Image via Washington State Wire.
1. The protests against budget cuts that have rocked Olympia this week—seventeen protesters from the Service Employees International Union were arrested yesterday after trying to storm Gov. Chris Gregoire’s office—will continue today with perhaps the biggest demonstration yet. The Washington State Labor Council says they’re bringing 5000 people to the state Capitol. (You can read our on-the-scene coverage of yesterday’s protests starting here.)
2. Erica will have a full report later today about the American Institute of Architects and Cascade Land Conservancy event at Daniels Recital Hall last night, where Seattle Channel star C.R. Douglas interviewed King County Executive Dow Constantine. But here’s a Fizz-worthy footnote: Immediately after the interview, as everyone was about to get up to leave, things seemed to enter the Twilight Zone when CLC leader Gene Duvernoy took the stage and—as if he was addressing a class of second graders—gave a play-by-play of the interview we’d all just seen, telling the audience what it all meant and punctuating each point by explaining how “interesting” it all was.
Even odder, he chastised Douglas for being provincial and praised Constantine for pivoting off Douglas’ questions about the tunnel into a more important (and “interesting”) discussion about regional issues.
3. Liberal state house members, and particularly the freshman class, are reportedly organizing to bring legislation to the floor that would propose swapping out corporate tax breaks—breaks for private jets, cosmetic surgery, and a loophole for big banks are cited most often—to buy funding for social services or education, such as K-4 class size reductions.
The move is widely viewed as a political show that would force Republicans, who’d presumably vote no because they believe corporate tax exemptions create jobs, to go on the record against say, kids, in favor of big banks.
However, the progressives don’t appear to have the support of their own leadership for the move. Asked yesterday about the strategy, house ways and means chair Ross Hunter (D-48, Medina) said “I don’t have the votes”—referring to the two-thirds vote needed to repeal a corporate tax break.
Right, but isn’t that point?
4. Meanwhile, a Republican house rep might beat the Democrats to the punch. Rep. Glenn Anderson (R-5, Fall City) has proposed an amendment to the house budget to help fund higher education by increasing the B&O tax 0.24 percent on businesses with gross incomes over $500,000 a year.
5. Speaking of off-script Republicans, new state Sen. Michael Baumgartner (R-6, Spokane), who got elected with help of Tea Party rhetoric, has a reputation as something of a green these days. Not only did he vote ‘Yes’ this week on an environmental bill that would make Washington State the first state in the country to ban coal tar sealants, but conservative Democrats are grousing because he gave the environmentalists the deciding twelfth vote they needed late last week to move an oil spill cleanup bill out of the senate ways and means committee. That bill went on to pass the senate four days later.
6. Josh will be on KUOW’s Weekday week in review edition today at 10:00 am.
