Category Archives: Rethinking and Reframing

August 20th, 2012

Tim Eyman’s lawsuit against the Office of Financial Management is without merit

In the CourtsRethinking and Reframing

Last week, as required by law, the Office of Financial Management (OFM) completed and published its fiscal impact statement for Initiative 1185, Tim Eyman’s latest attempt to mess up the plan of government that our founders gave us at statehood.

As we have previously noted, Initiative 1185 basically attempts to do two things:

  • Restate the unconstitutional, undemocratic provision of I-1053 that says any combination of actions that results in higher revenue need a two-thirds vote of each house of the Legislature, and…
  • …  Restate the provision of I-1053 that requires the Legislature to vote on fee increases.

OFM determined that this second provision in I-1185 (the one that pertains to fees) would prevent some already-scheduled toll and fee increases from going into effect, unless the Legislature intervened.

Consequently, OFM attached a price tag to Initiative 1185, estimating that adoption of the initiative would cost the state between $22 and $33 million over the next five years. OFM also concluded that “requiring new legislative approval to impose fees will also prevent implementation of certain businesses and health care certifications.” The agency has calculated that without implementation of those certifications, $2.7 million in revenue will be eliminated, and $3.6 million in expenses will also be eliminated.

Tim Eyman, who is showrunning I-1185 on behalf of powerful, greedy corporations like BP, ConocoPhillips, Shell, and Tesoro, is very unhappy that OFM has exposed what was previously a hidden cost of I-1053 and now I-1185. So he’s filed suit against the state demanding that he and his lawyers be allowed to rewrite the fiscal impact statement to wrongly claim that I-1185 will have no fiscal impact.

Hilariously, Eyman is asking Thurston County Superior Court James Dixon to grant him a writ of mandamus to force the Office of Financial Management to issue a new fiscal impact statement declaring that I-1185 will have no fiscal impact. Failing that, Eyman wants a writ of prohibition to block Secretary of State Sam Reed from including OFM’s already-completed statement in the voters’ pamphlet.

Eyman will be representing himself in court this Friday to argue his case (and no, we’re not making this up), because apparently his corporate backers weren’t interested in paying for someone who actually understands the law (and has been admitted to the bar to practice it) to represent Eyman. Eyman did get help from his friends at Groen & Stepehens to prepare a brief in advance of the court hearing, in which Eyman states the following:

Plaintiff is concerned about inaccurate assumptions expressed in voters’ pamphlet for  two reasons. First, inaccuracies might mislead the voters about what the measure actually does and Washington Courts have been vigilant in avoiding voter confusion. In several cases, the Washington Supreme Court has explained its concern with the potential misleading nature have been vigilant in avoiding voter confusion.

Wait a second. Hasn’t Tim always argued that the voters are smart enough to know when they’re being misled? If OFM is deliberately attempting to deceive the public – as Master Deceiver Tim Eyman says they are – then we’ve got nothing to worry about. The voters will see right through them when it comes time to make a decision on I-1185.

Seriously, though, it’s beyond ironic that Tim Eyman is expressing concern about “inaccuracies” that “might mislead the voters about what the measure actually does”. Tim has been misleading the voters and the press about the true costs and consequences of his initiatives for years.

We’ve seen it firsthand – we’ve been responding to his fabrications for more than a decade. Tim is a very slick salesman … nobody is more effective at spreading misinformation about state government than he is.

This lawsuit is merely Tim’s latest attempt to spread misinformation. What he is trying to do is mask some of the harm that his initiative would cause by hiding OFM’s analysis from the people of the State of Washington.

OFM has a duty to the people and the elected leaders of Washington State to accurately identify and describe fiscal impacts of proposed initiatives.

In 2010, prior to the adoption of Initiative 1053, the agency determined that enactment of I-1053 would not have a direct fiscal impact. At the time, I-1053 was not law, so OFM was making an educated guess about the initiative.

As it turned out, the fee provision of I-1053 (which was not present in I-1053’s predecessor, I-960) did have a direct fiscal impact, so OFM appropriately took that into account when preparing the fiscal impact statement for I-1185.

Tim Eyman is now asking a court to force OFM to not account for its prior mistake – in other words, to not make use of what it has learned about I-1053 since I-1053 went into effect – because he does not want the truth about the consequences of I-1053’s clone I-1185 to be known and to be discussed.

Eyman’s lawsuit is completely without merit. OFM has not committed any wrongdoing. The agency should not be compelled to reissue its fiscal impact statement for I-1185 simply because Tim Eyman doesn’t like it.

