This editorial will appear in Wednesday's print edition.

An everything-but-marriage bill would scour state law for the smaller benefits and responsibilities denied same-sex couples.

In the law, there are sweeping, fundamental rights that shape people’s lives, and then there are the small privileges that simply make life more bearable.

Washington’s incremental march toward fair treatment for same-sex couples has scored big gains in the latter category over the last two years. They’ve won legal recognition of domestic partnerships, the right to be at their partners’ sick beds, protection under domestic violence laws and acknowledgment of community property, among others.

Now gay-rights supporters are back with an everything-but-marriage bill that would extend to registered domestic partners every benefit and responsibility now offered to heterosexual married spouses.

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This editorial will appear in tomorrow's print edition.

The state House and Senate propose to wreak havoc on essential services and public education. They didn’t have much choice.

You can quibble with line items here and there, but the broad categories of state spending – education, public safety, human services, environmental protection – are essential.

There’s just no way to rip billions of dollars out of those essentials without hurting countless Washingtonians.

That’s what the Senate and House of Representatives had to propose this week when they released the most brutal state budgets in memory. Even with $3 billion in federal stimulus money, the deep recession has forced Olympia’s budget writers to cut muscle and even bone from critical state programs.

This was never going to be pretty. Look at any part of either budget, and you find urgent priorities being sacrificed.

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This editorial will appear in tomorrow's print edition.

This state will be collateral damage if Congress placates unions at the expense of international trade.

Just what we need; a trade war in the middle of a recession.

Congressional Democrats blundered into that folly earlier this month when they used the recent $410 billion spending bill to bar Mexican trucks from the United States. Mexico has responded by slapping punitive tariffs on $2.4 billion worth of goods from this country – including Washington pears, cherries, apricots and frozen potato products.

This is exactly why economically illiterate protectionists shouldn’t be allowed anywhere near American trade policy.

Background:

Originally, Mexican cargo had to be unloaded into a warehouse then transferred to a U.S. truck after crossing the border. The requirement was costly, inefficient and insulting. The United States agreed in concept to open its roads to Mexican trucking when it signed the North American Free Trade Agreement in 1994.

The Teamsters union and others did not like the prospect of competition with Mexican truckers. They raised legitimate safety and security issues, and Mexican trucking remained barred from this country as standards were developed.

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This editorial will appear in Tuesday's print edition.

Arts-oriented students have SOTA, and come fall there will be a left-brain counterpart for those with a math-science bent.

Is there any rule against middle-aged editorial writers going back to high school?

If not, where’s the sign-up sheet for the Tacoma School District’s new Science and Math Institute – otherwise known as SAMI?

Who wouldn’t like to take a hike through Point Defiance Park for P.E., muck around on the beach for science class and learn about the physics of rock climbing? For kids who like math and science, SAMI sounds like a dream come true. No wonder competition is heated for the 130 to 140 slots in the school opening this fall.

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We've gotten a raft of complaints from Roman Catholics - and at least one Lutheran - about a Mike Peters cartoon we ran a week ago Saturday that depicted the Pope covered by a condom.

It was a criticism of the questions he'd raised about the use of condoms to prevent the spread of AIDS in Africa. Political cartoonists are not big on subtlety.

When possible, we respond to every critic who brings a complaint to us. Here's one response I wrote today:

I’m sorry the political cartoon we published a week ago was the cause of distress in your home. Although I didn’t select that cartoon myself, I am responsible for the opinion section and ultimately for the publication of the cartoon in question.

I and the editorial board of The News Tribune have the utmost respect for the Roman Catholic Church. Our opinion pages serve as a forum for many different points of view, some conflicting with each other and some conflicting with our own. They are meant to be provocative and to stimulate thought about important issues in the news.

There’s often a fine line between being provocative and critical, and being merely insulting. We have to look for that line on a daily basis, with many of the items we print, and I can’t say that we invariably get it right.

In this case, the cartoon reflected a widespread criticism of Pope Benedict’s comments about condoms. Much of the criticism did not address the nuances of the Pope’s comments, but our section runs commentary – including cartoons – even from critics whose own views are open to criticism. We will print the other side, too; we have already run letters attacking the cartoon. Tomorrow, in fact, we are running a defense of the Pope’s comments written by a senior researcher at the Harvard School of Public Health.

Again, I’m sorry the cartoon caused distress. It does not reflect the editorial board’s view of Pope Benedict XVI or the Catholic Church.

Patrick O’Callahan

This morning's Senate budget release, which I watched on TVW, had the expected somber tone. There's no joy in budget-cutting. The Democratic leaders repeatedly emphasized that this was a "balanced and responsible" budget, written as if it was the last word. No new taxes are planned, although they may revisit that after the public has absorbed the realities of the "all cuts" budget.

Then, this afternoon, Sen. Majority Leader Lisa Brown posted a brief item on her blog that appears to invite consideration of an income tax. Tantalizingly, she calls it "part 1" and promises more tomorrow. Brown echoes a theme sounded last week by Sen. Adam Kline, D-Seattle, in noting that Washington voters approved an income tax in 1932, during the Great Depression. The Supreme Court struck it down in 1933, a decision that Kline and Brown both note has been criticized by some legal scholars. Brown refers to a brief article by Seattle attorney Hugh Spitzer appended to the 2002 final report of the Washington State Tax Structure Study Committee, chaired by Bill Gates, Sr. The committee, you may remember, recommended the state adopt an income tax. Gates and others recently urged a "high incomes tax."

A group of citizens is coming together to promote a "high incomes" income tax. It would be offset with an across-the-board cut of the state property tax. The new net revenue would be dedicated to public education.

Kline, calling it a long term revenue reform, echoes the theme in his blog post.

Some recent polls show that a slim majority of folks would support an income tax for folks who earn over $250,000 per year. My preference would be institute an income tax for individuals who make over $100,000 per year or for couples (either married or in a domestic partnership arrangement) whose combined income is over $200,000 per year.

This all strikes me as one of the more perverse manifestations of the emerging populist insurrection fueled by legitimate resentment of the greedy manipulations of a handful of Wall Street profiteers. Promising to give tax relief to most folks by taxing the "rich" to pay for popular programs may sound good initially. But it's the kind of thing that both destabilizes the tax system (even the Gates commission favored a flat tax) and drives investment out of state.

Still, it might be a conversation worth having, just to put it to rest again.

The Obama administration needs to resolve a dispute over Mexican trucks ASAP. Washington state cannot afford for the U.S. to get into a trade war with Mexico.

Tacoma School District's new Science and Math Institute sounds like a dream come true for some kids. No wonder the competition is heated for the initial 130 to 140 slots in the school opening this fall.

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.

This editorial will appear in tomorrow's print edition.

Parents and children need homes. The goal is to reduce the rate of family homelessness in Washington by 50 percent.

Family homelessness is a big problem. It needs a big solution.

A broad public-private partnership – including the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation and Pierce County – is out to come up with that solution. Last week, Gov. Chris Gregoire, the executives of King, Pierce and Snohomish counties, plus the Gates foundation and Building Changes (a homeless advocacy group), jointly launched an ambitious new initiative against homelessness.

The initiative will expand an existing program called the Washington Families Fund. It is aiming high: the goal is to reduce the rate of family homelessness by 50 percent over the next 10 years. That would put roofs over the heads of a lot of children and parents. Right now, roughly half of the state’s homeless population consists of families. Washington’s public education system estimates that as many as 13,000 schoolchildren don’t have houses of their own.

Homelessness hurts children in many ways. Children without an address suffer much higher rates of depression than their peers. They have twice the rate of learning disabilities, three times the rate of emotional and behavioral problems. Sometimes families must separate to survive.

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This editorial will appear in Sunday's print edition.

The state’s fiscal crisis gives lawmakers a pass on many otherwise worthwhile proposals this year, but reform of the archaic way Washington pays for K-12 education isn’t one of them.

State coffers need not be flush for the Legislature to officially admit that the state’s definition of basic education and the complex formula it uses to dole out money to school districts are woefully out of date.

Task force after task force has delivered that message to legislators. Electing not to listen – or to acknowledge the problem but punt on solutions – only puts off the inevitable.

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Contributing blogger Karen Irwin is on a historical family field trip. She couldn't post this lyrical piece from the road, so I'm doing it for her:

We packed up the family and headed back east for two reasons: 1)It is our eldest daughter's senior year and we wanted to give her a spring break to remember and 2) While America is in search of its soul, we wanted to help look.

The American Dream is circling the drain, "six different ways" according to one well known political pundit. Oh we still have "life" and "liberty" but the pursuit of happiness has for many, officially gone into foreclosure.

Thomas Jefferson defined happiness as this: "a quiet conscience, private esteem and public honor," but times they have a changed. In the late twentieth century and into the 21st century, happiness has been redefined as a 3,000 sq.ft. home with granite countertops and something big and shiny parked in the garage, or it is a 30 percent return on a hedge fund. Pick up a newspaper (please, pick up a newspaper), and you'll find that the American Dream has become a big ol' mess.

