Mon., Feb. 21, 2011
Now that most dust has settled from filling the Spokane Valley’s 4th District Senate seat, it may be safe to answer the question of who was guilty of committing politics to fill that spot. Answer: Everyone. While it’s generally true if everyone’s guilty, no one…
Fri., Feb. 18, 2011
OLYMPIA -- Gov. Chris Gregoire signed most of the supplemental budget designed to keep Washington from slipping into red ink by June 30, using her veto pen for several sections that added back $6.4 million of spending. She said she liked the Legislative spending plan…
Fri., Feb. 18, 2011
OLYMPIA-- With a resolution that read like a sports page account of their come-from-behind Division I football championship win, the Senate honored the Eastern Washington University Eagles during this morning's session. Members of the team held the NCAA trophy high and stood with EWU President…
Thu., Feb. 17, 2011
OLYMPIA -- Proposed changes to the state's initiative laws were blasted as unconstitutional, arrogant and un-American by a Republican senator who tried to block them Thursday. No, they're an attempt to bring modernize the system and protect it, said the Democrat who sponsored the changes.…
Thu., Feb. 17, 2011
OLYMPIA -- The Legislature may find a way to keep the Museum of Arts and Culture and the state museum in Tacoma open, despite Gov. Chris Gregoire's proposal to close them because of budget problems. Senate Majority Leader Lisa Brown said today a coalition of…
Thu., Feb. 17, 2011
OLYMPIA -- A supplemental budget agreement between the House and Senate, which cuts an estimated $242 million in projected state spending between now and June 30, was approved by a special conference committee this morning That means it will go to the chambers for an…
Wed., Feb. 16, 2011
Washington state has to change its popular prepaid college tuition program or risk financial problems down the road, a legislative panel was told Wednesday. The Guaranteed Educational Tuition Program, known to most parents simply as GET, could face insolvency in the long-run because the fund’s…
Wed., Feb. 16, 2011
OLYMPIA -- A few months ago, Mike Baumgartner and Chris Marr were locked in a generally contentious and historically expensive state Senate campaign in Spokane's 6th District. Today, Baumgartner was openly supporting Marr -- for a spot on the state Liquor Control Board. Gov. Chris…
Wed., Feb. 16, 2011
OLYMPIA -- Legislative negotiators have reached a tentative agreement on a plan to cut hundreds of millions from the state's budget through the end of June. It could get a vote in the Senate on Friday morning. The bill reportedly has the support of Democrats…
Tue., Feb. 15, 2011
OLYMPIA – Keeping a dog chained up in unsafe conditions could get the owner fined under a proposed state law being considered by the state Senate. Good senators, said supporters who told the Senate Judiciary that chained or tethered dogs are more likely to turn…
Tue., Feb. 15, 2011
OLYMPIA -- Mid-January storms caused enough damage in Western Washington counties to rate a state of emergency declaration from Gov. Chris Gregoire today. Gregoire said preliminary estimates put the damage to homes, businesses, highways and public faciilties from storms between Jan. 9 and Jan. 26…
Mon., Feb. 14, 2011
Diane Baxter adjusts the flag pin on her husband Jeff Baxter's lapel before he is sworn in Monday. OLYMPIA – As he paused from unpacking books Monday onto mostly empty shelves above a mostly empty desk in his mostly empty office, the Spokane-area’s newest senator…
Mon., Feb. 14, 2011
OLYMPIA -- Wasting no time after being named to the open 4th District Senate seat Friday evening, Jeff Baxter was sworn in Monday morning in a brief ceremony before the day's session got underway. With his wife Diane holding the family Bible, Baxter took the…
Sat., Feb. 12, 2011
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.…
Fri., Feb. 11, 2011
Changes to the state’s unemployment insurance system that will stop tax increases for businesses and temporarily increase benefits for jobless workers were signed Friday as the first completed legislation of this session. With all sides applauding each other for bipartisan and bicameral cooperation, Gov. Chris…
Fri., Feb. 11, 2011
Sen. Mike Baumgartner talks with Sen. Randi Becker Friday on the Senate floor. OLYMPIA -- Spokane Sen. Mike Baumgartner is taking a fair amount of ribbing from colleagues today, not for a vote he took but for one that was taken on him, naming him…
Thu., Feb. 10, 2011
Before he became a honcho in the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development, Ron Sims was King County executive for three terms and was on the county council before that. So it's sometimes easy for folks to forget that he has Spokane roots. Sims,…
Wed., Feb. 9, 2011
OLYMPIA -- After some serious negotiating and head-counts on different options, the House unanimously passed a new version of changes to the unemployment insurance system. It provides businesses with rate relief, cancelling a planned increase in taxes. It's not really a tax cut, Republican leaders…
Tue., Feb. 8, 2011
OLYMPIA – Locally distilled liquor could be bought at farmer’s markets along with organic tomatoes and hand-made candles under a plan being considered by the Legislature. And customers in state liquor stores would be able to taste test some pricy or exotic brands before buying…
Tue., Feb. 8, 2011
OLYMPIA – Washington state could collect about $200 million a year by legalizing marijuana, then regulating, taxing and selling it in state liquor stores, a legislative panel was told Tuesday. But the state could also wind up with no money and any liquor store employee…
Tue., Feb. 8, 2011
OLYMPIA -- A heavy hearing day -- in more ways than one -- with no real floor action scheduled in either chamber. The House Public Safety and Emergency Preparedness Committee has a hearing on a bill to legalize, regulate and tax marijuana. Don't expect any…
Mon., Feb. 7, 2011
The process to fill an empty Senate seat in the Spokane Valley’s 4th Legislative District has resulted in “vicious personal attacks” aimed at himself, his family and “our constitutional foundations and Christian principles,” state Rep. Matt Shea, one of the candidates for the opening, said.…
Mon., Feb. 7, 2011
OLYMPIA -- The state Department of Health has a message for you for flu season: WashYourHandsington. The agency's campaign to get you to get wash up, cover your cough and get your flu shot is summed up in a slogan that puts "Your Hands" between…
Mon., Feb. 7, 2011
Which was the worse pre-Super Bowl omission: Christina Aguilera leaving out a line from the Star Spangled Banner? Or the network leaving out whole sections of the Declaration of Independence? By now everyone knows Aguilera botched the national anthem, leaving out "O'er the ramparts we…
Sat., Feb. 5, 2011
Whom do you hold responsible for the problems Washington schools have graduating kids who can read, write, calculate and be intellectually flexible enough to have a dozen careers before they retire? Put another way, whom do you blame for the fact that nearly one kid…