Attorney General Rob McKenna – whose office has often defended Eyman’s initiatives (including I-1053 and I-960) in court – has asked Judge James Dixon to deny Eyman’s motion and dismiss the case with prejudice. The brief authored by Steve Dietrich in response to Eyman’s complaint makes it plainly clear that Eyman’s requests for writs of mandamus and prohibition are unwarranted:

Plaintiff argues that one particular assumption that OFM decided to include in the fiscal impact statement is subjective, “inaccurate,” “erroneous,” or “defective” and that it may influence future judicial construction of 1-1185. Plaintiff fundamentally misapprehends the nature of assumptions and the purpose of a fiscal impact statement. A fiscal impact statement is an estimate of the fiscal consequences of a proposed ballot measure if enacted into law, based on assumptions concerning its operation and activities of state government. By definition, assumptions are premises that may or may not hold true. An assumption is “[a] statement accepted or supposed true without proof or demonstration.” American Heritage Dictionary 80 (new college ed. 1982). Voters can judge OFM’s assumptions for themselves and determine whether they agree with them; and certainly, proponents and opponents of the measure may take issue with OFM’ s assumptions and estimates in the public debate that surrounds a ballot measure election. But the assumptions may not be challenged in an action in mandamus.

Because OFM’s responsibility under RCW 29A.72.025 to determine the content of the fiscal impact statement requires the exercise of discretion, Plaintiff’s action for a writ of mandamus must fail. The writ is not available to force OFM to make any particular assumption and Plaintiff’s petition and motion should be denied. For the same reason, Plaintiff’s argument taking issue with one particular OFM assumption is irrelevant. The decision about whether it is necessary to assume something about the effect of the measure for the purpose of making the estimate represents the exercise of OFM’s discretion. The decision about the substance of necessary assumption also involves the exercise of discretion.

Courts have historically been reluctant to issue writs of mandamus or prohibition when asked. Senate Majority Leader Lisa Brown found this out several years ago when the Supreme Court refused to grant her request for a writ of mandamus to overturn Lieutenant Governor Brad Owen’s ruling upholding I-960’s unconstitutional two-thirds requirement in the Senate. (Owen and Brown had been hoping that the court would strike I-960 down as unconstitutional so that the Legislature would be free to democratically deal with the state’s budget shortfall). The Court declined to act, reasoning:

While serving as the presiding officer of the senate, the lieutenant governor is an officer of the legislative branch. State ex rel. Lemon v. Langlie, 45 Wn.2d 82, 98, 273 P.2d 464 (1954). It is beyond the power of the legislature to rule that a law it has enacted is unconstitutional. Wash. State Farm Bureau, 162 Wn.2d at 303-04 (“‘[T]he legislature is precluded by the constitutional doctrine of separation of powers from making judicial determinations.’” (alteration in original) (quoting O’Brien, 85 Wn.2d at 271)).

Owen acted properly by declining to decide the constitutionality of RCW 43.135.035(1) and did not exceed his authority or abuse his discretion by ruling on a point of order consistent with RCW 43.135.035(1). Because we find the duties at issue are discretionary and find no abuse of discretion, we hold that a writ of mandamus would be improper.

Emphasis is ours.

The Court’s decision not to act in that case benefited Eyman, because it did not find his two-thirds scheme to be unconstitutional. (The Court will have another opportunity to do so later this year after it has heard oral arguments in the lawsuit against I-1053).

Ironically, Eyman is now the one asking the judiciary for a writ of mandamus (and, failing that, a writ of prohibition).

If Judge Dixon applies precedent and sense to this case, he will conclude that Eyman’s motion ought to be denied, and the case dismissed.

July 6th, 2012

NO on 1185: Permanent Defense calls on Washingtonians to stop greed, reject latest oil-soaked Eyman initiative this November

Ballot WatchdoggingEye on Money: DevelopmentsRethinking and ReframingStatements & AdvisoriesThreat Analysis

Earlier today in Olympia, Tim Eyman made his annual appearance at the Secretary of State’s Elections Division (as usual, accompanied by Jack and Mike Fagan) to turn in signatures for his latest initiative, made possible by more than a million dollars in contributions from some of the world’s most powerful corporations. The list includes BP, Shell, ConocoPhillips, Coca-Cola, Pepsi, Dr Pepper Snapple Group (through the American Beverage Association), Anheuser-Busch, MillerCoors, Crown Imports, and Heineken USA (through the Beer Institute).

Initiative 1185 is a clone of Initiative 1053, sponsored by Eyman two years ago and backed by many of the aforementioned corporations. It would sabotage our plan of government by allowing one-third of either house of the Legislature to decide the fate of any bill seeking to raise revenue for Washington’s common wealth. I-1053 was itself a clone of I-960 (from 2007), which was based on I-601 (from 1993).

“Initiative 1185, like its predecessors, is a serious threat to the health of our democracy,” said NPI founder Andrew Villeneuve. “Our republic is built on the idea of majority rule with minority rights. Our Constitution explicitly sets the standard for passage of legislation as a majority vote – an interpretation recently affirmed by King County Superior Court Judge Bruce Heller, who concluded that I-1053, I-1185’s predecessor, is unconstitutional on multiple grounds.”

“I-1185 is an illegitimate attempt to amend Article II, Section 22 of our state’s Constitution, which says that a majority vote is the threshold for determining the fate of a bill. I-1185 tries to undemocratically require a higher standard of two-thirds for some bills – specifically, any bills that would raise revenue to fund vital public services like our schools and universities,” Villeneuve added.

“I-1185 is purposely intended to create gridlock in our statehouse, so that a small group of reactionary legislators can wield veto power over important decisions about our state’s budget. That’s wrong.”