This is not how it was supposed to go. Call me a crazy romantic, but the real American Dream is principled, it was hard won, it is about common cause. I told this all to my kids over cereal a few weeks back. I was met with sleepy-eyed stares. After all four left for school, I Pricelined tickets to the East Coast, back where it all first started. If I couldn't tell them, maybe I could show them.

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For Sunday: The state's definition of basic education and the complex formula it uses to dole out money to school districts are ruefully out of date – and time is running out for the Legislature to act of its own accord.

For Monday: A new multi-county initiative has a spectacular ambition: reducing the rate of family homelessness by 50 percent over the next 10 years.

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.

This editorial will appear in Friday's print edition.

The state Senate – thank heaven – is poised to extend long-promised high-occupancy lanes into Pierce County.

The state Senate Transportation Committee has noticed that Interstate 5 runs not only through King County, but Pierce County, too. The committee has kindly decided to do something about it.

No one in these parts hasn’t noticed that the HOV lanes on Interstate 5 stop right on the border of Pierce County.

The lanes don’t stop there because the need for them stops. They stop there because someone in Olympia apparently decided long ago that King County’s piece of I-5 was more deserving of funding than whatever rarely traveled goat path exists south of the county line.

King County has long had an extensive system of transit and carpool lanes. Pierce County has zip, aside from a new – and very short – stretch on Highway 16.

The Highway 16 HOV lanes don’t connect to I-5; they vanish into a chronic traffic jam in the middle of Tacoma. Likewise, if there’s heavy auto traffic on I-5, it frequently grinds to a near standstill at the county line.

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This editorial will appear in Friday's print edition.

$5 voluntary annual fee – or close up to 45 parks?
An opt-out $5 annual fee on vehicle tab renewals looks like a painless way to raise a lot of money for state parks.

It’s easy to see why opting out is a touchy subject for some people.

Fail to check one opt-out box, and the next thing you know, your credit card is being charged an ongoing fee for a service you didn’t even know you had ordered. Miss checking another box, and your cell phone company is sharing your customer data with businesses you don’t want having that information.

But is it a big deal if failing to opt out costs you $5 a year and helps save a slew of state parks from being closed?

Unless some new revenue source is found – a tough proposition this year – Washington State Parks could have to cut $23 million over the next two years, forcing the system to close as many as 32 parks in addition to the 13 already targeted.

=> Read more!

More need, less money. Sound like a familiar story? It's hitting the community colleges especially hard, as Tacoma Community College's external relations guy, Dan Small, recounts here:

As we wait for legislators to announce the Senate and House operating and capital budgets, TCC enrollment continues to explode. Enrollment for winter quarter was up 18 percent over winter last year.

For Spring quarter, which begins March 30, a total of 6,824 students are enrolled to date – 691 more than last spring. Right now we are turning students away because we can’t handle any more. Many courses have long waiting lists.

We’ve added as many classes needed by students in areas like math and science that our budget will allow, and we are basically out of rooms. For some badly needed courses, we can’t find any more adjunct teachers to hire.

A lot of the reason, of course, for our enrollment increase is that so many people have lost their jobs and are coming back to retrain for a new career. As we said during the editorial board meeting, we are a big part of the solution for economic recovery in Washington State.

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Here's what we're working on for Friday's editorial page.

The state's fiscal crisis gives lawmakers a pass on many otherwise worthwhile proposals this year, but reform of the archaic way Washington pays for K-12 education isn't one of them.

UPDATE: We're holding off on this topic given this afternoon's release of a letter from the governor on the issue. Instead, we'll write about the state Senate Transportation Committee including Pierce County HOV projects in its budget – a big improvement on the governor's plan.

A proposed $5 opt-out fee on license tab renewals looks like a painless way to help avoid deep cuts in the state parks system.

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.

This editorial appeared in today's print edition.

The Highway 520 bridge must be replaced. Other parts of the state will have to pay however many billions tolls don’t cover.

Tolling the Highway 520 bridge over Lake Washington is a foregone conclusion, or it ought to be. The span must be replaced, and its drivers should help pay for the new structure – just as the users of the second Narrows bridge are paying for that structure.

But the Legislature faces two further questions: Should tolls be imposed next year, before construction starts? And should the I-90 bridge over Lake Washington also be tolled?

For anyone concerned about transportation funding in the rest of the state, the answer to both questions should be yes.

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This editorial will appear in Thursday's print edition.

Lawmakers should fix Initiative 937 – but do so in a way that doesn’t discriminate against the customers of large public utilities.

Initiative 937 has needed legislative fixing since the day it hit the books.

The measure, which mandates additional utility purchases of green power, has good intentions but some maddening flaws – among them an absurdly narrow definition of renewable energy and a rigidity that forces utilities to buy power they don’t need.

Reform appeared to be in the offing earlier this month. A bill giving utilities more flexibility in meeting I-937’s renewable energy targets passed the Senate with the backing of Majority Leader Lisa Brown, D-Spokane.

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In this provocative Chicago Tribune piece, a Chicago area doctor wonders if actor Natasha Richardson might have survived her bunny-slope head injury if she'd been in the United States.

WAS CANADA'S HEALTH CARE THE PROBLEM?
By Cory Franklin

Could actress Natasha Richardson's tragic death have been prevented if her skiing accident had occurred in America rather than Canada?

This is a legitimate question because of how Canadian and American medical care differ. Canadian health care de-emphasizes widespread dissemination of technology like CT scanners and quick access to specialists like neurosurgeons. While all the facts of Richardson's medical care haven't been released, enough is known to pose questions with profound implications for both countries.

Richardson died of an epidural hematoma, a bleeding artery between the skull and brain that compresses and ultimately causes fatal brain damage via pressure buildup. With prompt diagnosis by CT scan, and surgery to drain the blood, most patients survive. Could Richardson have received this care? Where it happened in Canada, no. In many American resorts, yes.

Between noon and 1 p.m., Richardson sustained what appeared to be a trivial head injury after falling while skiing without a helmet at Mt. Tremblant in Quebec. Within minutes she was offered medical assistance but declined to be seen by paramedics. Some have attributed the reason her case was untreatable to this delay, common in the early stages of epidural hematoma when patients have few symptoms. It's not unusual to face this type of delay and there is reason to believe her case wasn't beyond hope at that point.

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Toll both the Highway 520 and Interstate 90 bridges over Lake Washington, and toll them early. Without tolls, the 520 replacement project will swallow hundreds of millions that would otherwise be spent on urgent transportation projects elsewhere in the state.

Lawmakers shouldn't treat Initiative 937 as sacrosanct. The 2006 measure that mandates utility investments in green power has needed fixing since it was approved by voters – and that view comes from an editorial board that endorsed the initiative.

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.

God bless my mom. She’s spunky.

But Mom is also an anti-smoking fanatic, and I do mean a fanatic. Over the past 50 years I have seen her, in several different indoor and outdoor venues, call out smokers, lecture them on their sins, disparage them, and threaten consequences if they don’t cease.

For two decades, guests entering our family home were greeted with a 10x15-inch metal sign on the door that said: "Don’t Even THINK About Smoking In Here." Nowadays, for old time’s sake, that same sign hangs on her retirement home apartment wall.

The past two decades have obviously been a dream come true for Mom, especially here in groovy Washington state. Smokers have been pushed to the literal fringes of our society, hunkering over their smokes within tiny painted perimeters, standing in street gutters or in tar-papered annexes astride bars and restaurants. Smokers have been utterly cowed and humiliated. Mom is openly gleeful about their shunning and disgrace.

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I talked with local builder Rick Brunaugh Tuesday for background on today's editorial about two recent fires in high-density developments.

Naturally the conversation turned to the local housing market and the construction business. He called the effect of the recession on businesses like his "catastrophic."

He estimates that only about 10 percent of construction businesses will survive. And what will determine who makes it? His answer surprised me.

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This editorial will appear in Wednesday's print edition.

Take a closer look at safety of packed-in residences
Two fires within six days should be of concern to authorities. It isn’t even firecracker season yet.

It’s been said that once is an accident, twice is a coincidence and three times is a pattern.

After two destructive fires in close-quarters residential developments within a six-day period, Pierce County is still at the coincidence stage. The challenge is to make sure such fires don’t becoming a pattern – one that could be fatal next time.

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This editorial will appear in Wednesday's print edition.

Skip the demagoguery over the AIG bonuses
Congress had its fingerprints all over the plan that let AIG pass out big checks to the engineers of toxic assets.

Congress appears to be tempering its feigned fury over the AIG bonuses reported a week and a half ago. That’s good, but let’s first give the public’s genuine fury its due.

AIG deserved the pillory for the way it passed out $165 million in “retention bonuses” to executives and employees in its financial products division – after receiving $182 billion in taxpayer bailout money. Among the recipients of that loot were some of the very wizards who helped engineer the worldwide financial crisis.

