Is $50 too much to file an initiative? Depends on how you figure

OLYMPIA – As they do most years, legislators are considering possible changes to the state’s initiative system. That generates the usual shouts of alarm from populists who believe the process is a great bulwark of the citizenry, either against the Legislature’s inaction or its tyranny.

Rules that would require more registration and better identification of people paid to stand outside Home Depot and cajole you into signing are debatable. But one change being proposed is pretty hard to argue.

The Secretary of State suggests raising the filing fee from $5 to $50. Before fiscal conservatives go apoplectic at a 1,000 percent increase, it seems fair to note the filing fee has been five bucks for a long time.

Since 1893.

For 118 years the state has charged people a five spot to file whatever brilliant idea comes into their head…

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