“We urge Washingtonians to join us this fall in taking a stand against unchecked corporate greed by voting NO on Initiative 1185.”

“The only reason this measure is going to be on our ballot is because nine corporations and corporate fronts collectively shelled out more than a million dollars to hire mercenary petitioners to collect signatures. They’re betting that they can trick the people of Washington into approving this scheme to shield their tax breaks and tax loopholes from possible repeal. They’ve made it clear they are unwilling to pay their fair share in membership dues to our state, while at the same time disingenuously calling on our state’s leaders to strengthen investment in our schools, universities, roads, and bridges.”

“Here’s what the people of Washington need to know: We can only afford to keep our pubic services strong if we all pitch in, pay our fair share, and work to make our tax system fairer and more equitable. Unfortunately, that’s the last thing these corporations want. We’ve seen their true colors – they’re cheaters who want to rig the system for their own advantage. And they must be stopped.”

Throughout the rest of the summer and into the autumn, NPI’s Permanent Defense will be working with other concerned Washingtonians to build a strong coalition to oppose I-1185 and educate voters as to its true cost and consequences.

An updated list of the top ten contributors to Initiative 1185 is available at Permanent Defense’s Eye on Money page.

The chart shows that the top nine contributors are responsible for a whopping 93% of the total (estimated to be $1,131,704). All of the other contributors – combined – are responsible for only 7%. These figures make it plainly clear that this initiative was bought and paid for by powerful interests, including some of the world’s biggest and most profitable companies.

Who are the top nine?

  • Beer Institute: $400,000
  • BP: $100,000
  • ConocoPhillips: $100,000
  • Tesoro: $100,000
  • Equilon/Shell: $100,000
  • American Beverage Association: $100,000
  • WA Beer & Wine Distributors: $100,000
  • WA Realtors: $25,000
  • WA Restaurant Association: $25,000
  • Everyone Else (multiple entities): $81,703.95

FOR MORE: See State Representative Reuven Carlyle’s blog post about I-1185, The painful irony of using majority rule to eliminate majority rule.

March 5th, 2012

Tim Eyman, master of shameless self-promotion, accuses Senate Democrats of having “a lack of humility and self awareness”

Rethinking and ReframingThreat Analysis

A question for Washington’s press corps: Does the email sent out by Tim Eyman today about last Friday’s chaos in the Senate sound like it was written by an adult?

Because to us it reads like a series of petty schoolyard taunts and put-downs delivered by a third-grader who absolutely refuses to play nice with others.

There’s no substance or truth in this email. It’s just an entertaining pile of meanness. The funniest bit is the last sentence of the first paragraph: “They humiliated themselves publicly but their own lack of humility and self awareness stops them from feeling embarrassed by it.”

That line describes Tim Eyman’s near-constant behavior to a T!

We wonder: How much self-awareness did Tim Eyman gain after he was forced to admit that he took his own supporters’ donations for personal gain?

Here are some of the lowlights from Tim Eyman’s email:

RE:  Olympia’s Democrats throw a childish hissy-fit on Friday, stomping their feet, spitting venom and bile, holding their breath and turning blue … all because (gasp!) they didn’t have the votes but Republicans did – and they’re STILL pouting about it

In November, if Democrats lose their majorities in the state house and/or state senate and/or lose the governorship, it’ll be because they deserve it based on Friday’s childish hissy-fit.  In multiple floor speeches, Senate leader Lisa Brown could not have been more patronizing, superior, holier-than-thou, and condescending.  Wants-to-replace-congressman-Norm-Dicks-who’s-retiring Derek Kilmer nearly bawled like a little baby girl — quivering lip and all.  Craig Pridemore was a sanctimonious blowhard who’s still “searching for a word.”  They humiliated themselves publicly but their own lack of humility and self awareness stops them from feeling embarrassed by it.

Excerpt number two:

Maybe there’s a point when even 3 Democrats get tired of the arrogant, dictatorial, slave-master method of legislative manipulation employed by Speaker Chopp and Senate leader Brown and Governor Gregoire over the past 8 years.  Maybe there’s a point when even 3 Democrats can’t just whore themselves one more time, trading their vote for a bridge in their district and selling out their principles and constituents.  Maybe there’s a point when even 3 Democrats observe the railroading of minority Republicans on a daily basis for 8 years and think to themselves “we’re not omnipotent gods, let’s give some other reform bills a chance to be considered.”

All night long on Friday, the floor speeches by Democrats were pious, hypocritical, and pathetic.  Condescending lectures about abuse-of-process were pathetic and almost laughable.

And finally:

Chris Gregoire, Lisa Brown, Frank Chopp, and the other slave-master Democrats in Olympia have ruled with an iron fist for too long.  Power corrupts — absolute power corrupts absolutely.  These immature, power-obsessed Democrats are illustrating the need for new leadership in Olympia in November.

Eyman had no comment on the particulars of the Senate Republican budget (also supported by three “Democrats”: Rodney Tom, Tim Sheldon, and Jim Kastama).

