Tag: Permanent Defense

Posted inElections

Students reject Tim Eyman’s I‑517 in mock election; overwhelmingly pass I‑522

Andrew Villeneuveby Andrew Villeneuve

Today, Wash­ing­ton Sec­re­tary of State Kim Wyman’s office announced the results of this year’s mock elec­tion, which is held annu­al­ly in schools across Wash­ing­ton State. Stu­dents are giv­en the oppor­tu­ni­ty to weigh in on bal­lot mea­sures and key races for pub­lic office. The results don’t always por­tend the out­come of the real elec­tion, but oftentimes […]

Posted inAnnouncements, Elections, Meta

NPI launches BallotGuide.info, a microsite that demystifies ballot measures

Andrew Villeneuveby Andrew Villeneuve

On behalf of the team at here at the North­west Pro­gres­sive Insti­tute, I’m pleased to announce this evening that we have launched BallotGuide.info, a new microsite designed to help pro­gres­sive vot­ers nav­i­gate the many mea­sures on the 2013 gen­er­al elec­tion bal­lot in Wash­ing­ton State. (Microsites, for those who don’t speak tech, are very small stand­alone websites […]

Posted inEconomic Security, Policy Topics, Public Planning

Tim Eyman gets an earful in Seattle after stepping to the mic to recite his talking points

Andrew Villeneuveby Andrew Villeneuve

Ini­tia­tive prof­i­teer Tim Eyman got a taste of what it’s like to be inter­rupt­ed and heck­led tonight when he showed up in Seat­tle to speak at the sec­ond to last stop on Rod­ney Tom and Cur­tis King’s trans­porta­tion autumn “lis­ten­ing tour”, which has been trav­el­ing around the state since mid-Sep­tem­ber. Eyman, who was also at […]

Posted inPolicy Topics, Public Planning

Time to give the failed I‑5 Skagit River span a new name: The Tim Eyman Memorial Bridge

Andrew Villeneuveby Andrew Villeneuve

Yes­ter­day after­noon on Dai­ly Kos, pro­gres­sive activist Wu Ming sug­gest­ed that, in the wake of the fail­ure of Inter­state 5’s Skag­it Riv­er cross­ing, which car­ries more than sev­en­ty thou­sand vehi­cles a day, it would be appro­pri­ate to give the span a new name: The Tim Eyman Memo­r­i­al Bridge. Ming wrote: As I watched the coverage […]

Posted inAnnouncements, Elections, Legislative Advocacy, Open Government, Policy Topics

PDC to investigate Tim Eyman, associates for violating our public disclosure laws (again!)

Andrew Villeneuveby Andrew Villeneuve

Wash­ing­ton State’s Pub­lic Dis­clo­sure Com­mis­sion will inves­ti­gate alle­ga­tions that Tim Eyman and his asso­ciates failed to time­ly reg­is­ter a com­mit­tee for Ini­tia­tive 517 and failed to time­ly report con­tri­bu­tions and expen­di­tures for the I‑517 cam­paign, its Direc­tor of Com­pli­ance said this week. I‑517 is an ini­tia­tive to the Leg­is­la­ture that would: dou­ble the length of time that […]

Posted inEconomic Security, Litigation, Policy Topics, Public Planning

It’s time to update Tim Eyman’s Failure Chart

Andrew Villeneuveby Andrew Villeneuve

Now that the Wash­ing­ton State Supreme Court has ruled, at long last, that the main pro­vi­sion of Tim Eyman’s I‑601 clones is uncon­sti­tu­tion­al and void, it’s time for us to update Tim Eyman’s Fail­ure Chart. The Fail­ure Chart is a handy resource that we main­tain over at Per­ma­nent Defense which shows that most of the […]

Posted inBreaking News, Litigation

Governor Jay Inslee, advocates thrilled with today’s landmark Supreme Court decision

Andrew Villeneuveby Andrew Villeneuve

The Supreme Court’s land­mark rul­ing in LEV v. State has now been up on the World Wide Web for a cou­ple of hours, and we’ve been on the receiv­ing end of a num­ber of state­ments and press releas­es com­ment­ing on the deci­sion. We’d like to share some of what we’re hear­ing with you. First, Gov­er­nor Jay […]

