor and Industries’ workers’ compensation insurance rates continue to increase.

“Boeing is a big enough company to self-insure for worker’s compensation, but many of its suppliers in our state are being crushed under the weight of ever-increasing L&I rates,” noted Baumgartner, who also supports comprehensive reform of the state’s workers’ compensation system. “If we’re going to attract and grow quality aerospace jobs in this state, we need to give them some relief.

“Michigan recently became the 24th right-to-work state,” Baumgartner continued, “and making Washington the 25th will help retain and create great aerospace-industry jobs and provide millions in new funding for other priorities like K-12 education through economic growth.”

Washington State Lt. Gov. Brad Owen said on Thursday one possible solution for the difference of opinion over the budget that’s made necessary a 30-special session would be for Democrats to stop extending the courtesy of a proxy vote to ailing GOP Sen. Mike Carrell.

“At some point … you might have to say enough is enough,” Owen said during an interview on TVW.

Democrats currently outnumber Republicans in the Senate 26 votes to 23, but during the 2013 session a pair of fiscally conservative Democrats have joined with the GOP to form a so-called Majority Caucus, which outnumbers Democrats 25-24.

Carrell, however, has been absent for much of the session as he deals with a blood disorder this spring while waiting for a bone marrow transplant. As a courtesy to the longtime Republican lawmaker, Hoquiam Democrat Jim Hargrove has cast a proxy vote for Carrell.

As a courtesy to longtime GOP Sen. Mike Carrell, above, who is suffering from a blood disorder, his proxy vote has been cast during this session by Democrat Jim Hargrove. But Democratic Secretary of State Brad Owen believes it may be time to rescind that privilege — enabling him to beak tie votes in a Senate left with a 24-24 party split.

However, if negotiations get sticky during the 30-special session scheduled to begin on Monday, Owen — a Democrat — believes the courtesy should be dropped.

In such a case, if Carrell is too ill to travel to Olympia and vote, the Senate would be deadlocked 24-24.

And Owen, who presides over the Senate, would have the right to cast the deciding vote.

“I do believe Sen. Hargrove needs to say, ‘Look, if you folks aren’t willing to compromise, I’m not willing to do this anymore,’ ” Owen said. “That’s what I would counsel.

“Sen. Hargrove is a very honorable person,” Owen said, “and what he’s doing is commendable … but it could happen that someone crosses over and makes it 24-24. In which case I certainly would step in and vote.”

Hargrove has given no indication he would agree to make Carrell’s illness a negotiating point, and Owen made clear he was speaking only for himself. But following a Supreme Court ruling earlier this spring on Initiative 1053, the Legislature is no longer required to pass tax increases by a two-thirds majority.
And with the Democrat-dominated House of Representatives convinced the state needs new revenue while the Majority Caucus remains dead set against any tax increase, Owen argues it may take hardball politics to break the logjam.

“I think that would have happened a lot more this session if the (Majority Coalition) wasn’t holding its members so tight,” Owen said.

Critics of the move to appoint GOP Sen. Don Benton to head Clark County’s Environmental Services Department were allowed by the Democratic chair of the county commissioners to be raucous and occasionally profane during more than two hours of public testimony on Monday night. Photo Courtesy of The Oregonian

The Republican majority on the Clark County Board of Commissioners was subjected to several hours of vitriol stretching into the early hours of Tuesday morning from liberals incensed by the appointment of longtime 17th District State Sen. Don Benton to head the county’s Environmental Services Department.

Commissioners Dave Madore and Tom Mielke agreed last week to offer the position to Benton, citing his 18 years in the Washington Legislature and work on countless environmental bills during that span.

The move infuriated Democratic Commissioner Steve Stuart, who complained the hiring was made without going through the usual process of advertising the position and interviewing multiple candidates. While the action does violate the county’s normal procedures, it doesn’t appear to break any laws.

That didn’t stop a two-hour parade of critics at Monday night’s council meeting from asserting otherwise, however.