AIG’s theory, basically, was that it had to hang on to the inventors of the infamous “toxic assets” so they could cut the right wires on those infernally complex time bombs.

The $165 million may be budget dust in the scheme of things, but last week it became the symbol of everything responsible Americans rightly resent about the present predicament.

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This editorial appears in Tuesday's print edition.

Give the mountain back its rightful Indian name

Long before Capt. George Vancouver explored the Pacific Northwest and showered English names on the scenery, the region’s Indians had their own names for the rivers, shores and mountains they cherished.

To honor that heritage, some are proposing that Puget Sound, the Strait of Juan de Fuca and the Strait of Georgia be formally referred to – collectively – as the Salish Sea.

That’s a good idea. Aside from providing a needed umbrella term for these inland waters, it would pay some overdue respect to the Native Americans whose languages were stripped from the geography along with their claims to possess it.

But don’t stop there. Let’s also reconsider the decision not to call the Northwest’s chief landmark, “Mount Rainier,” what at least some of the region’s Indians called it: Mount Tacoma.

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Krista Hunt Ausland came to Tacoma 18 years ago to attend college. I never met her. I wish I had.

Krista, a 1995 University of Puget Sound graduate, packed more selfless service to others in a mere 25 years of life than most of us do in a lifetime.

She died in a horrific 1997 bus accident in Bolivia, where she did volunteer work with impoverished village women. Her inspirational legacy lives on.

I heard Krista's story Sunday at a small fundraising event in Tacoma for the Krista Foundation, founded by her parents to honor her life and memory by promoting volunteer service by young Americans at home and abroad.

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This editorial will appear in Tuesday's print edition.

Denying the right to vote to released felons based on income is fundamentally unfair – and a bureaucratic nightmare.

Buying the right to vote is so contrary to the idea of democracy that many Washingtonians would be surprised to find out that it’s happening in their state.

Current state law enforces a double standard in restoring the voting rights of felons who’ve been released from state supervision. The ones with means to pay their court fines in full can vote; the ones who can only afford to pay down their debts bit by bit may have to wait years before they are deemed worthy of helping elect a mayor or approve a school bond.

Such disparate treatment effectively makes the right to vote depend on the contents of a released felons’ wallet. The state Supreme Court has upheld the policy as constitutional, but constitutional doesn’t mean fair. There is a good reason why most other states have less onerous restrictions, and it’s because a person’s bankroll should not determine their access to such a fundamental right as voting.

Fortunately, the Legislature may be inclined to finally remove debt as a barrier to the ballot box.

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For centuries before Capt. George Vancouver explored the inland waters of the Pacific Northwest, the Coast Salish people thrived and traded in the region. They loved the rivers, shores and mountains – and knew them by their Salishan names. It’s time to reconsider restoring Mount Rainier’s ancient name in honor of the region’s Native American heritage.

Secretary of State Sam Reed has added a compelling new reason to get rid of Washington's law that effectively denies the right to vote to poor felons: It bogs down his office's efforts to keep voting rolls current.

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.

This editorial will appear in Monday's print edition.

Some TPU surplus sites could be pocket parks
Give interested neighbors a chance to pitch proposals for at least some of the substation properties.

The South Sound’s big regional parks – like those at Fort Steilacoom, Spanaway Lake and Point Defiance – are wonderful resources, serving thousands of residents’ recreational needs each month. But for most people, they’re not within easy walking distance.

The desire for open space close to home is the reason there’s a growing movement toward creation of so-called “pocket parks.”

A vacant lot or an irregular piece of land between homes can be a local eyesore, or it can be turned into a little gem by those who live nearby. Clean it up and add a little landscaping, a bench or picnic table, maybe even a vegetable or herb garden, and voilà – a pocket park is born.

Tacoma has the opportunity for a few of these parks on some of the nine substation lots that Tacoma Public Utilities wants the city to designate as surplus and sold.

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The First Law of Holes - when you're in one, stop digging - has thus far stymied lawmakers.

Granted, there's not much they can do to stem the decline in tax collections that mirrors the deteriorating economy, but they could have done more to cut spending early. Capturing those early savings helps by providing immediate relief for the state's current-year budget deficit and reduces commitments for the next budget cycle.

Seventy days into a 105-day legislative session, it's too late for "early" savings. But reckoning comes soon.

With Thursday's announcement of another $552 million trim in expected tax collections, reporters returned to their calculators, adding more than a half-billion to the budget shortfall. What began as a controversial $3.2 billion deficit in the months before the November elections has now blossomed into a staggering $9 billion problem.

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This editorial will appear in Sunday's print edition.

Arun Raha has spoken.

There is no soft landing or quick recovery in the offing for Washington’s economy, says the state’s top economist. Over the next two years, revenues will be nearly $9 billion short what it would take to run state government on autopilot.

Yup, that’s bad. Really, really bad – as Raha said it would be last month after lawmakers begged him to weigh in early. This state’s not seen a worse revenue picture in at least 30 years. It’s “devastating,” a “wake-up call,” a harbinger of “pain.”

That resolved, can we finally get to the hard part now? You know, the part where the lawmakers in charge let Washingtonians in on how they’re thinking they’ll balance the budget?

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I guess we know now why President Obama relies so heavily on teleprompters. They minimize the chance of a gaffe like the one he made Thursday night on the "Tonight Show."

Obama – who is much more comfortable on the basketball court than on the bowling alley – really blew it when he compared his bowling skills to something out of the Special Olympics. As anyone associated with that great organization can testify, many of its athletes can hold their own with anyone – or beat them.

It's not enough to apologize to the head of the organization. I suggest the president invite some Special Olympics bowlers to the White House for a throwdown. And then be prepared for an old-fashioned whuppin'.

I don't know if there is any poet more "Tacoma" than UPS English prof Bill Kupinse, whose gentle lament about noisy leafblowers appeared in the TNT's Sunday Insight section last year.

Not only does his poetry often reflect Tacoma settings and inhabitants, he is the city's first official poet laureate, an honor and duty he won in competition sponsored by the downtown Urban Grace church.

Well, Bill -- "William J. Kupinse" is the formal byline -- is about to relinquish his title. His successor will be announced at a poetry reading April 30 on the UPS campus.

Fellow poet and UPS English professor Hans Ostrom will join Kupinse in reading from their work, followed by introduction of the city's new poet laureate. The event will begin at 8 p.m. in Rausch Auditorium (McIntyre Hall Room 003). See map.

Bill also reports that an anthology of poetry by Tacoma poets is in the works.

=> Read more!

Thursday's state revenue forecast was the last word on the financial realities lawmakers face in writing the next two-year budget. Now can we finally get down to some specifics?

Tacoma has the opportunity for creation of a few mini-parks on some of the nine substation lots that Tacoma Public Utilities wants the city to designate as surplus and sold. TPU should slow down the surplusing process and see what proposals interested neighbors can come up with.

If you have comments or questions about these topics, please email them to kim.bradford@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.

This editorial will appear in Friday's print edition.

With limited resources to spend on post-release supervision, lawmakers should resist the trap of spreading them too thin.

Any hope of preserving post-release supervision of criminal offenders – if any still existed – vanished Thursday with the release of the state’s latest revenue forecast.

Budget writers now face a nearly $9 billion gap between expected revenue and the costs of running existing state programs over the next two years.

Explaining why the state has to cut community supervision will be among the easier tasks facing lawmakers responsible for this hard-times budget.

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These days, President Obama has a lot on his plate, and one item, one seemingly unimportant item, is whether or not to accept the title of President of the Boy Scouts of America, a title conferred on every U.S. president since William Howard Taft in 1910.

Many are asking President Obama to reject this title because the Boy Scouts, even though they are a federally funded group, do not allow people who are gay or people who do not believe in God, to participate, and according to a 2000 Supreme Court decision, they are well within their legal rights to do this.

By accepting the honorary title, many feel President Obama will be complicit in a discriminatory practice, but if President Obama rejects the title, others feel he will reject a long-standing tradition of an iconic institution. After all, Boy Scouts are as American as baseball and apple pie.

To be sure this is a difficult decision, and one President Obama has to make pretty quick. Compromise will be hard to find, but I think I have a story that might make President Obama’s job a little easier.

=> Read more!

Community supervision programs for ex-cons can’t be spared cuts when the state is facing a $9 billion budget deficit. The focus must be on making the remaining supervision effective.

A “We Agree” from the Charlotte Observer: President Obama’s proposed changes to the U.S. Food and Drug Administration couldn’t come a moment too soon. The nation’s food and drug safety system is badly broken. And as a consequence, the health and welfare of U.S. residents are constantly at risk.

If you have comments or questions about these topics, please email them to kim.bradford@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.