Posted inBreaking News, Litigation

Ruling coming tomorrow on constitutionality of Tim Eyman’s I‑960/I‑1053/I‑1185

Andrew Villeneuveby Andrew Villeneuve

The Wash­ing­ton State Supreme Court sig­naled today that it plans to issue a rul­ing tomor­row morn­ing in League of Edu­ca­tion Vot­ers, et al. v. State of Wash­ing­ton, et al, the all-impor­­tant legal chal­lenge to Tim Eyman’s I‑1053 filed in June 2011 by a group of Demo­c­ra­t­ic law­mak­ers, par­ents, and teach­ers. In a notice on its […]

Posted inEconomic Security, Media & Culture, Policy Topics, Public Planning

Don’t feed the trolls: Why we asked Andrew Garber and his colleagues to ignore Tim Eyman’s repugnant attack on Jay Inslee

Andrew Villeneuveby Andrew Villeneuve

Yes­ter­day, at a press con­fer­ence on the Capi­tol Cam­pus in Olympia,  State Rep­re­sen­ta­tive Judy Clib­born (D‑41st Dis­trict) and House Democ­rats unveiled a “Con­nect­ing Wash­ing­ton” trans­porta­tion pack­age that pro­pos­es to invest $10 bil­lion in Wash­ing­ton’s high­ways, streets, fer­ries, and local tran­sit agen­cies. Some of the mon­ey would go to road main­te­nance, some would be ded­i­cat­ed to […]

Posted inElections, Legislative Advocacy

Tired of destructive, self-serving Eyman initiatives? Help us stop Tim’s profit machine

Andrew Villeneuveby Andrew Villeneuve

This morn­ing, at the Sec­re­tary of State’s Elec­tions Annex in Olympia, Tim Eyman and his pals Eddie Agazarm and Paul Jacob showed up to deliv­er what they said were 345,000 sig­na­tures for Ini­tia­tive 517, Eyman’s lat­est scheme, which is intend­ed to make it eas­i­er and cheap­er for Tim Eyman to qual­i­fy ini­tia­tives for the ballot […]

Posted inElections

The News Tribune shines a spotlight on Tim Eyman’s secret campaign to qualify I‑517

Andrew Villeneuveby Andrew Villeneuve

Sev­er­al months ago, around the time Tim Eyman and his pals Roy Ruffi­no and Eddie Agazarm began accept­ing hun­dreds of thou­sands of dol­lars from big cor­po­ra­tions for I‑1185 (Eyman’s mea­sure to reim­pose the uncon­sti­tu­tion­al two-thirds vot­ing require­ment for rais­ing rev­enue), they qui­et­ly began schem­ing to have I‑1185 peti­tion­ers col­lect sig­na­tures for a sec­ond ini­tia­tive that […]

Posted inBreaking News, Litigation

BREAKING: Tim Eyman’s I‑1053 has *finally* been struck down as unconstitutional!

Andrew Villeneuveby Andrew Villeneuve

Joy­ous news to report out of the King Coun­ty Cour­t­house this morn­ing: Supe­ri­or Court Judge Bruce Heller has just ruled that Tim Eyman’s I‑1053 — the third in a series of ini­tia­tives unde­mo­c­ra­t­i­cal­ly requir­ing two-thirds votes of both hous­es of the Leg­is­la­ture to raise rev­enue — is uncon­sti­tu­tion­al on mul­ti­ple grounds. The rul­ing, which Rob […]

Posted inBreaking News, Elections

BP and ConocoPhillips revealed as the big money behind Tim Eyman’s I‑1185

Andrew Villeneuveby Andrew Villeneuve

The wheels and gears of Tim Eyman’s ini­tia­tive fac­to­ry are once again being lubri­cat­ed with piles of mon­ey from greedy multi­na­tion­al oil com­pa­nies, new­ly updat­ed Pub­lic Dis­clo­sure Com­mis­sion records show. Min­utes ago, Tim Eyman’s trea­sur­er uploaded cam­paign finance reports for the lat­est incar­na­tion of Eyman’s “Vot­ers Want More Choic­es” com­mit­tee for the month of April, […]

Posted inAnnouncements, Meta

Permanent Defense celebrates ten years

Andrew Villeneuveby Andrew Villeneuve

Today, we at NPI cel­e­brate a mile­stone like no oth­er in our his­to­ry to date: the ten year anniver­sary of the found­ing of Per­ma­nent Defense, NPI’s old­est project. For a decade, Per­ma­nent Defense has stood as a bul­wark against Tim Eyman’s ini­tia­tive fac­to­ry, respond­ing to anti-gov­­ern­­ment pro­pa­gan­da, refram­ing the debate around tax­es, push­ing for direct […]