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

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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.

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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.

“When They Come to Pick You Off in the Future.”

Morning Fizz   March 7, 2011 at 8:43 am Morning Fizz

1. File this under not surprising: Mayor Mike McGinn is doing fundraising phone calls for the new referendum to repeal the city’s tunnel agreements with the state—which the council recently affirmed by overriding his veto.

2. Here’s a potential assignment for the Seattle Police Department: According to several media reports, law enforcement in Nashville, Denver, and Baltimore have all made human trafficking busts by going after sex ads on backpage.com.

Backpage.com is the online advertising service for Village Voice Media, which owns 14 alternative weeklies, including Seattle Weekly, which uses the service.

The stings uncovered teenage prostitution.

3. “I have a warning for the business community,” state Sen. Val Stevens (R-39, Arlington), said on the floor of the senate on Saturday, “if they succeed here, this will be the playbook for when they come to pick you off in the future.”

Was Stevens sounding the alarm about one of this year’s bills to take away services from or brand undocumented workers? Was she speaking out against the attorney general’s bill to allow law enforcement to get special injunctions against people with no prior criminal record? No.

Stevens was speaking against state Sen. Phil Rockefeller’s (D-23, Bainbridge Island) bill to sign off on an agreement between Gov. Chris Gregoire, environmentalists, and TransAlta—the company that runs Centralia’s coal-fired electricity plant (the number one polluter in the state)—to phase out coal by 2025.

Stevens began her speech with the famous quote about how “they first came for the communists, and I didn’t speak out because I wasn’t a communist…” (and apparently oblivious to the irony of a Republican saying it in 2011, she continued with the next line about “how they came for the trade unionists.” She wrapped up the famous aphorism about “coming for the Jews” and no one spoke out—and “then they came for me and there was no one left to speak out for me.”

So, comparing the governor to Hitler and Centralia to the Warsaw Ghetto, I guess, Stevens went on: “I will not sanction this agreement by voting for this bill, I don’t want to participate in the destruction of another community. I watched, and I saw what happened to my communities when they shut down the timber industry. What industry will be next, will it be the paper mills, will it be the cement industry glass, gypsum, or lime? Oil refineries? I don’t believe that just shutting down coal is going to be the end of the story.”

Stevens was one of 13 senators to vote against the bill, which passed 36-13.

4. On the house side, environmentalists were the ones feeling persecuted this weekend. On Friday night, the house passed three bills that environmentalists have been lobbying against all session: a bill to let cities and counties delay the Growth Management Act; a bill to let some counties opt out the Growth Management Act altogether; and a bill to let developers put off paying impact fees.

Stalwart Seattle environmentalist Rep. Joe Fitzgibbon (D-34, Burien, W. Seattle) was one of only four reps to vote against all three bills,  joining just 10 others in the 86-11 vote against the GMA delay.

Another green, Rep. Marko Liias (D-21, Edmonds), who joined the ‘Nay’ contingents on the anti-GMA bills, sponsored the bill to give developers a break.

5. Fizz has heard about a potential compromise in the standoff between city hall and the UW over Seattle’s commercial parking tax (UW wants an exemption): Drop the tax and go with a citywide parking stall fee on property owners and developers.

The UW reportedly doesn’t like the idea (Fizz imagines the U Village doesn’t approve), but we hear the Associated Students of the University of Washing (ASUW) may split with the UW in support.

6. In cas you missed it on Friday afternoon: We had some more news on the Urban League’s WSDOT contract: WSDOT tells PubliCola it’s not a sure thing the money will keep flowing to the League.


  • Billy

    Watch out gypsum industry, you’re next.

  • Billy

    Watch out gypsum industry, you’re next.

  • fount

    re: #3

    let’s don’t forget that Senator Stevens gladly “came for the gays” just last year, and was a prime opponent of domestic partnerships.

    She’s fine with government “coming for you,” as long as you’re an individual that is disfavored by Republicans and/or Christians. It’s only wrong for government to “come for you” when you’re a huge corporation.

  • yep

    does the city have the authority to tax UW (a state entity)?

  • Clyde

    Shame, shame, shame on Senator Stevens. Clearly she knows nothing about history. To equate shutting down a polluting coal plant in ten years to the holocaust is utterly disgusting and ignorant.

  • laughing

    I doubt she knows not what she says. Shame on Senator Stevens’ constituents who vote for her.

  • Trevor

    Something else happened in Oly on Saturday as well. According to the state labor council, a coalition of conservative Dems and Republicans passed a bill without a hearing, introduced only the day before, to water down the state’s workers compensation system. http://www.wslc.org/reports/2011/March/07.htm#Monday

  • Trevor

    Something else happened in Oly on Saturday as well. According to the state labor council, a coalition of conservative Dems and Republicans passed a bill without a hearing, introduced only the day before, to water down the state’s workers compensation system. http://www.wslc.org/reports/2011/March/07.htm#Monday

  • Josh Feit

    True Trevor.
    Been calling labor folks all weekend and today to get their take on it, and I have not heard back.

