Viva La Cola!

Founded in January 2009, PubliCola is a blog about Seattle written by journalists who are dedicated to non-partisan, original daily reporting that prioritizes a balanced approach to news. Started by longtime local editor and award-winning reporter Josh Feit, PubliCola is the first online-only news site in state history to get media credentials to cover the state capitol.

PubliCola was off and running. In June 2009, PubliCola hired another award-winning journalist, super-sourced Seattle city hall reporter Erica C. Barnett.

People were afraid that blogging would change journalism. Instead, we believe journalism can change blogging. Twenty-first century journalism may look and feel different, and yes Erica isn't afraid to get cranky, but we're committed to making sure online news still delivers independent, reliable, even-keeled coverage. And most of all, we're committed to making sure the coverage sparks honest civic debate.

Bringing you cola for the people, PubliCola is named after Publius Valerius PubliCola, the alias for the authors of the Federalist Papers—the original bloggers.

x close
The first online-only news site in state history to get media credentials to cover the state capitol and Seattle city hall, PubliCola has been called a “must-read” by the Seattle Post Intelligencer and a hot “New Media Mover and Shaker” by Seattle Magazine—which also cited our own Erica C. Barnett as the city's No. 1 news nerd.

Bad News for Education Reformers

Politics, This Washington   December 7, 2010 at 2:49 pm Josh Feit

State Sen. Steve Hobbs (D-44, S. Snohomish County), a favorite of Arne Duncan-style education reform groups like Stand for Children, will not serve on the education committee this session according to the plan the Senate Democrats presented in caucus yesterday.

The assignments “are not set in stone,” according to Democratic spokesman Jeff Reading, and Hobbs could be added back in, he said. Members were reportedly concerned that the committee itself had been downsized (a typical move when the size of the caucus itself shrinks, as it did after November from 31 to 27.) Reading says members made it clear than “an exception should be made” for education given that it’s the paramount duty of the state.

The proposed members of the K-12 education committee—tasked with addressing the fact that Washington’s reforms to date have not met the Obama administration’s Race to the Top standards (which demand things like data-driven teacher evaluations)—were: Sen. Rosemary McAuliffe, Sen.-elect Nick Harper, Sen. Tracey Eide, Sen. Sharon Nelson, and Sen. Rodney Tom.

Compared to last year’s committee, this has to be a disappointment for reformers. With the exception of Tom (D-48, Eastside Seattle Suburbs), none of these Democrats are strong allies of the reform movement—a movement that got a glowing profile in the hit movie Waiting for Superman, which demonizes teachers’ unions for protecting bad teachers.

And MIA from last year’s education committee: Hobbs, along with fellow reform movement favorite, state Sen. Eric Oemig (D-45, Woodinville, Kirkland, Redmond).

Oemig lost his election in November (so of course, he’s gone). But Hobbs, who won in November and was supported by nearly $21,000 in independent expenditures from Stand for Children, is a glaring omission for reformers.

Harper and Nelson, the two new Democrats on the committee, are more traditionally union Democrats, which makes reformers nervous.

The Republicans have not named their committee members yet. There are two hopefuls for the Stand for Children crowd, though: State Sen. Curtis King (R-14, Yakima), who pushed the education reform agenda as a committee member last year, and newly elected Republican Steve Litzow, who SFC backed during the campaign.

The senate Democrats are on a caucus retreat today and Hobbs wasn’t immediately available for a comment.

Stand for Children has not returned a call for their reaction.




  • Disclosure Please

    Hobbs was another target of Moxie Media’s sleazy independent campaigns.

    They formed a phony committee called Stand for Citizens. Cute and so clever to make up a name so close to Stand for Children.

  • Josh Feit

    Stand for Citizens wasn’t a phony committee. Labor unions and progressives formed that committee, along with Stand Up for Citizens (not kidding) to defeat Hobbs and other moderate Dems they didn’t like. And their contributions to those committees were fully disclosed. The Moxie scandal is this: Moxie set up a truly fake committee—a faux conservative committee called Cut Taxes PAC and Conservative PAC—to pretend to hit Jean Berkey from the right. They tried to cover up who was paying for that.

  • http://twitter.com/fattailed fattailed

    What’s cute is that Stand for Children gave themselves a name that sounds like they’re about spending more resources on children when they’re actually about spending less resources on teachers.

  • http://twitter.com/fattailed fattailed

    What’s cute is that Stand for Children gave themselves a name that sounds like they’re about spending more resources on children when they’re actually about spending less resources on teachers.

  • Anc

    Oh well. Glad we haven’t had any children yet.

  • http://twitter.com/mrrgwood Rich Wood

    Teachers, the professionals in the classroom who work directly with students, are pleased that Nick Harper will be on the Senate Ed Committee. Harper listens to teachers! And he respects them!

  • seabos84

    OUTSTANDING lapdog “reporting” Joshie! Dare you mention all the Gate’s money funding the Stand On Children – Alliance For Ed – League of Education Voters … blah blah blah astro turf orgs?

    OOPS! Silly me! Don’t mention that part of reform!

    Don’t mention that there are over 50 million kids in the k-12 system, over 3 million teachers, over $500,000,000,000 spent a year, who knows how many admins and policy wonks … CUZ IT IS ALL THE TEACHER’S FAULT!

    Just think – keep up this shilling, and you HOPEfully dump this online phake paper & move in with your better class of Arne Rhee toadies and highly credentialed group thinkers –

    (pst! ya better get posts coming bashing the professional left for for being childish about 0bummer’s welfare to millionaires! Surely a bunch of the ed deform crowd are cheering Clinton III these days! )

    rmm

  • Marie

    Unfortunately, polarizing “reforms” can’t help children because the other more important factors are left unaddressed. I have taught for 15 years and I know that class size (which is much larger in Washington State than most places in the country) makes a big difference in what I can get done each year. The basics of how to steadily, not miraculously, improve education are quite mundane. Good early childhood ed funding, smaller class sizes, more special ed and non-english language support, and lots of tutoring support. All the parents who can afford it buy tutors for their high school kids who struggle with math. That is the secret to getting through for many students. Same story in many other countries that we are frequently compared to. But where do the poor kids get tutoring? Check out the library and after school programs. Full, full, full.

    If you really care, go tutor a struggling high school student.

  • Trevor

    That’s ok. They don’t have the money for their reforms anyway, and they don’t have a plan for where to get it either.