Spokane7
56°
January 10, 2012 in City
WA House Speaker goals: create jobs, fund education
House speaker evokes cooperation of 2003
OLYMPIA – Washington legislators started their 60-day session with the usual pomp and circumstance, and a quick preview of the debates likely to dominate the remaining 59 days.
As soon as the honor guard of Washington State Patrol troopers planted the flags at the House podium, the Pledge of Allegiance was recited and an invocation offered, House Speaker Frank Chopp set down five goals for a short session with a significant budget problem: Create jobs; fund basic education; save the safety net; ensure equality; and provide opportunity.
Let’s work together on those points, the Seattle Democrat told the full House chamber, like legislators did in 2003 when they coalesced to develop tax breaks Boeing and its workers wanted to help land the 787.
While those broad goals got general agreement and regular applause, minority Republicans were noticeably not clapping on certain points, such as Chopp’s call for “marriage equality,” a term Democrats use for a law that would allow same-sex couples to marry.
Many Republicans also refrained from clapping when Chopp said government does create jobs. To those Republicans who argue it doesn’t, just look at the hydropower projects in Eastern Washington, built with federal dollars and the springboard for public and private jobs; the state should develop “jobs now” programs to fix crumbling infrastructure and help returning veterans, he said.
House Minority Leader Richard DeBolt countered that Republicans were glad to hear calls for more jobs and funding of basic education. But if Chopp and the Democrats are serious, he said, they’d agree to GOP proposals to write a budget that pays for education first and spend what’s left on other programs.
And since Chopp mentioned hydropower, the Chehalis Republican said, how about a proposal the GOP has been pushing for years that would declare power from the dams as “green,” allowing it to be considered in a mix of options that would lower the cost of electricity.
That 2003 package to help Boeing a few years back was only a partial victory, he added. After it passed, the company still moved its corporate headquarters to Chicago.
Legislators’ main task in the session will be to close a looming gap in the 2011-’13 budget between the amount of tax dollars projected to come in and the costs of programs, policies and salaries they approved last spring. Gov. Chris Gregoire is asking for some $1.5 billion in cuts, with the possibility of a temporary half-cent sales tax increase that voters could approve later this year to restore some of the programs.
Judge rules against two-thirds tax law 
gotcha on January 10 at 5:32 a.m.
Gregoire throwing support to gay marriage is nothing more than a ploy to get voters attention away from the real problem which is Public Sector Unions and their unfunded pensions, and bloted benifit packages. Public Sector Unions are a cleaar-cut and blindingly obvious case of conflict of interest. The goverment is supposed to provide services to the people in a cost effective way, providing what’s necessary while extracting the least possible amount of money out of taxpayers. The goal of a union is precisely the opposite : to extract as much money as possible out of the organization that it feeds on. The Union is feeding off the goverment itself—funded by the taxpayers, the very people whose money they’re supposed to be spending frugally. Here in Washington state there is a 59% Union share of state and local goverment employment while California is at 58%. This means it is just a matter of time before we are going to be just like California finiancially and our govenor Gregoire along with a Ms. Lisa Brown have done a fine job of driving us down that road. Collective bargaining has to be struck a severe blow in this state or we will all face its wrath. I for one am sick of the Union bought politicans like Gregoire and Brown. Gregoire will be gone this year. Lets vote Brown out.
DickAdams on January 10 at 9:01 a.m.
gotcha:
I`m in total agreement re your posted comment. I have a hard time understanding why the voters continue to reelect Lisa Brown? IMO, Brown and Gregoire have the reckless spending habits (as the infamous saying goes) “spending money like drunkin sailors”. The pair apparently must be addicted spending taxpayer revenue. The lion share of the money they funnel, is someplace/or person (one example is, Gregoire`s husbands junkets), is such a waste. And for the most part the legislators buy into it or, whatever.