  • Godwin

    “Comparing the governor to Hitler and Centralia to the Warsaw Ghetto”

    I wonder what Czeslaw Milosz would say if he were alive?

  • gloomy gus

    Damn.

  • gloomy gus

    Damn.

  • Trevor

    Wasn’t criticizing Publicola on this one. Just wanted to toss it out there into the morning Fizz conversation.

  • ratcityreprobate

    If so, what are the cut-off rules about? Bills were supposed to have been passed out of committee a few days ago if they were to be considered, or does that just apply to lefty bills?

  • Phelix

    Any bill can be declared “Necessary To Implement the Budget” or NTIB… once leadership declares a bill NTIB all rules are off and it can be heard up until the final minutes of the Session. Considering we won’t have an official budget for another couple of weeks (after the March budget numbers come out) many bills have been preemptively declared NTIB because it is assumed they will be necessary.

  • Phelix

    Any bill can be declared “Necessary To Implement the Budget” or NTIB… once leadership declares a bill NTIB all rules are off and it can be heard up until the final minutes of the Session. Considering we won’t have an official budget for another couple of weeks (after the March budget numbers come out) many bills have been preemptively declared NTIB because it is assumed they will be necessary.

  • Phelix

    Any bill can be declared “Necessary To Implement the Budget” or NTIB… once leadership declares a bill NTIB all rules are off and it can be heard up until the final minutes of the Session. Considering we won’t have an official budget for another couple of weeks (after the March budget numbers come out) many bills have been preemptively declared NTIB because it is assumed they will be necessary.

  • Phelix

    Any bill can be declared “Necessary To Implement the Budget” or NTIB… once leadership declares a bill NTIB all rules are off and it can be heard up until the final minutes of the Session. Considering we won’t have an official budget for another couple of weeks (after the March budget numbers come out) many bills have been preemptively declared NTIB because it is assumed they will be necessary.

  • Phelix

    Any bill can be declared “Necessary To Implement the Budget” or NTIB… once leadership declares a bill NTIB all rules are off and it can be heard up until the final minutes of the Session. Considering we won’t have an official budget for another couple of weeks (after the March budget numbers come out) many bills have been preemptively declared NTIB because it is assumed they will be necessary.

  • Godwin

    Maybe it is because they are tired of getting trashed by your partner in crime.

  • http://manywordsforrain.blogspot.com/ Mr Baker

    And if that isn’t satisfying for those that favor deliberation, the bill could have been introduced in the Senate W&M Committee, taken testimony, exec session, and passed to the Senate Floor.

    Senate W&M has an exemption from the cutoff.
    http://www.leg.wa.gov/legislature/pages/cutoff.aspx

  • Perfect Voter

    One thing for sure, poor Sen. Stevens never read his work and hasn’t a clue who he was.

  • sarah

    Everyone is now quoting this thing by Niemoller (who was mainly upset that the Nazis were repressive to the Protestant church and was actually rather anti-Semitic). I doubt if half the people quoting it understand the background or care, including Stevens. Milosz would not consider it worthwhile to say anything.

  • Alf Hanna

    It’s all posturing, as the coal fired plant gets converted to natural gas, which is vastly cheaper, gives of far less green house gases, and frankly, from a business perspective these guys should have done that conversion long ago, as many plants are doing around the US. While natural gas is a problem in and of itself (i.e. fracking) this gives the citizens of this state some breathing room (pun intended) to look towards a day when renewable energy at scale has buy in from our government, which is still talking out of both sides of their mouths on this at this point.

  • Alf Hanna

    It’s all posturing, as the coal fired plant gets converted to natural gas, which is vastly cheaper, gives of far less green house gases, and frankly, from a business perspective these guys should have done that conversion long ago, as many plants are doing around the US. While natural gas is a problem in and of itself (i.e. fracking) this gives the citizens of this state some breathing room (pun intended) to look towards a day when renewable energy at scale has buy in from our government, which is still talking out of both sides of their mouths on this at this point.

  • Alf Hanna

    It’s all posturing, as the coal fired plant gets converted to natural gas, which is vastly cheaper, gives of far less green house gases, and frankly, from a business perspective these guys should have done that conversion long ago, as many plants are doing around the US. While natural gas is a problem in and of itself (i.e. fracking) this gives the citizens of this state some breathing room (pun intended) to look towards a day when renewable energy at scale has buy in from our government, which is still talking out of both sides of their mouths on this at this point.

  • Anonymous

    Tony Ortega, Village Voice editor, in an effort to
    protect prostitution ad revenue, belittles anti-child trafficking activists and
    tries to manipulate statistics on child sex trafficking to create an illusion
    that this is a minor problem.  See here: http://villagevoicepimp.com/tony-ortega-2/