“I don’t know if Don Benton is qualified — although it appears he is not,” Vancouver resident Bob Carrell told Madore and Mielke. “But the process should have been followed. You disrespected the process, you disrespected the county and you disrespected (Stuart).”

Former Clark County Human Resources Director Steve Foster agreed, noting that, “After 30 years of promoting open competition rather than cronyism to fill county jobs, I have to say that seeing this many people here to complain when that process wasn’t followed is very career-affirming.”

In all, an estimated 200 people — many of whom were allegedly recruited from Oregon — jammed into the commissioners’ chambers for a meeting that began at 6 p.m. Monday and ended around 12:30 on Tuesday morning. Public comments — normally the first item of business on the meeting agenda — were postponed until after a four-hour hearing on a plan to waive transit impact and development fees for potential Clark County employers.

Madore and Mielke, who voted for the change, said there was no reason to keep county staff members needed for the fee discussion until the end of what promised to be a long night of bitter testimony. But the perceived slight only fueled the anger of Benton’s critics — several of whom offered profanity-laced rants.

“It’s embarrassing to be a a resident of Clark County right now,” huffed Sunrise O”Mahoney.

“Don Benton isn’t qualified for this position,” agreed Peter Hodges. “This whole thing smacks of political favoritism.”

Helpfully, the meeting was chaired by Stuart, the board’s only Democrat, who urged those testifying to keep their remarks civil and asked the audience to refrain from applauding or interrupting the speakers. But he did nothing when witnesses swore at Madore and Mielke, accused them of criminal actions and demanded they resign or be recalled — while the crowd responded with boos, catcalls and standing ovations.

Former Vancouver Mayor Royce Pollard called Mielke “stupid,” accused both of breaking the law and concluded by calling their actions “bull—-.”

Stuart, who had earlier threatened to end testimony if the comments turned abusive, took no action.

Madore and Mielke were not without their supporters, however.

“Don Benton has been re-elected so many times because the voters get it,” said Carolyn Crane. “He is a balanced, clear-thinking and well-grounded representative of both the people and the environment.”

“The Republican commissioners on this board were absolutely correct to do whatever they could to reverse the effect of the longtime liberal politicians and their cronies here in Clark County,” added Dick Stone. “They are fulfilling their campaign promises to reign in over-regulation, and I applaud them for that.

“Any environmentalist overseeing other environmentalists is no oversight at all,” he said.

“The idea that (Madore and Mielke) don’t represent the wishes of the voters is absurd,” said Christian Berrigan. “I voted for them — as did thousands of others — to advance a particular point of view, and they’re doing a fine job of it.

“Elections have consequences,” he continued. “Why on earth should anyone expect them to listen to people who don’t support what they and Don Benton stand for and ignore the wishes of the thousands of people who put them in office? I, for one, am delighted they’re doing exactly what they promised to do rather than acting like all the politicians who say one thing to get elected then govern differently once they get into office.”

A provision in the transportation package passed by the Washington State Legislature last week would appoint a work group to study refinancing options aimed at keeping fares on the Tacoma Narrows Bridge as low as possible.

It isn’t as eye-catching as the bigger-ticket items in the package, but a component of the transportation budget bill passed by the Washington State Legislature last week calling for a work group to study refinancing options for the Tacoma Narrows Bridge could ultimately save toll payers millions on that project and be a model for others around the state.

During the 105-day session, 26th District Rep. Jan Angel (R-Port Orchard) said she offered numerous bills and amendments to reduce tolls on the Narrows Bridge, including selling naming rights, extending financing and returning toll-setting authority to the Legislature.

Jan Angel

Majority House Democrats defeated the toll-setting amendment and refused to allow her other bills to advance. However, a provision was placed in the final transportation measure, Senate Bill 5024, which would allow refinance options for the bridge to be investigated.