Nor did he defend Republicans’ failure to gather public input on their proposal. (Republicans pushed their ill-conceived draconian budget out of a back room and directly onto the Senate floor using a little-known parliamentary maneuver called the Ninth Order. Hours later, they voted to approve it and send it over to the House of Representatives, where it faces a very cold reception.)

Just imagine what could happen to our state if Tim Eyman’s cohorts in the Washington State Senate – including I-1053 cosponsors Don Benton, Janea Holmquist Newbry, and Pam Roach – were in charge year-round, as opposed to one day. They’d be gutting our common wealth and eviscerating vital public services under a cloak of darkness. That’s a future our state simply cannot afford.

January 24th, 2012

Tim Eyman refiles HB 1415 as initiative to the people, labels it “Fund Education First” (with what money, Tim?)

Rethinking and Reframing

Yesterday, presumably while he was at the state’s Capitol Campus to testify on a bill he didn’t like, Tim Eyman filed three more initiatives, bringing the total number he’s filed so far this year to eight. The first two are titled “Son of 1053” and “Son of 1125” (and they are comprised of provisions recycled from Eyman’s last two initiatives.)

But the third initiative is altogether different. Eyman filed it under the title “Fund Education First” (no, we’re not joking). However, Eyman didn’t write it. It appears to be a carbon copy of House Bill 1415, filed a year ago by House Republicans. HB 1415 is a short, four-provision bill that would require the Legislature to appropriate funding for Washington’s K-12 schools before appropriating revenue to fund other services.

The full text can be found at the Legislature’s website.

It appears that Eyman has simply lifted the text of the bill in its entirety and is using it as a first draft of an initiative to the people (an initiative he probably has no intention of running). The text will now be reworked by the Code Reviser’s office – at taxpayer expense! – into a format appropriate for an initiative, perhaps with editorial commentary written by Eyman inserted as a preface.

The last provision of HB 1415, by the way, ties the legislation to the fate of a proposed constitutional amendment. This provision will probably be deleted by the Code Reviser’s office since it makes no sense to keep it in.

This act takes effect January 1, 2012, if the proposed amendment to Article IX of the state Constitution HJR . . . . (H-0681.1/11) is validly submitted to and is approved and ratified by the voters at the next general election. If the proposed amendment is not approved and ratified, this act is void in its entirety.

We think it’s beyond ironic that Tim Eyman has filed an initiative to “fund education first”. His own initiatives have made funding vital public services like our public schools nearly impossible. Many schools and school districts have only managed to stave off financial disaster because they’ve been able to raise money through voter-approved levies and bonds or through Parent Teacher Association (PTA) fundraising.

Years of Eyman initiatives have taken a serious toll on our state’s commonwealth. Many of Eyman’s most destructive schemes have been explicitly designed to prevent the Legislature from acting to solve the problem. And Washington’s youth are paying the price. They aren’t getting the education they deserve – the education that the Constitution of Washington State requires us as a society to provide.

It is the paramount duty of the state to make ample provision for the education of all children residing within its borders, without distinction or preference on account of race, color, caste, or sex.

It is up to us to make our Constitution a living document. If we don’t uphold our Constitution, its provisions become nothing more than words on a page. Our Founding Fathers gave us an enduring plan of government which calls for majority rule with minority rights. Unfortunately, majority rule has now been sabotaged by multiple Tim Eyman initiatives, which have also indirectly harmed all of the public services our commonwealth pays for.

The disingenuous “Fund education first” mantra that Eyman and others are propagating must be rejected. We cannot fund our schools by taking away funding from our universities, corrections system, social safety net, state parks, or other services. That’s robbing Peter to pay Paul. There are no shortcuts we can take, or corners we can cut, that will get us out of this mess. There is no free lunch. A moral budget ultimately comes down to math, for public services cost money. And we are not raising enough money to pay for the services we want and need.

We are clearly not asking enough of ourselves. We need to stop dithering, backfilling, and sliding. That means raising taxes and beginning to work on addressing our broken tax structure so that we can sustain our commonwealth long-term.

Yes, times are tough. But recessions are precisely when we depend on our public services the most. Austerity measures will not help our economy recover. They create a vicious cycle that leads to more gloom and unemployment. We can only break that cycle by strengthening our commonwealth.

November 23rd, 2011

Debunking Tim Eyman’s budget fabrications

Rethinking and ReframingStatements & Advisories

Eager to put the failure of I-1125 behind him, Tim Eyman has, in recent days, resorted to attacking one of his favorite targets (Governor Chris Gregoire) in his multi-weekly fundraising appeals to his band of followers.

Eyman’s latest email, dated today, is a doozy; to describe it as chock-full of fabrications would be a major understatement. It is impressively crammed with blatantly false statements and mischaracterizations.

On occasion, we take the time to deconstruct Tim Eyman’s nonsense blow-by-blow, to illustrate what we mean when we say that he is a snake oil salesman.

We’ve done that again today.

For your reading enjoyment, here is the most dishonest, deceptive paragraph from Eyman’s email, followed by our line-by-line refutation of it.