Former Pierce County Councilman Calvin Goings noticed that we were planning an editorial today on financial literacy and legislation co-sponsored by Sen. Patty Murray. He wanted to let us know what the credit unions were doing in that regard. His job with the Washington Credit Union League includes education and financial literacy programs.

Here's what he had to say. It might be of particular interest to educators.

Credit unions from across Washington and the United States are the sponsors of a great financial literacy TV show called "Bizkid$." This show, produced by the same team that created "Bill Nye the Science Guy," is now airing on about 95 percent of all PBS stations, including KCTS9 here locally. Each year credit unions contribute over $2 million to make this show possible.

We are now in the process of offering an accompanying classroom teaching packet (at no charge) to any school that is interested. (Click here for more information.)

We fully support the legislation that Senator Murray is sponsoring, and we will continue to provide our services and materials at no cost. We are trying to do our part as the stable, nonprofit segment of the financial services industry.

In writing today's editorial about financial literacy, I came across a quiz provided by the Los Angeles Times.

It's simple to take and gives you immediate feedback on your answers. I scored 90 percent, which is amazing since I don't even keep a running balance on my checkbook.

To take the quiz, click here.

This editorial will appear in Thursday's print edition.

A citizen’s access to public records shouldn’t depend on whether a state lawmaker is feeling benevolent.

Tom Carr, Seattle’s city attorney, is generally not known as an outspoken advocate for greater access to public records. But if his city council has to abide by the rules, then he thinks the Legislature ought to as well.

He’s absolutely right.

Carr, who is also the chairman of the state Sunshine Committee, wants the committee to recommend that state lawmakers eliminate the so-called “legislative privilege” that they’ve used to get around public disclosure laws.

=> Read more!

This editorial will appear in Thursday's print edition.

Too many young people are digging themselves into debt, declaring bankruptcy and ruining their credit rating.

Paying off student loans isn’t the only debt young people have to worry about when they graduate from college. More than half of them also owe at least $5,000 on high-interest credit cards – putting them in a budget hole that will take years to dig themselves out.

Many never do get out of debt and end up throwing in the towel, declaring bankruptcy and damaging their credit rating for years – making it hard to get car loans and mortgages.

But let’s look at the recession as the ultimate teachable moment. There couldn’t be a better time to convince people of the need for financial literacy.

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The Sunshine Committee has postponed a vote on making the Legislature subject to the same public disclosure rules as the rest of state government. Why? Because the lawmakers who serve on the committee weren’t at Tuesday’s meeting. How convenient. Now the Sunshine Committee could be dead before it gets a chance to meet again.

Let's look at the recession as the ultimate teachable moment. There couldn't be a better time to convince people of the need for financial literacy. That's why the unlikely pair of U.S. Sens. Patty Murray, D-Wash., and Thad Cochran, R-Miss., are introducing legislation this week to give $1.2 billion in grants over five years to financial literacy education efforts.

If you have comments or questions about these topics, please email them to kim.bradford@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.

It's not every day that a three-star general comes to visit with the editorial board. Lt. Gen. Charles H. Jacoby Jr., who commands both Fort Lewis and I Corps, dropped by Tuesday with the fort's garrison commander, Col. Cindy Murphy. She handles the post's day-to-day operations and is playing a major role in the upcoming merger of Fort Lewis and McChord Air Force Base into Joint Base Lewis-McChord.

Jacoby said he wanted to touch bases with the ed board before he leaves Sunday for I Corps' one-year deployment to Iraq, where it will be managing U.S. combat operations. The fort has been in the news recently – and not in a good way – and he wanted the chance to talk about it.

He said the South Sound community should know that fort officials take very seriously the drug overdose death last month of 16-year-old Leah King in a barracks.

"It hit us all very hard," said Jacoby. "Tens of thousands of soldiers serve honorably, and the community can trust them. A small minority dishonors themselves and their comrades.

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This editorial will appear in Wednesday's printed edition.

Democratic lawmakers bought themselves a way out of a difficult spot by crying foul over a relatively innocuous e-mail.

The ill-named Worker Privacy Act is exactly where it should be: on the cutting room floor of this legislative session.

How it got there, though, is another matter.

Last week, legislative leaders and the governor created quite a stir when they abruptly issued a joint announcement that they were killing the bill after learning about an e-mail that raised “serious legal and ethical questions.”

“The matter has been referred to the Washington State Patrol for investigation,” they ominously announced, prompting all sorts of speculation about who sent the message and what it said.

Nothing stays a secret for too long in Olympia. Soon, the e-mail itself was making the rounds – and prompting shrugs from some veteran observers of the Legislature.

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This editorial will appear in Wednesday's print edition.

Pierce County doesn’t seek money it’s due
State reimbursement is available for the sheriff’s department and superior court – but they haven’t bothered to put in for it.

Pierce County Sheriff Paul Pastor says his department is cutting back on investigating crimes at state-owned institutions in Pierce County due to lack of resources.

As it turns out, some resources have long been available in the form of compensation from the state – which would have offset many of the law enforcement costs county taxpayers have shouldered. But the sheriff’s department hasn’t been submitting the paperwork needed to obtain the state reimbursements.

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Pierce County Sheriff Paul Pastor says his department is cutting back on investigating crimes at state-owned institutions in Pierce County due to lack of resources. As it turns out, some resources have long been available in the form of compensation from the state – which would have offset many of the law enforcement costs county taxpayers have shouldered. But the sheriff's department hasn't been submitting the paperwork needed to obtain the state reimbursements.

The State Patrol says an e-mail linking future campaign contributions to support for the ill-named Worker Privacy Act was not illegal. No matter. There were good reasons to kill the bill that had nothing to do with a relatively innocuous e-mail.

If you have comments or questions about these topics, please email them to kim.bradford@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.

Tacoma City Councilwoman Marilyn Strickland tells me today's the day she announces her plans to run for mayor this fall.

I've been pestering Strickland for weeks for confirmation, because the story that former mayor Brian Ebersole has been encouraging her to run has been all over town for a couple months now.

Strickland held what allies called an "exploratory fundraiser" last week. One of her supporters told me "she's in, and she'll be tough to beat."

Strickland will take on architect Jim Merritt, the only other mayoral candidate to file with the PDC so far. Councilman Jake Fey, who floated a trial balloon for a while, confirmed that he's not going to seek the job.

Strickland's bid is audacious in that she's only in her second year on the council. But Strickland, with strong backing from Ebersole and friends, handily defeated Tacoma Rescue Mission Director David Curry in her first bid for elected office. She currently works as fund development officer for Bates Technical College. She previously held a similar position at the Tacoma Public Library.

In other news from Gossip Central:

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This editorial will appear in Tuesday's print edition.

An obit for the P-I, 1863-2009
With its last print edition today, the state’s oldest newspaper passes into history.

The Seattle Post-Intelligencer, née Seattle Gazette, passed away today after a long and courageous battle against falling revenues and changing readership habits. It was the grande dame of newspapers in Washington state, but at 146 years old still one of its scrappiest, regularly scooping the rival Seattle Times.

The P-I, as it was familiarly known, led a rich and rewarding life, chronicling the frontier days of Seattle, the Alaskan gold rush, world wars, the rise of the Northwest aviation and technology industries, and the city’s lively arts and rock music scene. But it couldn’t overcome a death spiral of revenue losses, and no buyer stepped forward to save the venerable newspaper when it was put up for sale on Jan. 9.

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This editorial will appear in Tuesday's print edition.

The opening of St. Anthony Hospital today represents a triumph of community will and creative problem-solving.

If it is, as some say, that nothing worth doing is easy, then St. Anthony Hospital in Gig Harbor has proved itself worthwhile several times over.

The hospital, which opens today, is the product of a 25-year community campaign to bring acute-care services to the residents of Gig Harbor, the Key Peninsula and south Kitsap County. As far back as 1984, community activists were pressing hospital organizations to take a closer look at the Peninsula’s medical needs.

Franciscan Health System adopted that fight as its own in 2003 when the health care nonprofit announced plans to build Gig Harbor’s first hospital.

=> Read more!

This editorial will appear in tomorrow's print edition.

Sunshine Week is a reminder that American democracy cannot work unless citizens know what their governments are doing.

This is Sunshine Week, seven days dedicated to the cause of open government. If only such an occasion weren’t needed.

The reflex of too many public officials and administrators – and the lawyers who advise them – is to keep their agencies’ operations as opaque as possible. Embarrassing mistakes and failures are thus hidden, and it’s simply easier to get things done without pesky citizens quarreling with what’s going on.

But that reflex is inimical to American democracy, which presumes that the citizens are sovereign and owners of the governments created to serve them.

What people don’t know does hurt them. The failure of Congress and federal regulators to effectively curb reckless Wall Street transactions helped create a financial crisis of historic magnitude. Greater public scrutiny might averted at least some of the financial agony Americans are suffering today.

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Hi my name is Callie, aka “Caaaalleeeeee,” “yadumbcat,” or a more recent moniker, "VeeVee." I go by all of ‘em.

