Tag: Budgeting

Posted inEconomic Security, Legislative Advocacy, Policy Topics

Eyman’s I‑1366 is buried; now the Legislature needs to get back to work on school funding

Andrew Villeneuveby Andrew Villeneuve

Yes­ter­day, Wash­ing­ton’s Supreme Court gave Tim Eyman’s I‑1366 a prop­er and fit­ting bur­ial, rul­ing 9–0 that the mea­sure was uncon­sti­tu­tion­al. In affirm­ing Judge William Down­ing’s deci­sion strik­ing down Tim Eyman’s I‑1366 in its entire­ty, the high court both did its job and res­cued the Leg­is­la­ture from hav­ing to wor­ry about los­ing $8 bil­lion in funding […]

Posted inEducation, Legislative Advocacy, Policy Topics

Washington State Legislature adjourns 2016 session Sine Die; special session needed

Andrew Villeneuveby Andrew Villeneuve

Not long ago, the Wash­ing­ton State Leg­is­la­ture adjourned its 2016 reg­u­lar ses­sion Sine Die, fol­low­ing the adop­tion of HCR 4417 by the House and Sen­ate. Though the reg­u­lar ses­sion is now offi­cial­ly over, law­mak­ers can­not head home just yet, as their work is unfin­ished (sur­prise, sur­prise). Gov­er­nor Jay Inslee plans to call a spe­cial session […]

Posted inLegislative Advocacy, Our Environment, Policy Topics

Washington State Labor Council votes to oppose CarbonWA’s Initiative 732

Andrew Villeneuveby Andrew Villeneuve

The Wash­ing­ton State Labor Coun­cil, AFL-CIO, a fed­er­a­tion of more than six hun­dred unions rep­re­sent­ing near­ly half a mil­lion work­ers in Wash­ing­ton State, announced today that it has tak­en a posi­tion for­mal­ly oppos­ing Car­bon­WA’s I‑732, which back­ers have adver­tised as a “rev­enue neu­tral” tax swap that would levy a tax on emis­sions of gas­es like […]

Posted inLegislative Advocacy

Republican Ed Orcutt tries to set up House vote on Tim Eyman’s desired amendment, fails

Andrew Villeneuveby Andrew Villeneuve

This morn­ing, just pri­or to the House of Rep­re­sen­ta­tives’ adjourn­ment for the day, Repub­li­can State Rep­re­sen­ta­tive Ed Orcutt of Kala­ma attempt­ed to fast-track a res­o­lu­tion that would amend the Wash­ing­ton State Con­sti­tu­tion to require a two-thirds vote to raise or recov­er any rev­enue, as fer­vent­ly desired and demand­ed by Muk­il­­teo-based ini­tia­tive prof­i­teer Tim Eyman. Ris­ing during […]

Posted inOur Environment, Policy Topics

CarbonWA’s I‑732 barely survives random sample check, Secretary of State reports

Andrew Villeneuveby Andrew Villeneuve

Car­bon­WA’s Ini­tia­tive 732, a sup­pos­ed­ly “rev­enue neu­tral” pro­pos­al to levy a statewide tax on car­bon emis­sions while low­er­ing Wash­ing­ton’s sales and B&O tax­es, has nar­row­ly qual­i­fied as an ini­tia­tive to the 2016 Leg­is­la­ture fol­low­ing a ran­dom sam­ple check, says the chief spokesman for Sec­re­tary of State Kim Wyman. In an ear­ly evening press release, Wyman’s Communications […]

Posted inLegislative Advocacy

Tim Eyman is wrong: Washingtonians have previously supported levying an income tax

Andrew Villeneuveby Andrew Villeneuve

Pro­lif­ic ini­tia­tive spon­sor and ser­i­al liar Tim Eyman sent out an email this morn­ing once again tak­ing aim at the grand tax reform pro­pos­al unveiled by State Trea­sur­er Jim McIn­tire and State Super­in­ten­dent of Pub­lic Instruc­tion Randy Dorn back in the spring. Though the pro­pos­al is over six months old, Eyman was irked that The […]

Posted inElections, Legislative Advocacy, Litigation, Policy Topics

New legal challenge filed against Tim Eyman’s hostage-taking I‑1366 in Superior Court