Gregoire’s first term involved explosive spending growth that was completely unsustainable: 34% spending increases. Her mountain of spending made the valley of deficits that much deeper. So by their crazy math, they claim they’ve cut spending $10 billion. And they believe the only ‘fair’ way to balance the budget is with 1/2 tax increases, 1/2 spending cuts. So that means $5 billion in tax hikes, not $500 million. If not for I-1053, they could take as much as they want and with an “emergency clause” slapped on, there’d be nothing the voters could do about it.

Let’s take this paragraph apart.

Claim #1: “Gregoire’s first term involved explosive spending growth that was completely unsustainable:  34% spending increases. Her mountain of spending made the valley of deficits that much deeper.”

False. Governor Chris Gregoire’s first term began on January 12th, 2005 and ended January 14th, 2009. During those four years, state and local expenditures per $1,000 of personal income actually fell. (This is the measurement economists use to compare our government’s finances from year to year).

According to the Office of Financial Management, state and local expenditures per $1,000 of personal income were $205.75 in 2004 – the year before Gregoire took office. In 2005, they declined slightly to $199.41, and they dropped again in 2006 to $196.41. Expenditures stayed constant in 2007 and then went up a smidgen in 2008. Here’s a table, which can also be seen on OFM’s website.

2008 $197.74
2007 $196.41
2006 $196.41
2005 $199.48

That page also has a chart showing that expenditures have been somewhat constant over the last two decades. There have been highs and lows, but no wild swings.

OFM’s data, by the way, is derived from the U.S. Census Bureau and the U.S. Bureau of Economic Analysis.

Eyman’s “explosive spending growth” claim is pure fiction, and he knows it.
Claim #2: So by their crazy math, they claim they’ve cut spending $10 billion.
In reality, it’s Eyman’s math that’s crazy – not the governor’s and not OFM’s. Eyman routinely (and dishonestly) fabricates numbers. Being accurate is not important to him. Unlike Eyman, Governor Gregoire and state economists have to operate in the real world. They can’t lie with impunity like he can.
The correct figure is actually $10.5 billion in cuts over the last three years, not $10 billion. It should be understood that $500 million is not an insignificant amount of money. In fact, it’s a huge amount of money.

Claim #3: “[T]hey believe the only ‘fair’ way to balance the budget is with 1/2 tax increases, 1/2 spending cuts.”

False. We assume that “they” means Governor Gregoire and Democratic lawmakers (it’s not clear who else Eyman would be referring to). To our knowledge, neither Democratic legislative leaders nor any subset of the House and Senate Democratic caucuses have formally released a plan for addressing the latest budget shortfall, let alone a plan with a formula of “1/2 tax increases, 1/2 spending cuts.”

Governor Chris Gregoire, on the other hand, has released a plan for addressing the budget shortfall. If adopted as proposed, it would make $2 billion in cuts, raise $835 million in revenue, and leave $600 million in reserves. The $2 billion in proposed cuts is more than twice the amount of proposed new revenue.

The governor has repeatedly made it clear she does not want to make any more cuts to vital services, period. “I don’t want anyone to think that I like these options,” Gregoire said on October 27th, when she rolled out the first draft of her plan for dealing with the budget shortfall (which did not include any revenue increases).

Contrary to what Eyman implied in his email today, Gregoire has not used the word “fair” to describe her more recent, amended proposal, which calls for some revenue to cancel out devastating cuts. That’s probably because she recognizes that there is nothing that’s fair about the situation we’re in as a state, and nothing fair about a response that is mostly oriented around counterproductive austerity measures (which is a kinder way of saying evisceration of vital public services that people rely on).

What the governor did say is this: “After three years of cutting, now is the time to invest in a better future for all Washingtonians… I believe Washingtonians will stand with me. I believe they are tired of tearing down the services our parents and grandparents built — services that reflect the special values of Washington State.”

Claim #4: So that means $5 billion in tax hikes, not $500 million.

False. The governor has proposed increasing the state sales tax from 6.5% to 7%. The increase would be temporary, expiring on July 1st, 2015. The increase would go into effect on July 1st, 2012, and is projected to bring in $494 million through June 30th, 2013. If it brought in a similar amount in the two subsequent years it remained in effect, then the total raised would amount to approximately $1.5 billion.

The governor is also asking the Legislature to approve $341 million in additional revenue alternatives, some of which are temporary. If all of them were approved, that would bring the total raised through June 30th, 2013, to $835 million.

The Office of Financial Management has not estimated how much revenue the governor’s plan would bring in through July 1st, 2015. But even if we assumed that the governor’s plan would increase state revenue by $835 million per year beginning July 1st, 2012, and ending July 1st, 2015, that’s still only $2.5 billion… not $5 billion.

Claim #5: If not for I-1053, they could take as much as they want and with an “emergency clause” slapped on, there’d be nothing the voters could do about it.

False. Voters have the power to fire the entire House of Representatives and half the Senate every two years. If we the people of Washington don’t like the decisions our lawmakers make, we can vote our lawmakers out of office. That’s what representative democracy is all about. (Every Washington voter, Tim Eyman included, is represented by two state representatives and one state senator).

