Taxes, Timing, Election Stand In Stadium’s Way

To understand why the Legislature is not at all likely to hold a special session to help the Seattle Mariners get a new ballpark, first understand the politics of taxes, timing and the 1996 election.

Forget for the moment what it is lawmakers could or would do for the Mariners if they actually met, wrapped as they are in the flag of less spending and lower taxes.

Would they sacrifice principle for expediency? And if so, would they dare do what King County voters refused to do, finance a new stadium?

“I don’t think so,” veteran Rep. Ruth Fisher, D-Tacoma, said Tuesday. “Give me a break. King County voters said no, no, no.”

But never mind all that. In order to do something, the Legislature first must get here, and people around here think that won’t happen until January, the start of the regular session.

The reason?

It all has to do with taxes, timing and the 1996 elections.

First the taxes. Majority House Republicans say any special session must include votes to override or modify Gov. Mike Lowry’s vetoes this year of $265 million in tax cuts for business and property owners. But neither Lowry nor Majority Senate Democrats want to take such a vote, and timing has everything to do with that.

Senate Democrats, if not Lowry, are increasingly comfortable that a tax cut of some sort can be granted next year - an election year. Senate Majority Leader Marcus Gaspard said as much last week after state economists noted a budget surplus of nearly $700 million combined with growing and stable revenues.

But if Democrats agree to a round of tax cuts in a special session this year, they leave themselves little room for a cut next year, a year when half the Senate and all of the House are up for election. And they know that Republicans would push hard for even more tax cuts, leaving the Democrats looking like the spoilers only months before voters go to the polls.

“I do believe the Democrats don’t want to use up a tax-cutting opportunity this year when they can use it next year,” agreed Sen. Emilio Cantu, R-Bellevue, one of the lawmakers pressing for a special session to cut taxes and help the Mariners.

Lowry called the stadium proposal an important quality-of-life issue, but also has said he will not call a special session without a guarantee that tax cuts will be off the table.

Cantu and other Republicans say that in good conscience, they cannot agree to a special session without fighting for tax cuts, so it’s a stalemate.

Privately, many legislators who don’t live in pennant-hungry King County say they don’t see how such a stalemate can be broken.

But Cantu and his King County colleagues also say they’re holding out hope that enough pressure can be brought to force Democrats into a special session, tax-cut votes and all.

The governor, meanwhile, promises to convene a meeting of state, local and Mariners officials to discuss ways to build a stadium and keep the winning baseball team in Seattle.

But don’t bet on one of those ways being a special session to help the Mariners.