“We need to have something in place that would prevent tolls from increasing every year on the Tacoma Narrows Bridge,” she said. “Our economy is still very fragile and that is amplified by the federal sequestration cuts that deeply affect our military families in the Kitsap Peninsula who use the bridge. Many families still struggling in this economy rely on the bridge to get to and from work. We simply cannot afford higher and higher tolls.”

The provision in Senate Bill 5024 states: “The Joint Transportation Committee shall convene a work group to identify and evaluate internal refinance opportunities for the Tacoma Narrows Bridge. The study must include a staff work group, including staff from the Office of Financial Management, the Transportation Commission, the Department of Transportation, the Office of the State Treasurer, and the legislative transportation committees. The Joint Transportation Committee shall issue a report of its findings to the House of Representatives and the Senate Transportation Committees by Dec. 31, 2013.”

The state Transportation Commission voted last month to recommend a 25-cent fare hike beginning July 1, which would bring the price to $4.25 for electronic (“Good to Go”) tolling, $5.25 at the toll-booth, and $6.25 for pay-by-mail.

The tolls would increase by another 25 cents on July 1, 2014.

On April 19,  Angel introduced Amendment 386 that would have kept the Legislature in charge of toll- and ferry-fare setting authority as intended under voter-approved Initiative 1185.

The amendment was rejected. The final bill, which was sent to the governor Sunday, includes language that returns toll-setting authority to the state Transportation Commission.

“While we and the voters who approved Initiative 1185 lost that battle,” Angel said, “this new study will keep the discussion open and, hopefully, allow us to find ways during the 2014 legislative session to prevent future toll increases on the bridge. So I still see that as a victory.”

Angel, who is currently campaigning to fill the Senate seat vacated in November when Democrat Derek Kilmer was elected to Congress, said she reluctantly voted in favor of the transportation package because it continued construction on two new ferry boats, which her West Sound constituents also needed.

The state Transportation Commission has scheduled a final public hearing on the new toll rates for May 20 from 6to 8 p.m. at the Gig Harbor Civic Center, 3510 Grandview St.

The Legislature adjourned its regular 105-day session Sunday. Gov. Inslee has called a special session, beginning May 13, for the Legislature to complete its business of adopting a two-year state operating budget.

Port Orchard Republican Rep. Jan Angel is taking advantage of the two-week lull between the end of the regular session and the start of the special session to campaign in earnest for the 26th District’s Senate seat. With the Senate so evenly divided, what would ordinarily be an obscure, off-year special election will have huge implications for the state.

Twenty-sixth District Rep. Jan Angel wasted no time transitioning from governing to campaign mode on Monday, launching her active bid to claim the Senate seat left vacant in November when Gig Harbor Democrat Derek Kilmer was elected to Congress, succeeding longtime U.S. Rep. Norm Dicks.

Incumbent candidates are banned from raising money while the Legislature is in session, but Angel sent out an e-mail message to supporters early Monday — just hours after the regular, 105-day session adjourned and before lawmakers are scheduled to return on May 13 for a special session to hammer out a two-year operating budget.

“This week marks the official start of my campaign,” the Port Orchard Republican wrote. “Now that the regular legislative session is over I can ask you to donate to my Senate campaign.

“As a 26th District state representative,” Angel continued, “I put the constituents’ voices first in a number of key bills and resolutions. My priorities have been and continue to be creating jobs through promoting a business-friendly environment, building our future through education and keeping our district moving, healthy and safe. I believe that I can further advance these goals in the state Senate.”

Angel, midway through her third term in the Legislature after two terms as a Kitsap County commissioner, has never made any secret of her intentions to seek the Senate seat eventually and, when Kilmer announced his bid for Congress, she immediately served notice she planned to move up.

Knowing she didn’t intend to serve out her full two-year term in the House apparently didn’t phase 26th District voters, who re-elected her with more than 60 percent of the vote in November.