Furthermore, as the American Beverage Association proved last year with Initiative 1107, it is possible to force a public vote on a revenue increase even if the emergency clause is invoked. That’s because, although a bill with the emergency clause attached cannot be subject to referendum, it can still be repealed by initiative.

During the 2010 legislative session, lawmakers voted to slightly raise taxes on soda. The ABA (which is mostly funded and controlled by The Coca-Cola Company, PepsiCo, and Dr Pepper Snapple Group) responded by dumping $16 million into I-1107, a statewide initiative which was approved at the November 2010 general election. I-1107 rescinded the tax increase on soda, the tax increase on candy, and put back into place an unfair tax exemption the Legislature had repealed.

October 26th, 2011

Danny Westneat assails Tim Eyman’s secret war on light rail

From the Campaign TrailRethinking and Reframing

Seattle Times columnist Danny Westneat has a blistering must-read column in today’s edition of the Seattle Times, taking Tim Eyman and Kemper Freeman Jr. to task for quietly trying to stop Sound Transit’s East Link project through a sneaky provision buried in I-1125, which is intended to kill East Link, but doesn’t actually mention the project or even include the words “light rail”.

When Tim Eyman went before the Bellevue City Council recently, he handed out a sheet describing what his latest idea, Initiative 1125, would do.

It’s what was missing from the sheet that got the most attention.

“I’ve never seen an initiative quite like this, where its intentions are masked from the people who will vote on it,” says Grant Degginger, a Bellevue City Council member and former mayor.

“If you’re trying to kill light rail, just come out and say so.”

It’s not just that the words “light rail” weren’t in Eyman’s handout that day. They also are not in the Voter’s Guide statement for the I-1125 campaign. Nor in any of Eyman’s campaign news releases. Nor in recent op-eds written by Eyman and the initiative’s financier, Bellevue developer Kemper Freeman.

The words “light rail” aren’t in I-1125 or in Eyman’s campaign materials because Eyman and Freeman apparently don’t want to be seen as trying to overturn the will of the voters. (The phrase will of the voters is one of Eyman’s favorites). Both Eyman and Freeman opposed Sound Transit 2 when it was on the ballot three years ago, but they lost. In fact, they didn’t just lose, they lost big.

As Westneat notes:

[P]utting light rail across the Interstate 90 bridge is already voter-approved, by a 57 percent vote in the 2008 election. Brochures from that campaign show a rendering of the bridge with light rail running on it, along with before-and-after drawings of how the traffic lanes would be altered. So it’s hard to argue people didn’t know what they were voting for. Then, anyway.

Of course, in Tim Eyman’s mind, a vote of the people only counts when it goes his way. Eyman views his own losses as temporary setbacks, but he demands that his opponents recognize his victories as permanent. It’s quite the double standard.

Please join us in voting NO on I-1125 this autumn. Keep Sound Transit’s East Link project on track, keep our roads safe, and keep Washington rolling.

September 16th, 2011

RE: Given the state’s newest revenue forecast…

Legislation & TestimonyRethinking and ReframingStatements & Advisories

Washington’s Legislature passed a budget last spring that relied on revenue forecasts which were too optimistic. The Economic and Revenue Forecast Council yesterday projected that the state will collect $1.4 billion less in taxes between now and 2013 than it had previously estimated.

Consequently, Governor Gregoire and lawmakers must now figure out how to close yet another deficit, after having already eliminated or slashed vital public services earlier this year.

Unless the governor and lawmaker decide to raise revenue to close the shortfall, there is no way that this deficit can be closed without hurting the lives of Washington families, especially seniors, youth, and veterans. We are the past the point, figuratively speaking, where we are scraping bone as a state, in terms of our public services. Without new revenue, we’ll have to chop off limbs.

The governor and state lawmakers ought to call upon those who fiercely oppose raising revenue – including Tim Eyman and his corporate allies – and insist that they help write a modified state budget. The time has come for the people responsible for bringing us Initiative 1053 to take responsibility for the consequences stemming from the outcome of the election they bought.

Tim Eyman has turned himself into a full-time citizen – sorry, make that corporate – lawmaker. If lawmaking is what he wants to do, then he needs to be accountable like any other lawmaker. We have a fiscal emergency.

This is an all hands on deck situation.

We at NPI propose that the state begin closing this $1.4 billion shortfall by sunsetting outdated and unnecessary tax loopholes.

For instance, there is a loophole on our books now which allows Wall Street banks to avoid paying business and occupation taxes on the interest or investment earnings made from the interest from residential first mortgages. There are dozens upon dozens of loopholes like this that could be closed, which could save what is left of our public services from being further eviscerated.

If Tim Eyman and his sympathizers do not want to raise revenue as we propose, then they must spell out what they want to cut. That is the only other choice. Eyman said today, “With I-1053, tax increases become an absolute last resort… Olympia must exhaust all other options first. That’s what the people want.”

Actually, what people want is for the economy to get better. But it won’t as long we keep wrecking government and destroying public services, which is the only course of action that I-1053 was designed to allow.

