After weeks of discussion about moving Washington's too-late-to-matter presidential primary from May 27 to something several months earlier, a panel of top elected officials and party leaders convened under the Tiffany chandeliers of the state capitol reception room and...deadlocked.Five Republicans, including Secretary of State Sam…
Interesting fact, according to the hard-working House Judiciary research staff: All 50 states grant some form of privilege for clergy-penitent communications. In other words, no one can compel a member of the clergy to tell investigators -- or anyone else -- about what is said…
"I don't want it to be collegial. I want it to be a lot more hostile." --Initiative promoter Tim Eyman, on the mutual praise between State Auditor Brian Sonntag and the state Department of General Administration during the first of a long series of new…
Three years after the state Supreme Court ruled that it's unconstitutional for companies or nonprofits to use prison-inmate labor, lawmakers want to rewrite that 118-year-old clause of the constitution.The workers are paid for their time – although more than half of that money can be…
"It's gone on too far. If I knock on one more door during the next election campaign and have people laughing when I talk about the North South Corridor, it won't be good."-- Sen. Chris Marr, D-Spokane, on the same topic.
Savvy readers of our print edition may have a done a double-take this morning, when they saw our front-page headline: "House Passes Budget Plan."That, of course, should have been "House Proposes Budget Plan."I don't write the headlines.
"In the year 2000, you're going to see a different education system and it's going to be better. We want our students to compete not just with neighboring districts, but with the world."That was Washington's superintendent of public instruction – 13 years ago."We are competing…
Three teens die in a fiery gas pipeline explosion. Two are minors; their grief-stricken parents sue for the pain and suffering of losing their children. Another is 18, however. And under the law, his equally grief-stricken parents are left unable to do the same thing.That's…
The House went late again Tuesday night, debating until about 11:30 in a rush to try to get bills through before today's 5 p.m. cutoff.Among the things that passed: Rep. Joyce McDonald's HB 1214, which bans people from trying to text-message someone on a cell…
After months of political jousting over how to replace Seattle's decades-old Alaskan Way Viaduct, the voters there have spoken.The question: How to replace the ugly, noisy elevated highway along Seattle's otherwise-scenic waterfront? The cheaper option, although not cheap, is to simply replace it with another…
As curious preschoolers peered over the edge of the table (and one mugged for the camera), Gov. Chris Gregoire on Tuesday signed a new law that will provide health coverage to thousands more children in Washington.The law will expand coverage to an additional 38,000 children…
As Tuesday afternoon fades into evening -- and a likely late night as lawmakers try to beat tomorrow's bill cutoff -- it seems a good time to reflect on the sausage-making that is legislation.For all the Senate-clashes-over-something stories, many of the thousands of bills that…
Sen. Bob Morton, R-Orient, scored a win this week, when the Senate passed his SB 5461.It sound like a little change: making permanent state timber officials' four-year-old authority to contract with crews to fell trees according to specific instructions, instead of the more common system…
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--Sen. Chris Marr's bill to dramatically expand health coverage of poor and some middle-income children in Washington passed the House yesterday, and could be signed into law by Gov. Chris Gregoire as early as Monday.--The Senate has passed Senate Majority Leader Lisa Brown's SJM 8012,…
"Men who never get carried away should be." - Malcolm Forbes
We ask forgiveness for the over 500,000 Christians in Washington State who did not vote in the last election resulting in the current disaster in Olympia. We pray forgiveness for the many Christians who concern themselves only with their own family and church and who…
Two years after two seismologists were killed when huge logs tumbled off a speeding and overloaded logging truck, the House of Representatives has approved a bill to launch a tracking system for large trucks, with safety violations added to the same database now used to…
State Rep. Dean Takko is trying to steer a little more money into pothole-fixes and sidewalk repairs for small cities. Co-sponsors include local Rep. Steve Hailey, R-Mesa.Takko's HB 1482, unanimously approved by the House on Wednesday, would double a small fund set up to help…
In a few minutes.It's SB 5336.
Man Will Not Be Charged in Death at Screaming Yak.
"Outraged" by the recent release of dozens of felons due to a shortage of space, Gov. Chris Gregoire took the rare public step this afternoon of publicly blasting her own corrections secretary, Harold Clarke.The prisoners who were let out of jail had been arrested again…
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Sen. Chris Marr is running into some political headwinds in his push to change the law so all sex crimes against children can be prosecuted until the day the abuser dies.Consider:•A week after Marr, D-Spokane, had more than half the state Senate signed on as…
Everett horticulturalist Steve Sarich suprised everyone Tuesday by showing up at a Senate hearing with a small cardboard box that I think said "raspberries" on the side.Raspberries they were not.Sarich, there for a hearing on a bill (SB 6032) to toughen the legal protections for…
Short takes and breaking news from the Washington Legislature and the state capital.
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