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The Spokesman-Review Newspaper
Spokane, Washington  Est. May 19, 1883

First Week Of Special Session Anything But

Lynda V. Mapes Staff writer

Taxpayers had better beware the better-than-banker’s hours kept by lawmakers negotiating the state biennial budget.

So far they’ve put in only about 30 hours in three weeks spent working out a compromise between budgets presented by the House and Senate. They are are no closer to agreement at the end of the first week of the special session convened Monday than they were when negotiations first began.

Lawmakers’ response? They took the weekend off. Meanwhile special session costs continue to mount at the rate of about $20,000 a day.

The price tag includes $66 a day paid to every lawmaker for food and housing costs - a particularly sweet deal for Olympia-area legislators living and eating at home anyway.

Democrats frustrated by the snail’s pace called a news conference Friday to decry the Big Stall in Olympia, but Republicans rebuffed them, calling their complaints sour grapes.

Democrats - who managed to grind to a halt in special session budget negotiations even when they controlled both houses of the Legislature - are just whining because they are not getting their way, the GOP claimed.

The question is how long GOP budget hawks will hang tough. More than a dozen members have vowed to shut state government down for lack of money July 1 rather than compromise.

They are sporting buttons with the mathematical symbol for less than or equal to, and the figure $17.3. Billion, that is, the total House members say ought to be spent in the coming biennium.

In response, Democrats are wearing buttons that say “Common Sense ‘95” and “5/5,” the date they would like to see a budget compromise reached.

Meanwhile, lawmakers should be glad the cable TV station broadcasting Olympia doings hasn’t yet been allowed to film in the legislative chambers.

All those empty chairs would make for pretty dull viewing, as lawmakers go off looking for ways to fill their time while conference committees convene.

Politics keeping politics off the air

Speaking of Washington’s new C-SPAN-style television station, there’s a good reason legislative proceedings aren’t on TV yet: The Senate has stiff-armed the station over an internal dispute that shows no sign of resolution.

Sen. Majority Leader Marcus Gaspard, D-Puyallup, has refused to allow coverage of Senate proceedings because the board of directors of the non-profit station is chaired by former Senate Majority Leader Jeannete Hayer, R-Walla Walla.

Hayner raised thousands of dollars last year to try to return the Senate majority to the GOP.

So while the Senate joined the House in spending $5 million to start up the station, it so far is denying the public the access it paid for.

Denny Heck, president of TV Washington, sighs over the impasse. “I have no idea when it will be resolved or how,” Heck said last week. “I try not to think about it.”

Meanwhile TVW has gone ahead without the Legislature, beaming coverage of Public Disclosure Committee meetings, policy forums and speeches statewide, including about 60 hours of programming shown every week in Spokane, Heck said.

“Would we like to be there, sure,” Heck said of the legislative chambers. “But this problem certainly isn’t stopping us.”

Lawmakers accused of breaking fund-raising rule

In the do-as-I-say-not-as-I-do department, Senate Republicans embarrassed themselves last week when the Public Disclosure Commission caught the Senate GOP caucus fund-raising during the legislative session.

That, despite Republican authorship of I-134, the 1993 initiative that banned fund-raising while the Legislature meets. For fairly obvious reasons.

But Republicans argued last week the freeze only pertains to individual lawmakers, not the caucuses.

Ridiculous, said the PDC, which voted 5-0 to find the caucus in violation of the session freeze.

The commission also asked Attorney General Christine Gregoire to impound more than $67,000 raised this session by the caucus, comprised of 24 Republican senators.

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