We encourage reporters and lawmakers to take every opportunity to ask Tim Eyman: What “other options” do you have in mind?

Should we cut off our universities and colleges and say, “You’re on your own! No more state money!” Should we begin releasing prison inmates early? Should we end Apple Health or Disability Lifeline entirely?

As a state, we can either move forward or slide backward. We can move forward by raising revenue to save vital public services that we all depend on. Or, we can slide backward by eliminating services, laying off more public workers, and abandoning people who desperately need help.

There isn’t a third choice.

Our elected lawmakers have spent the last decade backfilling like crazy, cleaning up after unelected lawmakers like Tim Eyman. Well, the days when we could backfill and mitigate the ramifications Eyman’s initiatives are over.

Now come the days of reckoning.

For too long, Governor Gregoire and lawmakers have tried to ignore Tim Eyman because they haven’t wanted to confront him.

But we need a confrontation. Washingtonians need to be given an opportunity to think about what kind of state they want to live in before the governor and Legislature play TimCity for real. If Eyman and his corporate backers want a budget with no new revenue in it, they need to help write that budget. The governor and state lawmakers should insist that they participate in identifying cuts.

And reporters should start replying to every email Tim Eyman sends with a simple one-liner: Hey Tim… what do you think we should cut?

August 15th, 2011

Voters in King County never demanded “$30 car tabs”

Election PostmortemRethinking and Reframing

Still mad over King County Executive Dow Constantine’s successful efforts to patch Metro’s funding shortfall, Tim Eyman is now asking his supporters to print out and hang up an eight and one half by eleven inch poster which accosts King County Councilmembers Jane Hague and Kathy Lambert as liars, Councilmember Julia Patterson as a sell-out, and Councilmember Bob Ferguson as… wait for it… Switzerland (because he didn’t say at the outset of the debate how he would vote).

In his email announcing the poster, Eyman complains:

“Whatever happened to our $30 car tabs?”  We hear it all the time from citizens. Voters have twice approved $30 car tabs and required that anything higher than $30 requires voter approval. It’s what the voters demanded and what the politicians promised (after I-695 was rejected by the courts — Governor Gary Locke said “Regardless of the court’s ruling today, $30 tabs are here to stay.”).

While Initiatives 695 and 776 (which Eyman is referring to) did pass statewide, they both failed in King County. In other words, King County actually voted against $30 car tabs… twice. So, in choosing to raise vehicle fees to save Metro, King County’s leaders were actually not only taking a just and moral action to protect a vital public service, they were respecting the will of the people they represent.

(Initiative 695, on the ballot in 1999, failed in King County by a vote of 53.34% to 46.66%. Initiative 776, on the ballot in 2002, failed in King County by a vote of 59.57% to 40.43%. Neither outcome was close).

June 6th, 2011

Memo to the Seattle Times: Majority vote means fifty percent plus one – no more, no less!

Election PostmortemIn the CourtsRethinking and Reframing

The following is the text of the letter to the editor sent by NPI to the Seattle Times in response to the Times’ Sunday editorial urging the state Supreme Court not to strike down I-1053 if it receives an opportunity to do so.

In your Sunday, June 5th editorial (State’s two-thirds rule on taxes should be retained), you contend that Tim Eyman and BP’s Initiative 1053 (which violates Article II, Section 22) could pass constitutional muster:

The constitution does say a majority, but it uses negative language. It says, ‘No bill shall become a law’ without a majority. The state’s Republican attorney general, Rob McKenna, argues that this sets a minimum standard, and that the voters, through the initiative process, may temporarily raise it.

A similar argument was made by proponents of a 1053-like measure in Alaska several years ago, and rejected by Alaska’s Supreme Court in Alaskans for Efficient Government v. State of Alaska (2007). “Other courts interpreting constitutional language have wisely refrained from attributing any automatic significance to the distinction between negative and positive phrasing,” the Court ruled.

Referring to the proponents (Alaskans for Efficient Government), the Court added:

AFEG’s logic would just as readily compel the anomalous conclusion that section 14 was meant to set a ceiling but not a floor — that a majority vote would be the maximum needed to enact any bill, but the legislature would remain free to specify a sub-majority vote as sufficient to enact laws dealing with specified subjects, as it saw fit.

Majority vote means fifty percent plus one. No more, no less. There is no minimum standard. There is only the standard the founders intended – the only standard that makes sense in a democracy.

Our founders knew when it was appropriate to use supermajorities to protect minority rights from mob rule. Wherever a supermajority is required, the Constitution spells it out. But there is no reference to supermajorities in Article II, Section 22. That’s because the founders intended for a majority vote to decide the fate of all bills – not just some bills.

Initiative 1053 is a slippery slope. Unless it is struck down, we will not be protected against future copycat measures that undemocratically tie lawmakers’ hands and prevent our republic from functioning as it was designed to.

The Times gravely errs in attempting to justify its support of an initiative that dangerously undermines our plan of government.

POSTSCRIPT: The Seattle Times has published this letter online.