Andrew Villeneuveby Andrew Villeneuve

With Wash­ing­ton’s 2015 gen­er­al elec­tion on the verge of being cer­ti­fied, the time has come to con­tin­ue the fight against Tim Eyman’s I‑1366 in the courts. Accord­ing­ly, attor­neys with Paci­fi­ca Law Group have filed a new law­suit seek­ing a declara­to­ry judg­ment that I‑1366 exceeds the scope of the ini­tia­tive pow­er and vio­lates mul­ti­ple pro­vi­sions of […]

Posted inElections, Legislative Advocacy

A progressive Legislature, not Eyman’s 1366, can fix Washington’s regressive tax system

Andrew Villeneuveby Andrew Villeneuve

With­in hours of Elec­tion Night 2015, after it had become appar­ent that Tim Eyman’s hostage-tak­ing I‑1366 had too much of a head start in ear­ly bal­lots to be defeat­ed, mul­ti­ple com­men­ta­tors with a thirst for pro­gres­sive tax reform began float­ing the idea of using I‑1366 as a spring­board to get the job start­ed, rea­son­ing that […]

Posted inLegislative Advocacy

New NPI poll finds Washingtonians strongly support a capital gains tax on the wealthy

Andrew Villeneuveby Andrew Villeneuve

A clear major­i­ty of Wash­ing­ton vot­ers sup­port tax­ing the cap­i­tal gains of wealthy indi­vid­u­als to help pay for pub­lic schools, col­leges and uni­ver­si­ties, accord­ing to a new sur­vey con­duct­ed by Pub­lic Pol­i­cy Polling for NPI. Our recent annu­al research poll found 55% of Wash­ing­to­ni­ans like­ly to vote in the Novem­ber 2015 gen­er­al elec­tion sup­port a cap­i­tal gains tax, with […]

Posted inLegislative Advocacy

U.S. House votes with Senate to keep federal government open… for a few more months

Andrew Villeneuveby Andrew Villeneuve

The Unit­ed States fed­er­al gov­ern­ment will not be shut­ting down tomor­row, thanks to Con­gress’ approval of a con­tin­u­ing res­o­lu­tion that keeps the nation’s many crit­i­cal pub­lic ser­vices fund­ed through ear­ly Decem­ber of this year. By a vote of 277 to 151, the House of Rep­re­sen­ta­tives vot­ed to con­cur with the Sen­ate amend­ment to the House amendment […]

Posted inLegislative Advocacy, Our Environment, Policy Topics, Public Planning

Washington State Legislature adjourns Sine Die, again (for real this time!)

Andrew Villeneuveby Andrew Villeneuve

Hav­ing reached agree­ment on the specifics of an oper­at­ing bud­get, trans­porta­tion pack­age, and plan for delay­ing imple­men­ta­tion of last year’s ini­tia­tive to low­er class size, the Wash­ing­ton State Leg­is­la­ture today adjourned its third spe­cial ses­sion sine die, with exhaust­ed law­mak­ers and leg­isla­tive staff breath­ing a sigh of relief. The Leg­is­la­ture began its 2015 ses­sion a […]

Posted inLegislative Advocacy

The party of government shutdowns is at it again

by Robert Cruickshank

If there’s one thing you can count on when Repub­li­cans con­trol one part of gov­ern­ment and Democ­rats con­trol the oth­ers, it’s that Repub­li­cans will force a gov­ern­ment shut­down. We saw it in Con­gress in the fall of 2013 when John Boehn­er shut down the fed­er­al gov­ern­ment in an attempt to defund the Patient Pro­tec­tion and […]

Posted inElections, Legislative Advocacy

Join the coalition opposing I‑1366 — Tim Eyman’s most destructive initiative yet

Andrew Villeneuveby Andrew Villeneuve

This Novem­ber, in addi­tion to choos­ing lead­ers at the city, coun­ty, and port lev­el, Wash­ing­to­ni­ans will very like­ly be decid­ing the fate of the most destruc­tive ini­tia­tive that Tim Eyman has ever pro­posed: Ini­tia­tive 1366. I‑1366 is a clone of last year’s I‑1325, which failed to make the bal­lot because Eyman was­n’t able to find […]