Yesterday, I was diagnosed with PTSD, or Post Traumatic Stress Disorder.

My symptoms? Phantom fur balls, mostly. I hack a lot. Hack.

The doctors say it’s neurological, a tic is what they called it, only I told them I had a tick a few years back, and this ain’t no tick, a tick’s a giant flea that don’t move, but they said it’s a different kind of tic, they called it a “brain hiccup” I told them cats don’t hiccup, they faint before they hiccup.I know this because one of my littermates, Celia, was always fainting and it turned out she had a diaphragm that spasmed involuntarily. She eventually grew out of it and then got hit by a car.

They tell me I’m famous now. I spend years perfecting haikus and now I’m famous for getting stuck in a twenty-seven dollar couch. That’s life for you.

“Cat gets trapped in twenty-seven dollar couch” You hadn’t heard? It’s all over the newspapers and Internet. http://www.thenewstribune.com/887/story/664313.html

Just to set things straight: I wasn’t “trapped” per se, I got in the couch so I could certainly get out of it, it’s not like they sewed me up in the thing, I just didn’t want to get out.

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This editorial will appear in tomorrow's print edition.

The secret ballot is fundamental to democracy. It’s as important in unionization votes as it is in political elections.

That’s why Congress ought to reject the Orwellian-named “Employee Free Choice Act,” a bill that would deliver exactly the opposite of what it promises.

The EFCA is designed to strengthen organized labor’s hand in dealing with employers. As a broad goal, that’s a matter of legitimate policy debate.

But one of its provisions is outrageous. It would let organizers pre-empt the usual union-certification elections and win the right to represent a group of employees by collecting signatures from a bare majority of them.

The catch is, the signatures on the required cards would not be confidential. The organizers would know who signed and who didn’t; they could disclose that to anyone. This would multiply the opportunities for coercion. Workers who might prefer a different union – or no union at all – would know that their refusal to sign could become common knowledge in their workplace.

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There's plenty of blame to go around for the economic mess. And humor columnist Joel Stein is happy to name names.

Here's a column that won't get in the paper, but I thought our online readers would enjoy it.

By Joel Stein
I leave the petty details of fixing this economic crisis to others. I shall focus on a far more important task: assigning blame.

I particularly want someone to blame because last Friday, Best Life magazine offered me $7,500 to write a cover story on actor John Krasinski, which I accepted because I’m a huge fan of both Krasinski and $7,500. But on Wednesday, Best Life folded, and now I’ll never get to meet that $7,500.

My first target was former Fed chief Alan Greenspan, partly because he’s made himself vulnerable by apologizing and mostly because he sort of looks like Mr. Burns on “The Simpsons.”

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This editorial will appear in Friday's print edition.

The assessor-treasurer’s office has a big problem on its hands: Thousands of property inspections that were never done.

Score one for the power of elected office.

For years, Dale Washam – and perhaps others – have been trying to call attention to an apparent violation of state law by the Pierce County assessor-treasurer’s office.
Washam went so far as to file a recall in 2005 against then-Assessor Treasurer Ken Madsen, alleging that he had allowed the office to skip required physical inspections.

That recall was rejected as factually insufficient. So too was a 2004 claim and eventual lawsuit brought by an ex-employee of Madsen’s, who complained he was fired for reporting the lack of inspections to the state.

Fast-forward to 2009. Washam, who shocked the county by beating out better-known and more qualified candidates for the assessor-treasurer’s job, takes office. Once on the inside, he promptly compiles evidence of what he has alleged, in part to fend off a proposed 3 percent budget cut.

That evidence appears convincing.

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New Pierce County Assessor-Treasurer Dale Washam has apparently been vindicated in at least one respect. His claim that the county should have been doing "boots-on-the-ground" property inspections checks out. The upshot could be that a lot of taxpayers have been paying too little.

A "We agree" from the St. Louis Post-Dispatch: Last fall, Congress approved spending $72 million to pay $500-a-month bonuses to military personnel whose active-duty service has been involuntarily extended by so-called “stop-loss” orders. Nearly six months later, not a dime has been spent. That must be remedied – and quickly.

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.

We can’t pretend it isn’t front-page news can we? The breakup of Bristol Palin and Levi Johnston, that is.

For those of you returning from a recent trip to Mars, Bristol is the teenage daughter of recent GOP vice-presidential candidate Sarah “lipstick on a pit-bull” Palin. Johnston is the father of Bristol’s baby, the same young man who won us over with his MySpace description that he is a “bleepin’ redneck” and proud of it. The two were supposed to get married after prom, but the headline today is they have broken up.

In such a time as this, a time of economic (How did former Fed Chairman Alan Greenspan put it? Oh, yeah, "tsunami”) in such a time of economic tsunami-ism, how can we be bothered with the break-up of two Alaska teenagers? It happens every day in every city across America, why is the blogosphere all abuzz?

As I write this, tweets and twitters are being exchanged in wild abandon. Natural curiosity has people wondering about the particulars: Who broke up with whom? Did baby Tripp make them feel trapped? Did Joe the plumber have anything to do with it? Did Grandma Johnston mistake a meth bottle for baby bottle?

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This editorial will appear in Thursday's print edition.

Many voters are just making do – and they expect the same kind of approach from tax-supported institutions.

If ballots had comment sections, the votes counted Tuesday might have read something like this: “It’s not personal. It’s business – the business of keeping my family afloat.”

Voters in four South Sound school districts gave a resounding no to construction and equipment requests totaling $975 million.

The nearly across-the-broad pummeling (tiny Carbonado won passage of a $72,000 technology levy) undermines any notion that voters had it out for one school district or another.

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This editorial will appear in Thursday's print edition.

The president’s call for merit pay and more charter schools isn’t likely to set well with the public school establishment.

No one should be surprised by the content of President Obama’s speech Tuesday outlining his ideas for improving American public schools. Many of those ideas were talking points during the presidential race and were detailed on his campaign Web site.

What’s different now is the tone of urgency he used in challenging the nation, its educators and parents to do better. Along with health care reform, Obama believes that reversing what he sees as “our educational decline” is a crucial element in reversing the nation’s financial fortunes by making America’s students more competitive with their counterparts in other countries.

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Political types have been buzzing all day about the death of the so-called Worker Privacy Act (the link is to Joe Turner's blog post). Briefly, the Governor, Senate Majority Leader, and Speaker of the House issued a rare joint statement saying

...upon becoming aware of an email linking potential action on the bill to campaign contributions, bringing the bill forward was no longer an option. The email raises serious legal and ethical questions.

I wrote about it in a column earlier this year. Here's how I describe it.

Essentially, it prohibits an employer from requiring workers to attend meetings or participate in communications regarding “political or religious matters.”

The key to unwrapping the rhetoric is in the definition of “political,” which includes labor issues. The whole point of this legislation is to sideline employers in order to make it easier for union organizers to influence workers.

In a contentious session, this thing, called the Employer Gag Rule by business groups, took the tension to a higher level. Bitterly opposed by business groups, who recognized that the legislation would unconstitutionally tilt the scales toward labor during union organizing campaigns, the legislation was organized labor's top priority. Boeing vigorously opposed the bill, taking an uncharacteristically high profile stance. Had it passed, the future of the state's aerospace cluster was clearly at risk.

Yet, committees in both the House and Senate had passed it and the bill was headed for a floor vote. Then, according to Turner's post and other reports, last night a labor lobbyist sent an email to four state legislators tying future campaign support to a 'yes' vote on the bill.

Very bad form. And unlawful.

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After Tuesday's nearly across-the-board defeat of school measures, districts should sharpen their pencils before trying again. Many voters are just making do – and they expect the same kind of approach from tax-supported institutions.

There’s not much new content in President Obama’s strategy for improving public education; many of the ideas were talking points on the campaign trail. What's different now is the tone of urgency he used in challenging the nation, its educators and parents to do better.

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.

Senate Democrats have declined to seek revenge for a Seattle law firm's attack ads on three senators last week. The Senate just passed the so-called Homeowners Bill of Rights, which had been championed by one of the firm's lawyers before he left the Legislature.

It might have helped that the law firm's managing partner took the fall for the ad this week, stepping down from his leadership position and taking some of the heat off Brian Weinstein, the former state senator who lawmakers had accused of being behind the ads criticizing lawmakers for blocking asbestos liability legislation.

Here's the loyal opposition's response to passage of the homeowner bill:

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Here's the movie we mentioned in today's editorial on "gritty" Tacoma. It was a sequel to South 5, the Audience Choice Award winner from the Grand Cinema's 2007 72 Hour Film Competition.

Enjoy.

What do Olympic gold medalist Michael Phelps and Popeye have in common besides, of course, superhuman muscles? Well, it turns out they both like “the green stuff.”

Speaking of green stuff, in New Mexico yesterday, the Motor Transportation Division found 1,200 pounds of marijuana packed into cans of labeled spinach. The police estimate the cans of “spinach” were worth $1.5 million.