The district’s Democrats, meanwhile, appointed Gig Harbor emergency room physician Nathan Schlicher to serve the final year of Kilmer’s term, and he will be seeking the seat outright this fall. It isn’t clear whether any other candidates will join those two in the race.

In any case, with the Senate so evenly divided, this is more than an off-year election to fill one obscure seat. Currently, Democrats outnumber Republicans 26-23 in the Senate, but Republicans are able to wield considerable power anyway because a pair of fiscally conservative Democrats have opted to side with the GOP to form a so-called Majority Caucus.

A victory by Angel, however, would trim the Democrats’ margin to 25-24 and bring a true majority within reach in 2014.

“I’m running to help make sure our citizens have a good quality of life and can well provide for their families through good jobs and strong employment,” Angel wrote on her campaign’s website. “Good jobs and strong businesses are the foundation to economic prosperity through increased competitiveness and innovation. I want to help with good solutions for reform to limit government regulations that are continually imposed upon business. I am also running to help preserve the personal freedoms and the core values of our constitution that I believe we all hold dear.”

Unable to come up with a budget plan that would satisfy Democrats in the House as well as the Senate’s fiscally conservative Majority Coalition, Washington state lawmakers ended their regular 105-day session on Sunday and must now return for a special session slated to begin on May 13.

Gov. Jay Inslee was forced to order a special session of the Washington State Legislature when lawmakers adjourned on Sunday far short of an agreement on a two-year budget.

Republicans had urged the governor to start the extra session on Monday to underscore the urgency of completing the task as soon as possible. Democrats — most of whom believe the budget should include a revenue component — would prefer a break at home to raise money, campaign and gauge their constituents’ appetite for a tax hike.

Inslee, a Democrat, ordered the extra session to begin on May 13.

At a press conference last week, Inslee also made in clear he expected the legislators to address more than fiscal matters in the extra session. With the Senate controlled by the mostly GOP Majority Coalition, Republicans successfully thwarted action during the regular session on a number of bills important to Democrats, including:

• the so-called “Reproductive Parity Act,” which would require that any employer-provided healthcare plan offering maternity coverage also cover abortion services;
• the “DREAM Act,” which would allow illegal aliens who came to the United States as minors to qualify for needs grants and scholarships;
• a gun-control bill, presumably one including universal background checks on all gun purchases; and,
• tougher penalties for repeat drunk-driving offenders.

The Senate, the majority of whose members passed a budget that would have added $1.2 billion to education and continued funding other services at their current levels without a tax increase, announced last week its work was finished and it was just waiting for the House to send over its budget.

That action will have to wait until the middle of next month at the earliest.

Senate Democrats are incensed by a GOP-sponsored bill that would protect the freedom of conscience of people like Richland florist Barronelle Stutzman, who faces discipline from the state for refusing to work a same-sex marriage due to her religious objections. Democrats a year ago said such protections were already present in the state’s same-sec marriage law.

A year ago, when lawmakers in Olympia were debating Washington’s same-sex marriage law, supporters of the bill defeated numerous amendments that would have protected the rights of private business owners — such as caterers and photographers — to decline service based on their religious convictions.

“I believe the bill does a good job of protecting religious liberties,” Rep. Jamie Pedersen (D-Seattle) said  at the time. Likewise, Seattle Democratic Sen. Ed Murray, one of the measure’s prime sponsors, argued the state’s existing domestic partnership laws included sufficient protections for private business owner wishing to exercise their right of conscience.

But when a Richland florist last month put the question to the test, she found herself in hot water with the state Attorney General’s Office, which accused her of violating anti-discrimination laws.

A bill introduced on Friday in the state Senate would institute such protections, but this time around, Democrats have dropped the pretext that they were there all along.

“The whole notion that a business should have the right to discriminate against its customers is abhorrent,” Murray said.

“Providing legal protection for this kind of bigotry takes us back to the days before Martin Luther King Jr., and attempts to reopen an issue that has been settled history in this country for decades,” fumed Sen. Kevin Ranker (D-Orcas Island).

