Inside the editorial page

What's on the minds of TNT editorial writers

Thursday, May 1st, 2008

Posted by Patrick O'Callahan @ 03:27:22 pm

We're all delighted about Congress' belated creation of the Wild Sky Wilderness Area, which will put 106,000 acres of the Cascade Mountains under federal protection.

But there's a curious omission in this excerpted press release from the Sierra Club, Wilderness Society and other enviros. Can you spot it? (Answer below.)

Wild Sky Wilderness Passes Congress

Conservation Community Celebrates Congressman Larsen's and Senator Murray's Commitment to Washington's Wilderness

Seattle – After years of work, supporters of the Wild Sky Wilderness Act (H.R. 886/S. 520) celebrated today as the legislation passed Congress and was sent to the White House for final approval. Conservationists praised Congressman Larsen and Senator Murray for their unwavering commitment to Washington's wildlands and thanked them for their support of the people and the places that make Washington state such a great place to call home.

"Congressman Larsen and Senator Murray are true heroes of our state's environment. They have never stopped fighting for Wild Sky and today we can finally start celebrating the first new wilderness in Washington in more than 20 years,” said Tom Uniack, Conservation Director of the Washington Wilderness Coalition. "Senator Murray and Representative Larsen are fortunate to have had strong support from Washington's congressional delegation throughout this process, including Congressmen Jay Inslee and Norm Dicks and Senator Maria Cantwell.”

After more than six years of legislative action, the Wild Sky Wilderness Act has now passed both the House and Senate and is headed to the President's desk, where he is expected to sign the bill into law.

The omission: U.S. Rep. Dave Reichert – a co-sponsor and champion of the Wild Sky bill.

Reichert is hardly lacking in green credentials. But this is an election year. Heaven forbid that an ounce of credit, for anything, should go to a Republican up for re-election.

Categories: Taking notice • 1 comment

Sutherland sets campaign kickoff

Posted by David Seago @ 03:07:00 pm

State lands commissioner Doug Sutherland's re-election bid is blessed by no less than "the Father of Washington Conservation."

At least that's the sobriquet bestowed upon Jim Ellis, who will be the main speaker at Sutherland's campaign kickoff event on May 21 at the Hilton Bellevue.

The honorific is not much of an exaggeration. Here's a description from the History Link website:

A retired municipal bond lawyer, James R. Ellis has never held public office, never headed a major corporation, and never been rich. Yet he has left a bigger footprint on Seattle and King County than perhaps any other single individual, as a citizen activist for more than half a century.

He was a leader in the campaigns to clean up Lake Washington in the 1950s; to finance mass transit, parks, pools, and other public facilities through "Forward Thrust" bonds in the 1960s; to preserve farmlands in the 1970s; to build and later expand the Washington State Convention & Trade Center in the 1980s, and to establish the Mountains to Sound Greenway along the I-90 corridor in the 1990s.

Not a bad endorsement to bag for Sutherland's bid for a third term managing the state's public lands and shorelines. King County Councilmembers, Jane Hague and Reagan Dunn, both Republicans (as is Sutherland) are the official hosts. Details here.

Sutherland is a former Tacoma mayor and Pierce County executive. His principal opponent will be Okanagan County rancher and environmentalist Peter Goldmark, a Democrat.

Categories: Taking notice

Coming Sunday in Insight: Pro-con on all-day kindergarten

Posted by David Seago @ 02:44:40 pm

The lead article on our Insight section cover Sunday will be the fifth installment in our year-long 125th anniversary series on The News Tribune's corporate and journalistic values.

This time Executive Editor David Zeeck will tackle the topic of objectivity, noting how the concept has changed in the newspaper business over the years.

On the letters page, we'll have an oped piece from Metro Parks Tacoma commissioners Ryan Mello and Victoria Woodards. They respond to recent complaints that Metro Parks has kept the public in the dark about some important issues.