Stories like this bring attention to just how much the marijuana industry is worth, and in this economic crisis, it has some people reconsidering the marijuana laws.

Like it or not, marijuana is one of the top U.S. cash crops. There are an estimated four million Americans using marijuana on a regular basis. If the government is looking for new tax revenue (and it should), it may want to start looking in the nearest dorm room, frat house, rock concert, four-bedroom/two-bath middle-class suburban home. The truth is that marijuana use crosses all socio-economic lines (although the prison demographic says different, apparently not every group can afford the best lawyers).

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This editorial will appear in tomorrow's print edition.

Judges should have the sense to recuse themselves from cases involving their personal interests or those of campaign supporters.

The latest ethical dispute involving state Supreme Court Justice Richard Sanders almost knocks the lid off the Groan Out Loud Meter.

It’s part of a much larger question: When should judges recuse themselves from case in which they have a real or apparent self-interest?

The answer should have been obvious in Sanders’ case.
He wrote a Jan. 15 decision that effectively increased the potential penalties a government body must pay to citizens who’ve been wrongly denied access to public records.

The ethical problem: Sanders had a dog in the fight. He had been seeking higher penalties in a records dispute of his own. His decision indirectly increased what the state might have to pay him – by as much as $614,000 in addition to the $18,112 he’d already been awarded.

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This editorial will appear in Wednesday's print edition.

Tacomans don’t put on airs. Beware anyone who suggests they start.

Tammy Blount, God bless her, is being taken for a ride.

We’re sorry to have to say it. But there is no other plausible explanation for her plea for a new way to describe Tacoma.

Blount, the city’s professional cheerleader at the Tacoma Regional Convention + Visitor Bureau, says it’s been “suggested” to her by “some folks” that she stop using “grit” or “gritty” to describe Tacoma.

Just who are these people who think Tacoma has outgrown its gritty image? Blount won’t say.

Consider us suspicious.

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I have no problem with Barack Obama's decision to allow federal funding for embryonic stem cell research. I do have a problem with the way he lumped the previous ban in with actual attempts by the Bush administration to distort science for political ends.

Bush's stem cell policy was a straight-out ethics decision. When he announced it, he showed every sign of having balanced conflicting moral imperatives and reaching what he believed was the best compromise. That isn't the same thing as, say, letting a political appointee lean on NASA's top climate scientist to prevent him from speaking his mind about global warming.

Bush may have come out in the wrong place on stem cells, but his decision was rooted in values that run deeper than politics. If we try to disentangle science from ethics, we're going to be in big trouble.

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Richard Sanders’ decision not to recuse himself from a case involving his own interests ties into a pending U.S. Supreme Court case on recusal – that one involving justices who were elected by special interests with cases before the court.

So some anonymous folks think “gritty” is beneath Tacoma? Them’s fighting words.

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.

This editorial will appear in Tuesday's print edition.

Attack ads aimed at winning public sympathy and cornering state lawmakers have deservedly backfired.

What were the lawyers at a Seattle law firm thinking when they took out hit pieces on three state senators last week?

The full-page newspaper ads told the story of a Vietnam vet and former Bremerton shipyards worker who died at age 57 after a “horribly painful illness” caused by asbestos exposure. They also accused three senators, Puyallup Democrat Jim Kastama among them, of denying asbestos victims justice.

If Bergman Draper & Frockt, the firm that bought the ads, had hoped to win the Legislature over, it failed miserably. Washingtonians don’t have much of a stomach for hardball politics, especially outside of the campaign season.

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This editorial will appear in tomorrow's print edition:

No county justice system should be saddled with a sitting judge – like Michael Hecht – under the cloud of serious criminal charges.

This state clearly needs a faster way of dealing with judges who have been charged with felonies – but still refuse to stop hearing cases.

It happens rarely, but not rarely enough. Judge Michael Hecht of Pierce County’s superior court has been charged by the state Attorney General’s Office with felony harassment – threatening to kill a prostitute, to be precise. He’s also been charged with the misdemeanor of hiring the services of another young prostitute. He’s still on the job.

If found guilty of either charge, Hecht should be removed from the bench. But a jury’s decision is likely a long way off, if the case does come to trial.

In the meantime, the criminal charges hanging over Hecht have crippled his effectiveness as a credible arbiter of justice.

Other states have mechanisms for suspending judges charged with felonies. A common rule provides for “interim suspension,” in which judges must step aside when the state’s judicial conduct commission begins an investigation of possible ethical violations. Another common rule automatically disqualifies them from hearing cases when they are indicted with felonies.

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The Washington Post has picked up on the broad significance of Barack Obama's plan to kill plans to dispose of nuclear reactor wastes at Yucca Mountain, Nev. Our comment. Theirs:

Yucca Mountain; Now What?

The following editorial appeared in Sunday’s Washington Post:

By stripping the funding for the nuclear repository at Nevada’s Yucca Mountain, President Obama has succeeded in killing the contentious project that remains unfinished 22 years after Congress selected the site.

He compounds the error by not offering an alternative. If the president’s vision for a clean energy future is to be believed or is to come to fruition, nuclear energy must be a part of the mix, and the safe disposal of its radioactive waste must be given more serious consideration.

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There should be a way to temporarily suspend Washington judges accused of criminal misconduct rather than keep them on the bench in a credibility-impaired state.

Washingtonians got a rare glimpse into how things really work in Olympia last week – and it wasn't pretty. Lawmakers didn't take kindly to lawyers' attempts to strongarm them over asbestos legislation.

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.

Dear Ms. Oprah Winfrey,

This past weekend, news got out that Michelle Obama was going to be the first person other than you to grace the cover of "O" Magazine. Fitting, I thought to myself, not too many people share a plane with Oprah, but Michelle Obama surely does.

Now flash forward to this morning when I saw a picture of the magazine cover. As promised there was the radiant Michelle Obama standing tall in the sun, as if to signal to all of us that a long and cold winter was finally over, but next to her (cue screeching sound effect) was you. Talk about an "O moment."

Oprah, I mean no disrespect, but I am going to tell you what I once overheard a bride say to her newly minted mother-in law as they stood by the honeymoon getaway car: “Get out of the picture!”

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This editorial will appear in Monday's print edition.

Is Eric Anderson underpaid compared to his peers? Perhaps. Is a recession the right time to make up lost ground? No.

Eric Anderson will apparently not go down in Tacoma history as the city manager who accepted a huge raise while his fellow Tacomans were suffering almost unparalleled economic misery.

The city manager e-mailed City Council members Friday morning to ask them to pull a resolution granting him a 14.5 percent pay hike. The council is expected to grant his request at its Tuesday meeting.

Council members are in Anderson’s debt. He is sparing them a tough choice between telling the public to eat cake and saying no to a well-respected executive they want to keep.

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This editorial will appear in tomorrow's print edition.

When voluntary doesn’t work, sometimes you’ve got to do mandatory. It’s come to that with the nation’s housing crisis.

The House of Representatives on Thursday approved a plan to lean on mortgage lenders to renegotiate loans on terms that would help keep borrowers in their homes.

This isn’t the centerpiece of the Barack Obama’s effort to slow foreclosure rates and stabilize the housing market. The rest of the plan is a bundle of costly carrots, including $200 billion to help distressed homeowners refinance and $75 billion in incentives to encourage financiers to reduce payments.

Thursday’s bill is the stick, a big one. It would empower bankruptcy judges to “cram down” mortgage loans – order lenders to lower payments to affordable levels by cutting interest rates, lengthening terms or even reducing principal.

This move wouldn’t make sense under normal circumstances. It’s risky. It may well lead to higher interest rates as lenders anticipate losses from a stampede into bankruptcy. It will also bail out borrowers who don’t deserve bailing out and penalize lenders who don’t deserve penalizing. The House actually defeated an attempt to exclude borrowers who had lied on their original mortgage applications.

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We all watched with interest as the Obamas chose a Washington, D.C., school for their daughters to attend. Sidwell Friends School is an excellent private school, with a price tag to match. But the Obamas can afford it, and it's their money for their kids, so good for them. This is America.

At Sidwell, Sasha and Malia study with Sarah and James Parker, about whom the Wall Street Journal recently ran a story. They are also black and reside in Washington D.C., but that’s where the comparison with the Obama kids ends.

Sarah's and James’ mother cannot afford the hefty Sidwell tuition. The children each attend Sidwell using $7,500 federal education vouchers created by the Bush administration’s D.C. Opportunity Scholarship Program. Sarah and James are two of 1,700 low-income students using the program as a chance to bail out of D.C.’s broken, dangerous public schools.

Across the nation, thousands of indigent children have been given this opportunity by state and local governments. But not for long.

Teachers’ unions have been itching to use the November election mandate to get rid of those pesky vouchers. Sen. Dick Durbin, D-Ill, has introduced a bill for Washington, D.C., that will do just that.