Senate Bill 5297, sponsored by Kennewick Republican Sen. Sharon Brown and co-sponsored by 10 other GOP members, would protect the “right of an individual or entity to deny services” if providing those services is contrary to their “sincerely held religious beliefs, philosophical beliefs or matters of conscience.”

Brown bristled at the suggestion her bill sanctioned bigotry.

“I have biracial children,” she said, “and so I get very upset when people accuse me of trying to thwart certain civil liberties in this country.  I, of all people, will not stand for that.”

The 105-day legislative session is scheduled to adjourn on Sunday so, even if the bill managed to win approval in the Senate, it would almost certainly face overwhelming odds in the Democrat-dominated House, which is struggling to approve a budget it can reconcile with the Senate version.

Even as the Washington State Legislature races to reconcile diametrically opposing views in the House and Senate regarding education, transportation and the operating budget in time to adjourn by Sunday, Gov. Jay Inslee signaled on Wednesday he still hasn’t given up on several pieces of social legislation that had been presumed dead.

Asked if he would order a special session to address his social priorities even if a budget deal had been reached during the regular session, Inslee said anything was possible.

“I was elected governor, not dictator,” he told reporters at a press briefing in Olympia. “We’re going to try and make progress on all fronts this year, and all of these are things Washingtonians want the Legislature to act on this year.”

Specifically, Inslee said he’s hoping there’s still time to make drunk-driving penalties even more severe in addition to passing a gun-control bill in the wake of the failure of similar legislation in Congress already this year.

Even more improbably, Inslee is still pushing a measure that would require all employer-provided health insurance plans to include abortion services as well as the so-called “Dream Act,” which would allow illegal aliens who came to this country as minors to compete for needs-based college scholarships.

Washington Gov. Jay Inslee wouldn’t dismiss the possibility of ordering state lawmakers back for a special session to consider his social legislation — including tougher DUI penalties — even if they do manage to agree on a budget deal by Sunday.

“I do believe strongly and emphatically that we have more responsibility to the public than simply passing budgets,” Inslee said. “I’m going to do everything I can to make sure the Legislature and the governor do their jobs.”

Senate Democrats twice last week attempted to force a floor vote on the abortion bill, believing there is enough support to pass the measure, which was tabled in the Republican-led Senate Health Care Committee.

Invoking the controversial Ninth Order — the same parliamentary tactic Republicans employed to pass a GOP budget in last year’s Senate — Democrats sought an up-or-down vote on the abortion bill. But the effort was defeated by the bipartisan Majority Coalition, whose leader, Bellevue Democrat Sen. Rodney Tom, supports the underlying bill but opposes using the Ninth Order to bring it to the floor.

When that attempt failed, Democrats tried to attach the abortion provision to an unrelated insurance bill, but that tactic, too, failed when Tom and Mercer Island Republican Sen. Steve Litzow — who also supports the measure — refused to force a vote by using backdoor tactics.

Inslee refused to speculate about the chances of the Legislature adjourning on time or the final shape of a budget deal.

“There are probably 20 or 30 moving parts in the budget process,” he said. “At this point we’re trying to figure out what everyone’s priorities are and where there is room to negotiate. Reality has begun to set in it’s time to figure out how to merge several separate plans.”

The governor said he was particularly frustrated by the state’s inability to pass what he characterized as “common-sense” gun control measures.

“We’re better than this,” Inslee said. “Just because they can’t do what’s right in the other Washington doesn’t mean we can’t here. If this session adjourns without an agreement on gun regulations, it would be a real shame.”

Inslee said he is working behind the scenes with leaders of both parties in both houses to facilitate agreements on a variety of issues, and that the social issues are part of those discussions.

“These things are certainly related,” he said. “I don’t think our legislators should walk away from their responsibilities. I know I’m not going to; I’m still optimistic about a positive outcome.”