Democrats Accuse Gop Of Assaulting Working Families

House Democrats on Monday accused the Republican majority of having an “anti-working family” agenda that includes proposals to cut health care, unemployment pay and work place safety.

House Speaker Clyde Ballard, R-East Wenatchee, retorted that the Democrats are failing to mention legislation that benefits working people, such as a $9 million-a-year financing package to preserve 670 jobs in Lewis County.

“We are seeing in Olympia an unprecedented attack on working families. We are outraged at what is happening this year,” said Rep. Frank Chopp, D-Seattle.

He and his colleagues held a news conference Monday to lay out measures they said are especially damaging to working families, and to complain about GOP disinterest in their proposal to increase the minimum wage.

The House Democrats said they expect the House GOP, and possibly their Senate colleagues, to pass legislation to:

Reduce by between 15 percent and 29 percent the size of unemployment checks to hold down unemployment insurance tax increases.

Permit restaurant owners to count as wages a portion of tips received by waitresses and waiters.

Allow employers to work teenagers nearly 40 hours a week during the school year.

Make it more difficult for injured workers to sue an employer for neglecting work place safety regulations.

Reduce money available to retrain workers laid off because of cutbacks in the timber and pulp and paper industries.

Revise laws to make it harder for people to get health insurance and then to get coverage for existing conditions by allowing applicants to sign up for health insurance only in July of each year.

All of those measures face strong prospects of being vetoed by Democratic Gov. Gary Locke if they reach his desk.

Chopp and his colleagues also complained bitterly that the GOP had refused even a hearing on a Democratic proposal to raise the $4.90 minimum wage up to $6.50 an hour.

Ballard said Republicans are busy “trying to reverse a lot of the anti-business actions the Democrats engaged down here for years. Take the minimum wage. How much is enough? Why not take it to $10 an hour? They (Democrats) would if they could.”

Ballard said much of what the GOP is trying to do is lift the “tax and regulatory burden on business so it can afford to expand and hire more people.”

He also noted that Republicans are putting the finishing touches on legislation, also supported by Locke, to finance new pollution control equipment for the Centralia Steam Plant and adjacent coal mine so that the operation can continue for another quarter century. The help would in the form of tax breaks valued at about $9 million a year.

“We’re talking about 670 family wage jobs there,” Ballard said. “If that isn’t helping the working family, I don’t know what is.”