Deal Sought On Affirmative Action Measure Lawmaker Pushes For ‘Middle Ground Plan’ To Keep Programs But Bar Specific Quotas

Supporters of affirmative action, rallying at the Capitol on Tuesday in opposition to a proposed rollback initiative, urged lawmakers to offer voters a milder alternative on the ballot this November.

However, even the prime sponsor of Option B, Sen. Eugene Prince, R-Thornton, said it has almost no chance of clearing the Republican-controlled Legislature. He also predicted the state Senate won’t vote on Initiative 200, the rollback plan.

That would mean a straight up-or-down vote on the initiative by voters this fall without a competing plan.

Prince, a moderate who already has irritated his party by balking at their “tax-free” transportation funding proposal, is the sponsor of what he calls a “middle ground plan” between the initiative and the status quo.

His plan, quickly embraced by forces who oppose the initiative, would allow existing affirmative action programs to continue, but would prohibit any specific quotas.

Initiative 200, patterned after the measure that passed in California in 1996, would ban preferential treatment of women and minorities in state and local government employment, contracting and college admission.

Prince said that goes too far.

“I agree with phasing down affirmative action, but 200 is pretty extreme,” he said in an interview. “We still need to make progress towards equality. We need a middle ground.”

But Rep. Scott Smith, R-Graham, co-sponsor of the initiative, said the alternative is “utterly meaningless” and would simply restate the current law.

“It is a misguided attempt to confuse the public, and when the public is confused, they vote no,” he said in an interview.

Gov. Gary Locke, a staunch opponent of the measure, was featured speaker at a rally that drew about 300 foes, including students, minorities, women’s groups, gay-rights activists, religious groups, union members and Democratic legislators.

Locke, the country’s first Chinese-American governor and an affirmative action admission to Yale years ago, invoked the name of slain civil rights leader Martin Luther King Jr.

“We must move from celebrating his legacy to moving heaven and earth to preserve his legacy of reconciliation and moral progress,” he told the cheering crowd.

“We must re-light the fire of hope and opportunity,” he said, adding, “We need open minds, rather than closed doors. … I don’t want our state moving backwards.”

Smith said both House Speaker Clyde Ballard, R-East Wenatchee, and Senate Majority Leader Dan McDonald, R-Bellevue, support the initiative and that he’s confident both houses will take a vote later this session. But he conceded that Ballard hasn’t promised him a vote, and Prince said he has been told that a Senate vote is unlikely.