May 18th, 2011

Hypocrisy, thy name is Eyman: Voters Want More Choices responds to underhanded tactics with campaign of harassment

Rethinking and Reframing

Yesterday, one of Washington’s largest daily newspapers, the Everett Herald, semi-outed a commenter who has been regularly defending red-light cameras in the comment threads of news stories the Herald has published about city governments’ deliberations over whether or not to use them.

It turns out this commenter, “W Howard”, is actually Bill Kroske, a vice president for development at one of the nation’s largest red light camera manufacturers – American Traffic Solutions. The Herald was able to find this out because Kroske used his work email address when submitting comments, which either means he doesn’t understand how to cover his tracks on the Internet or wasn’t even trying.

The story would have been interesting enough without any reaction from Tim Eyman, but the reporters who wrote the post, like so many of their colleagues, apparently feel some sort of obligation to give Eyman extra and unnecessary exposure.

But maybe it was a good thing they did, because as a result of them asking Tim for his thoughts, we got this gem of a sound bite:

Eyman chuckled when told about the Kroske connection.

“It shows a level of sophistication and manipulation,” he said. “… If you’ve got a product that everybody loves it is going to be self evident. You don’t need to manipulate web sites, sounding boards and impersonate local folks to get the message out.”

Oh really? If that’s the case, then why does Tim spend so much of his time manipulating websites and sounding boards to get his message out?

Not to mention paying reporters a visit, or calling them, or emailing them. (That’s partly why the press corps can’t ignore him. Eyman makes sure that they can’t. He has a gift for media manipulation, and he uses it to the fullest extent he can).

Anybody who has looked at the comment thread of a news story about Tim Eyman knows exactly what we’re talking about. Eyman shows up, posts links to his websites, trashes opponents, and debates other commenters. But his activities are hardly limited to that. He regularly reposts his emails on the region’s best known right-wing blog, (un)Sound Politics. He crafts talking points into op-eds so he can get his message directly into websites operated by media outlets.

He’s even edited his own Wikipedia entry.

Pretty much all of Tim’s activities shows a level of sophistication and manipulation that impresses us. It also worries us, because his means and ends are incredibly destructive in more than one way.

For instance, Eyman’s response to the story was to email all of his supporters and urge them to pepper Bill Kroske with nastygrams, and then send nastygrams to a long list of city councilmembers from Mukilteo, Monroe, Bellingham, Seattle, and Redmond, the hometown of NPI and Permanent Defense.

Now, there’s nothing wrong with constituents writing to their councilmember, but Eyman is hardly trying to encourage civil discourse here. He’s waging a campaign of harassment against people he portrays as evil.

What does that make him and those of his followers who do as he asks?

And what’s the deal with Eyman calling out Bill Kroske and American Traffic Solutions for trying to make money? Doesn’t right wing dogma say that’s a good thing? “[T]he Everett Herald has exposed the lengths they’ll go to as a corporate policy to protect those profits,” Eyman declared in his email this afternoon.

That’s funny, because the same point could be made about BP, ConocoPhillips, Shell, Bank of America, Wells Fargo, JPMorgan Chase, USBank, and the host of other powerful corporations that donated big bucks to put Tim’s Initiative 1053 on the ballot last year. Without their money, I-1053 couldn’t have made it, as Tim well knows. They ponied up for Eyman because I-1053 helps them protect their profits – at our expense – on a grand scale.

Tim obviously doesn’t care about big corporations running roughshod over the rest of us – he’s defended his corporate support on many occasions.

That just proves what we’ve tried to point out for years: Tim Eyman is not a champion, a guru, or a populist. He is a professional political operative, living off of the huge checks written to him by some of the wealthiest, most powerful people and businesses in the state. The persona he’s crafted for himself is fake, and yet somehow, he’s managed to dupe some sadly misguided people into believing that he’s making Washington State a better place to live.

How? By destroying our common wealth? Gutting public services? Wrecking representative democracy? Lowering the level of discourse with endless name calling and campaigns of harassment against elected officials and public employees?

Eyman says it’s outrageous that a business executive misrepresented himself in comment threads on a newspaper’s website. What’s even more outrageous is Tim Eyman’s giant double standard. The loophole Eyman has created for himself in his own bizarrely construed moral system is so large you could drive a Mac truck through it – to borrow a reference from one of Tim’s recent emails.

The Everett Herald has shown a light on what Kroske was doing. That’s healthy and helpful for our public discourse. What is not helpful is the campaign of harassment Eyman is trying to wage. He is purposely trying to provoke his supporters into acting like jerks. No doubt next week, he’ll selectively quote from some of the more nicely-worded nastygrams and congratulate his followers on their ability to behave reasonably in the face of bullying.

The truth is, Eyman’s his most vocal followers are the ones who are doing the bullying. They shout, they make unsupported claims, they mimic Eyman’s name calling, they express a desire to see harm come to those they disagree with. We have seen all of that, firsthand, because NPI was one of Eyman’s recent targets.

There’s nothing more American than having an opinion and expressing it. But a democracy cannot survive without majority rule, which is espoused in our Constitution, and a civil discourse. The people who call themselves Voters Want More Choices are regrettably doing all they can to undermine both.

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