So, next year James and Sarah may be back in the D.C. public schools. If so, the Journal reports, they will finish up at Roosevelt High School, with its security guards, metal detectors and test scores documenting that only half its students are proficient in reading and math.

Mr. and Mrs. Obama – our nation’s First Parents – should reflect on the impact of Durbin’s attempt to end the D.C. school voucher system for children less fortunate than their own.

An interesting article on the McClatchy Web site looks at how differently Democrats and Republicans view the role of government.

As it turns out, writes Steven Thomma, "Both major parties are really for big government — just big in different places."

Republicans like government spending as long as it's for something the Pentagon wants: war, big weapons projects, etc. Democrats like it when it's for social programs like health care and education.

And of course, anything that benefits the home district is dandy. Lawmakers tend to find bipartisan consensus on that.

Read the article here.

For Sunday: We're taking a closer look at President Obama's mortgage relief plan, who it will help and how effective it promises to be.

For Monday: The Tacoma City Council faces a tough vote Tuesday as it decides a proposed 14.5 pay raise for the city manager. This is an opportunity to show some leadership. UPDATE: This topic has taken a turn. Eric Anderson has asked council not to boost his pay.

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.

Yesterday, the state Supreme Court unanimously declined Sen. Lisa Brown's invitation to toss out voter-approved limits on the Legislature's ability to raise taxes. It's not for lackawanna. I think the majority of the Court would like to scrap the supermajority requirement. Brown v. Owen was simply the wrong vehicle.

Some background.

Back in 1993, reacting against lawmakers' decision to respond to a - by current standards - mild recession with tax hikes, voters adopted Initiative 601. I-601, among other things, required a two-thirds supermajority vote in both legislative chambers for tax hikes. Under certain conditions, legislators would have to submit their tax proposals for voter approval. In 2007, voters approved Initiative 960, which reaffirmed and expanded the supermajority requirement.

Unlike California and Oregon, Washington does not allow the voters to amend the constitution by initiative. Brown argued that changing the rules for passing laws in the legislature requires a constitutional amendment. Last year, she asked Lt. Gov. Brad Owen, in his role as presiding office of the Senate, to declare that a proposed tax increase could be passed by simple majority. Saying it wasn't his job to decide constitutional issues, he upheld the supermajority requirement. And Brown took the issue to Court. (Good links to the briefs here.)

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Get out your microscopic birthday candles 'cause Barbie, a lady who enjoys 100 percent name recognition around the world, turns 50 this month!

Don’t look for this modern mid-lifer to start donning more neck scarves and take up Tai Chi. Oh no, Barbie’s not going to go gently into that goodnight, she’s getting even more hip. In honor of her birthday, Barbie is getting a tattoo, or a “tat” as my teenage girls inform me is the current parlance.

Moms are understandably upset. What kind of example is this setting for the average 7-year-old girl who likes to play with her? What’s to stop this little girl from jumping on the back of her boyfriends motorcycle and getting her own tattoo, other than the fact that seven year old girls don’t have boyfriends with motorcycles, and by the time they do Barbie will be long gone from their thoughts?

Maybe these moms are right though.

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The Tacoma City Council will be considering whether to ban smoking in multifamily housing units. Read about it here.

I’d argue in favor of the ban.

This isn’t a particularly easy call. I know smoking is horribly addictive, and I believe people should be able to do what they want in the privacy of their own homes, as long as it doesn’t hurt anyone else.

But that’s the problem. Smoking in one’s own home can hurt others if that home is in a multifamily building.

How many times do we read about fatal fires started by someone leaving a cigarette unattended? Usually the person falls asleep and the cigarette ignites bedding or upholstery.

In some cases, the fire spreads to other apartment units, particularly in low-income, poorly constructed buildings without fire walls. In fact, smoking is the leading cause of fire-related deaths, according to the Centers for Disease Control.

Then there’s the secondhand smoke problem.

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This editorial will appear in tomorrow's print edition.

The Legislature’s first priority must be a budget that spreads $8 billion of agony as widely and as shallowly as possible.

Half the people in the country seem to be clamoring for a bailout these days. The Democrats who run the Legislature look ready to join the club.

In their case, the bailout would come from Washington’s taxpayers. Faced with a staggering $8 billion funding shortfall through the end of the next biennium, legislative leaders are flirting with a tax package for the November ballot. A state Supreme Court ruling Thursday effectively killed the possibility of raising taxes without a vote of the people.

But the budget-writers in the Capitol shouldn’t bank on November, either. Many Washingtonians will be reluctant to send more of their money to Olympia when their own income has been downsized by precisely the same forces squeezing the general fund.

The line of attack on a November tax package would be simple: “Families have to make ends meet; so should state government. Deal with it.” That argument might be answered only if the Legislature has wrung every conceivable economy out of existing state spending.

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This editorial will appear in Friday's print edition.

The property owner’s opposition to listing the University Union Club on Tacoma’s historic register should not be a trump card.

Truly historic buildings have, in a sense, dual ownership. They belong not just to the people listed on their deeds, but also to the community.

Whether the University Union Club on Broadway qualifies as worthy of that distinction, we’ll leave to Tacoma’s Landmarks Preservation Commission members.

They are better equipped to know whether the building retains “enough integrity of location, design, setting, materials, workmanship, feeling and association to convey its historical, cultural or architectural significance” – the bar for a listing on the historic register.

The former gentleman’s club certainly has much to recommend it.

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Laurie Jinkins, deputy director of health at the Tacoma-Pierce County Health Department, asked if we were planning to editorialize on the proposal to ban smoking in Tacoma's parks. Here's part of the exchange:

Laurie,
We may talk about it soon. We probably don’t have time for a full sit-down meeting. Give me your quick take, if you could. We’ve been adamantly in favor of indoor smoke bans, but I don’t know about this. Actually, my biggest complaint about smoking outdoors is that smokers feel they have a license to litter, like cigarette butts don’t count as trash.
Pat O’C

Pat ---
I suppose my first thought is that this is really something that's in MetroParks authority, not ours, however, I know that the Tacoma-Pierce County Health Department staff have been consulting with MetroParks through their policy development.

MetroParks has a great role in promoting healthy activities for children and families, which are integral to creating healthy communities. This policy seems to fit squarely within their mission.

The Tacoma-Pierce County Health Department is fully supportive of MetroParks' work to improve the quality of life of citizens by making parks smoke-free. So, I'll just give you some of the information that we shared with MetroParks staff:

• Reducing trash. You're right about this one, for sure. According to the Department of Ecology, 480 million cigarette butts are littered annually across Washington State. And the butts are not biodegradable (plastic filters take roughly 15 years to decompose).

· Denormalizing smoking. 90 percent of smokers start as teenagers, often because they see adults smoking. Reducing images of smokers has an impact.

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Legislative leaders are living in a fool’s paradise if they think voters will bail them out of the $8 billion state fiscal crisis – unless they have truly wrung out existing spending and forced serious economies on public programs and payrolls.

A community's interest in preserving its architectural heritage sometimes has to trump private property interests.

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.

We did some hand-wringing Tuesday over the state judiciary's seeming inability to persuade (or compel) Judge Michael Hecht to stop hearing cases until the criminal charges against him are settled.

Our suggestion that the Washington Supreme Court intervene got me this informative response from Wendy Ferrell, communications manager for the state judiciary:

Hi Patrick,

In regards to the Hecht story, I just wanted to touch base re: the Washington Supreme Court’s role and authority in this situation.

As your op-ed correctly noted “…the upper reaches of the judiciary appear to have no mechanism for moving expeditiously. Ethical accusations against judges are normally investigated by the state Commission on Judicial Conduct…”

The Commission on Judicial Conduct is provided for in the Washington State Constitution and is the ONLY mechanism available under current state law for investigations of judicial misconduct.

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Far be it for me to discourage anyone from buying full-page ads these days, but today's A9 was a bit over the top.

In case you haven't seen it, the ad screams, "Senator Kastama, why are you denying my husband justice?" It goes on to tell the story of Paul Ondell, a former Naval Shipyard worker exposed to asbestos.

Paul's widow – and a Seattle law firm – accuse Kastama of blocking a bill that would punish companies that fail to issue warning about the dangers of asbestos.

Actually, the bill is an attempt to undo a state Supreme Court ruling unfavorable to lawyers who bought the ad.

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This editorial will appear in Thursday's print edition.

The picture emerging out of City Hall is of a government blissfully ignorant of its citizens’ financial straits.

The Great Recession seems to have taken a holiday at Tacoma City Hall. The City Council is poised to do something unheard of these days: Give its city manager a beefy 14.5 percent raise.

The nearly $30,000 cost is budget dust compared to the additional $4.5 million the city will begin shelling out Friday to hundreds of city employees whose pay was found to be “below market.”

