The Buckeye State will vote November 7th on Issue 1, an amendment to the Ohio Constitution which proclaims: “Every individual has a right to make and carry out one’s own reproductive rights.” The decisions include contraception, fertility treatment, continuing one’s own pregnancy, miscarriage and abortion.”
Category: Policy Topics
Posted inPolicy Topics
Sound Transit Board agrees to open Redmond to Bellevue segment of East Link in 2024
The East Link extension, approved as part of Sound Transit Phase II in 2008, will connect Bellevue and Redmond to Mercer Island and Seattle when complete. Defective construction on the cross-lake segment (which is necessitating a do-over of some work) prompted the agency to rethink the original opening plans.
Posted inPolicy Topics
Most of Washington’s counties are suing the state for refusing to provide necessary behavioral health treatment under state law
“In the face of DSHS’s continuing contempt for both legislative and judicial authority, Washington’s counties have joined in an unprecedented coalition to enforce DSHS’s legal obligations,” the counties declare in their legal action.
Posted inPolicy Topics
From pariahs to cultural icons: The Pacific Northwest has thankfully come to love orcas
Though they have been considered relatives by the region’s Coast Salish peoples since time immemorial, it wasn’t that long ago that orcas were viewed negatively by many non-indigenous Pacific Northwesterners. NPI contributor Joel Connelly recounts how much has changed in the last half century.
Posted inPolicy Topics
Courageous young Montanans have just won an important legal victory for climate justice
“Plaintiffs have a fundamental constitutional right to a clean and healthful environment which includes climate as part of the environmental life support,” Lewis and Clark County District Court Judge Kathy Seeley wrote in a groundbreaking opinion.
Posted inPolicy Topics
As climate catastrophes envelop the world, it’s business as usual for fossil fuel zealots
The Earth is telling us as loudly as it can that it’s got a fever. But a frighteningly large percentage of humanity isn’t listening and doesn’t care, a stance encouraged by fossil fuel zealots profiting from the planet’s destruction.
Posted inBreaking News
Medical Lake ordered to evacuate as fast-spreading Gray Fire consumes structures
The blaze was one of three fires burning in Eastern Washington near Spokane as the weekend of August 18th-20th, 2023 began.
Posted inBreaking News
Canada can’t catch a break: Raging fires now threaten Yellowknife and Kelowna, B.C.
With a little over a month to go until the autumnal equinox, blazes are wreaking havoc across the country, with significant fires in every province and territory.
Posted inLegislative Advocacy
New fiscal dashboard proposed by NPI and Senator Kuderer goes live for Washingtonians
Prepared by the Legislative Evaluation and Accountability Program (LEAP) and the Office of Financial Management (OFM), the Budgeting for Washington’s Future fiscal dashboard provides useful, truthful, and accurate information about state revenue and expenditures, as required by the legislation we created to get rid of Tim Eyman’s push polls.
Posted inEvents
Kamala Harris talks climate damage amidst a summer of record heat and extreme weather
“It is clear the clock is not just ticking, it is banging,” Harris told a crowd at the McKinstry, a Seattle based firm which has been a national leader in energy-efficient building construction.
Posted inPolicy Topics
Taking book bans to a whole new level: Right wing parents are trying to shutter an entire library in rural Washington via ballot measure
A rural community library system in the Pacific Northwest is under attack from a right wing ballot measure that seeks its closure after library staff and trustees refused to go along with a parent’s censorship agenda.
Posted inPolicy Topics
Taxes yield investments in our future: Second Gentleman Doug Emhoff announces new National Park Service conservation projects
The projects announced by Emhoff are of particular importance to the Northern Rockies. The Park Service will go to work restoring sagebrush to Jackson Hole, in places once cleared by ranchers so they could grow hay.
Posted inPolicy Topics
A victory for tree retention in Seattle: Luma the western red cedar won’t be cut down
Though initially uncooperative and resistant to appeals to protect the tree, Legacy, Rock House Builders (the property owner), and Bad Boyz GC (the contractor) have now agreed to leave Luma standing and modify their plans for the parcel.
Posted inPolicy Topics
Donald Trump indicted again — this time, finally, for assaulting American democracy
The indictment is the result of careful, methodical work by Special Counsel Jack Smith and many hardworking investigators at the Department of Justice, who have labored to ensure that the work done to expose what happened on January 6th didn’t merely pass into history as a report, but led to charges.