We'll also have a point-counterpoint on the merits of all-day kindergarten. The Washington Policy Center contends research doesn't support wide use of all-day-K. Bethel School Superintendent Tom Seigel, whose district plans to expand all-day-K this fall, begs to differ.

Categories: What's coming

Carl Chew talks back

Posted by Cheryl Tucker @ 02:28:48 pm

Carl Chew, the Seattle science teacher suspended for refusing to administer the WASL test, gives his side of the story in a Viewpoint Friday.

Chew writes that since his action became public (see news story here), "there has been a lot of uninformed and negative criticism directed at me and my value as a teacher."

He doesn't name names, but I suspect he was offended by a recent News Tribune column by Peter Callaghan, who wrote: "His isn’t a desperate cry for justice. His is a petulant response to the fact that his point of view hasn’t prevailed." Read Callaghan's column here.

Categories: What's coming

Tacoma will have to dig a little deeper for police

Posted by Kim Bradford @ 01:48:33 pm

Looks like the money the City of Tacoma set aside in anticipation of negotiating a new contract with police officers won't stretch quite far enough.

Bob Biles, the city's finance director, says that the 10.2 percent pay increase the police union negotiated for the years 2006-2008 will cost the city somewhere between $4.1 million and $4.4 million.

The city had yet to settle with police when it wrote the 2007-08 budget, so it set aside roughly $3.9 million. City Manager Eric Anderson had hoped the police union would settle for less generous wage increases in exchange for using the set-aside to hire more officers and make progress in relieving chronic understaffing.

Rank and file didn't take kindly to us calling their raises "hefty" (maybe we should have better sense than to irk a marksman). But, as we noted, the new contracts did come with a fiscal upside: The arbiter established a realistic yardstick by which to measure police salaries that could help keep future increases in check.

Categories: Editorial outtakes

Friday editorials: No holiday from gas price economics

Posted by Patrick O'Callahan @ 09:38:49 am

1. The Clinton-McCain call for a pre-election gas tax holiday is nothing more than election year pandering. It would do nothing to help consumers, and both of them know better.

2. Mike Cohen, should he pull off his grand plan to transform a Superfund eyesore into a $1 billion waterfront community on the old Asarco site, will deserve Tacoma's gratitude. Whether he's due a tax break is another matter.

About our editorials:
If you have comments or questions about these topics, please email them to patrick.ocallahan@thenewstribune.com. Editorials represent the consensus view of The News Tribune's editorial board.
Want to sit in on a daily ed board meeting? Email cheryl.tucker@thenewstribune.com to make an appointment.

Categories: Editorial cartoons

Inside the editorial page

Inside the editorial page

This blog is designed to give readers a glimpse of our editorial-page operation and how we make our decisions. We’ll let you know who we’re meeting with, what they’re telling us, what events and issues we’re looking at. We’ll also pass on information and observations that may not make our print editions. In addition to the editorial board members who post on this blog, the board includes Publisher Cheryl Dell and Executive Editor David Zeeck.

Contributing bloggers

Editorial page editor David Seago joined The News Tribune in 1967. He oversees the daily editorial and letters pages and the Sunday Insight section. E-mail him at david.seago@thenewstribune.com.

Chief editorial writer Patrick O’Callahan came to The News Tribune in 1987 and has worked at Washington newspapers since 1979. He writes the editorial board’s annual civic agenda published at the beginning of each year. E-mail him at patrick.ocallahan@thenewstribune.com

Editorial writer Cheryl Tucker began her journalism career in 1974 at a Virginia newspaper and came to The News Tribune in 1978. She is responsible for day-to-day production of the editorial and op-ed pages and editing letters to the editor. E-mail her at cheryl.tucker@thenewstribune.com.

Editorial writer Kim Bradford joined The News Tribune in 2005 after working 11 years at newspapers in Washington and Maryland. She manages this blog. E-mail her at kim.bradford@thenewstribune.com.