Those raises were adopted in early December based on the premise that employee retention was a problem. The evidence was shaky then, and the claim that the city can’t hold on to workers is more dubious today.

It’s hard to imagine in this market anyone having trouble recruiting and retaining for secure jobs that provide generous health care and other benefits, and that rarest of all perks, a pension.

While Tacoma works to make city employment even more attractive, workers elsewhere are facing pay cuts, unpaid furloughs and the elimination of retirement benefits. That’s if they’re lucky enough to not be killing time in unemployment lines.

Against that backdrop, Tacoma city leaders appear to be living in an alternate universe. City staff were prepared to pay another $300,000 to a consultant who helps organize employee meetings until the council called whoa. Now it’s the council looking like it’s operating on autopilot.

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This editorial will appear in Thursday's print edition.

Drug-related immunity bill goes one step too far
Those who provide drugs to others shouldn’t get immunity for calling 911 in overdose cases.

If people sharing drugs notice that one person has sickened, perhaps passed out, should they get immunity from drug-related prosecution if they call 911 for help?

What about the person who actually provided the drugs? Should he or she also get a pass from prosecution if it saves a life?

Those questions are at the heart of

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The Great Recession seems to have taken a holiday at Tacoma City Hall. The Tacoma City Council is poised to do something unheard of these days: Give its city manager a beefy 14.5 percent raise.

It makes sense to grant immunity from prosecution to those who call 911 in drug overdose cases. But that immunity should be limited to drug users, not those who provide the drugs.

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.

Ooh, there’s trouble in paradise today, and poor Rush Limbaugh is at the center of it.

At the recent Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC,) Rush Limbaugh said once again that he wanted President Obama to fail. Oops. For that he is getting raked over the coals, and not by the usual suspects.

In response to Rush’s CPAC remarks, remarks by the way that earned him stratospheric cheers, Republican National Committee (RNC) Chairman Michael Steele said this: "So let's put it into context here … Rush Limbaugh is an entertainer. Rush Limbaugh, his whole thing is entertainment" that is at times "incendiary" and "ugly."

“Just an entertainer”? Excuse me? A man with Rush’s educational pedigree (he enrolled for two semesters at Southeast Missouri State University but failed his classes, including ballroom dancing,) should not be called “just an entertainer.” So what if Rush can’t dance, he has things to say.

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This editorial will appear in Wednesday's print edition.

It’s not a done deal yet, but legislative negotiators appear close to finding middle ground on payday borrower protections.

Sometimes, the surest sign that lawmakers have found a reasonable resolution to a seemingly intractable fight is the lukewarm reception coming from both corners of the ring.

So it is with regulation of payday lending. Neither advocates for the poor nor the payday lending industry are thrilled with a promising compromise taking shape.

That’s not surprising, given how far apart the two sides started – and remain, philosophically at least, to this day.

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This editorial will appear in tomorrow's print edition.

The proposed abandonment of a Nevada disposal site means there’s no destination for Hanford’s nuclear waste.

Nothing seems to be more permanent than “temporary” nuclear waste storage.

Washington is learning that the hard way. For decades, this state has put up with the biggest concentration of the deadliest waste on the planet. Now Barack Obama has told Washingtonians: Get used to it.

President Obama’s new budget proposal would kill funding for a long-planned nuclear disposal site at Yucca Mountain, Nev. That site has been the intended destination of thousands of tons of intensely radioactive reactor byproducts now sitting at the Eastern Washington nuclear reservation.

If the Yucca Mountain option is foreclosed, there would be only one destination for that Hanford waste: Hanford. In other words, the thorough Hanford cleanup long-promised by the federal government simply won’t happen.

This is a grand victory for Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, who has been pushing to kill the Yucca Mountain for many years. He’s doing the bidding of his Nevada constituents – but the Obama administration has no such excuse.

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A reader wondered if I – me, specifically – am trying to suppress skeptical points of view on global warming. Here's an excerpt from his e-mail:

Many of us simply don't buy into the notion of the global warming thing as a consequence of human created conditions. There are creditable scientists that don't either. And, there are papers that print both sides. Why not the TNT?

A reasonable question. Readers deserve to know what's going on behind the scenes here. Actually, what's going on behind the scenes here is a little more random than some would suppose. Here's an excerpt from my answer:

Newspaper journalism is a daily scramble to put together a package of news and commentary with the resources and information available to us that day.

In scientific disputes, the information almost always comes from our wire services, with news judgments made elsewhere. We just don't have the time or energy to carry out a conspiracy of fact-suppression. Nor can we provide a comprehensive picture of all facets of a scientific issue as complex as climate change. That's the job of scientific and polemical journals.

In our jobs, information comes at us so fast that it is like drinking from a fire hose. At any given time, any one of us is tracking several dozen issues.

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Sometimes, the surest sign that lawmakers have found a reasonable solution to hotly contested issue is the lukewarm reception coming from both corners. So it is with regulation of payday lending.

Nothing seems to be more permanent than "temporary" nuclear waste storage. Washington is learning that the hard way as the Obama administration moves to kill the Yucca Mountain project that was supposed to take Hanford’s radioactive waste.

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.

The Tacoma School District sent me some helpful data on the achievement gap between minority and white students late Monday afternoon.

I skimmed the line graphs and bar charts while on deadline for our editorial about opposition to the Tacoma school bond measure. But the information deserves a fuller discussion and posting here.

Much of what the district provided strikes at any lingering notions that black kids in Tacoma are faring far worse than black students elsewhere. In the lower grades, black students in Tacoma are performing on par with the average black student statewide. In upper grades, they trail the state averages but are keeping pace. (Bond supporters have made similar points.)

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The following editorial will appear in tomorrow's print edition.

A judge must meet a far more rigorous ethical standard than ‘escaped conviction’ or ‘hasn’t been tried yet.’

Judge Michael Hecht must recuse himself from presiding over any cases in Pierce County Superior Court. If he has an ethical bone in his body, he will do so immediately.

On Friday, the state Attorney General’s Office charged Hecht with two grave crimes: repeatedly hiring a young prostitute and threatening to kill another young prostitute he believed was squealing on him.

No judge with such charges hanging over him can be considered a credible arbiter of justice.

Hecht – if he possesses the modicum of judgment expected of any judge – will recognize this fact and stop hearing cases.

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This editorial will appear in Tuesday's print edition.

Tying school construction to student achievement is a hard case to make, no matter which side of the issue you’re on.

Backers of a $300 million Tacoma school bond measure have an increasingly difficult sale on their hands.

The prospects of voters agreeing to tax themselves more get grimmer with every new round of layoffs, every plunge of the Dow, every new financial report. As if the economy weren’t enough of a sinker, now the bond measure faces organized opposition – a rarity in Tacoma.

Worse yet, the opposition comes from a seemingly unlikely source, advocates for minority children.

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Tacoma's black leaders are using their best point of leverage to call attention to their concern about the achievement gap. Agree or disagree with their strategy, they make a point about Tacoma building grand schools while far too many minority kids fall by the wayside.

Pierce County Superior Court Judge Michael Hecht, charged with soliciting a prostitute and felony harassment, ought to recuse himself from hearing any kind of cases until his guilt or innocence is established.

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.

This editorial will appear in Monday's print edition.

Some bright spots
in gloomy donor picture
MultiCare’s ER campaign, early learning and low-income college students get a boost from significant foundation grants.

The tough economy has businesses and individuals reining in their expenditures for just about everything. Unfortunately that also includes donations to worthy causes.

We know that’s happening – if only anecdotally. Food banks are receiving fewer donations of food and cash, even as they’re experiencing alarming increases in the number of people seeking help. United Way of Pierce County saw the corporate distress and layoffs and warned its member agencies to expect a 25 percent across-the-board cut this year. Tacoma’s Read 2 Me, the nation’s longest-running reading tutoring program, is in trouble after losing corporate donors. Many arts organizations are barely holding on.

Still, amid the gloom, there are some rays of light . Consider:

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Dan Voelpel wrote a terrific column in last week's TNT about the minimum wage. Washington state will soon have the highest minimum wage in the nation – over $8/hour to work at a McDonald's.

But many young folks won't be working at McDonald's, or anywhere else. Anyone who has taken Economics 101 knows that the higher the mandated pay for unskilled laborers, the fewer of those laborers will work. Employers will cut costs where they need to, and they won't enter overpriced labor markets.

For example, in the Midwest, Shoney's Restaurants have quit using busboys/girls because they cannot afford to pay unskilled laborers more than they are worth. As a result, waitresses (who make tips) are busing tables, and customers are waiting a little longer for lunch. Closer to home, my local coffeehouse just transitioned from two afternoon servers (who also make tips) to one. Finally, study the growth of a score of large Post Falls, Idaho, chain motels (and motel maids) at Spokane's, and Washington state's, loss....

There is a compromise here. Lower the minimum wage back down to $6 an hour. That will put tens of thousands of folks back to work. And it will get my three teenagers out of the house this summer!