A new three-year contract proposal between the City of Tacoma and the labor union that represents the city's rank and file officers calls for a 6.2 percent wage hike next year.

That's up from the 3.3 percent raise officers received this year as part of the final year of a contract that was settled by an independent arbitrator.

Under the new contract, wage increases in 2010 and 2011 would be tied to the Consumer Price Index.

The agreement calls for raises equaling 100 percent of the CPI with a maximum of 5 percent, unless a larger raise is required to keep the current first-place ranking in the market, according to a city memo highlighting terms of the deal.

The three-year cost of the new contract is estimated to be $7.13 million in salary and benefits.

In addition to salary increases, the contract allows officers to receive extra pay for:

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Interestingly, it includes state Rep. Hans Dunshee, D-Snohomish, who will advise Lands Commissioner Peter Goldmark, and Sen.-elect Kevin Ranker, a Democrat who also is a San Juan County Commissioner, for the moment, anyway. Ranker is Goldmark's aquatics adviser.

And in case you wondered what happened to Gov. Chris Gregoire's campaign press secretary after she won reelection, Aaron Toso is on Goldmark's transition team, too.

Goldmark announces transition plans

Public Lands Commissioner-elect taps statewide leaders for transition team

Olympia – Public Lands Commissioner-elect Peter Goldmark today announced members of his transition team. These leaders will help him usher in a new vision of environmental sustainability and economic opportunity on our state’s lands.

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Lost in all the hubbub over Nativity Scene vs. Freedom from Religion debate is the fact that there will be a Christmas (can I say that?), I mean, a green tree that will be adorned with lights and they will be lighted.

The Association of Washington Business donated a tree and is hoping to stay above the fray so kids can get presents and have fun.

This show starts at 6 o'clock tonight. (The photo to the right is a TNT snap of the 2005 tree.)

AWB Holiday Kids’ Tree lighting tonight at Capitol Rotunda

OLYMPIA — The holidays will officially kick off tonight in Washington state’s Capitol Rotunda with the lighting of the 20th Annual Capitol Holiday Kids’ Tree. The tree is sponsored by the Association of Washington Business.

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I've confirmed the first half of that headline, but not the second half.

Katie Blinn, 37, who has been assistant director of elections for Washington Secretary of State Sam Reed for the past four years, is going to seek appointment from the Pierce County Council to replace Auditor Pat McCarthy.

McCarthy just won election as county executive, so she'll be leaving the County Annex on Jan. 2 to work downtown at the County-City Building.

And she's taking her chief deputy, Keri Rooney, with her.

Shawn Bunney, who lost to McCarthy in the executive race, reportedly also will seek appointment to her (soon to be) old job.

Could be quite a fight, this month and into the new year. Voters made Pierce County auditor a non-partisan job, starting next year. But the Democratic Party will argue that McCarthy is a Democrat so the council should be obliged to replace her with a Democrat. And then hold a special election later in 2009 to see who voters pick in what's supposed to be a "nonpartisan" race.

Bunney is a Republican.

That's what Sen. Pam Roach, R-Auburn, told Gov. Chris Gregoire in a letter.

Of course, that was before anyone knew the display by the Freedom from Religion Foundation had been swiped.

UPDATE: Brad Shannon, my colleague at The Olympian, reports that the display is on its way back to Olympia, thanks to the State Patrol.

Roach told me during a 10 a.m. hearing on how the Nov. 4 election went that she had to leave because she had to be in Seattle at a TV studio so she could tape a segment for Bill O'Reilly's show. It apparently will delve further into the anti-Christian nature of the display in the Legislative Building on the state Capitol Campus. It's a counterpoint to a nearby Christmas display

The TV show will be on at 5 p.m., or so I'm told.

I asked her if she was planning on being critical of the atheist display.

"No. I'm going to praise free speech and point out that with a half million square feet (of space in the building), I think it's possible to have them further apart," Roach said.

Here's what Roach sent to the governor:

Senator Pam Roach appears on “O’Reilly Factor” concerning rotunda display

State Senator Pam Roach (R) today delivered to Governor Gregoire a letter in response to the dispute on the rotunda display. On this issue she will be appearing on Fox News, Bill O’Reilly’s “The O’Reilly Factor” which will air this evening. The letter is attached.

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Here's the story that will appear in Saturday's paper:

Pierce County spent a lot of money on a new voting method for a few Pierce County offices this election, and most voters didn’t like it a bit.

Auditor Pat McCarthy said Ranked Choice Voting will cost county taxpayers about $1.7 million, which is half of the overall $3.4 million it cost to put on the 2008 general election.

Although Pierce County voters changed the county charter last year to allow the new voting method, it appears they have changed their collecting mind. Two of three voters who responded to a survey were opposed to the concept.

“It was overwhelming,” McCarthy told members of the state Senate Government Operations and Elections Committee on Friday. “The majority did not like it.”

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I'm working on a story about the oh-so-sexy topic of litter.

It's focused on the state's 866-LITTER-1 hotline. We've got the database of the calls and Web responses and are looking at the types and volumes of trash that are being reported, especially around Pierce County.

Quick fact: Last year, state crews picked up more than 6.2 million pounds of trash.

Here's who I'd love to hear from: people who have no compunction about tossing stuff out of their car, people who have a pet peeve about the aforementioned group, people who have used the state's litter hotline and people who have received a litter letter from the state as a result of someone else calling the hotline (perhaps you were framed!).

You can e-mail me or call 253-597-8872. Please be sure to include your name, hometown and a daytime contact number.

Some readers of my story about some people being owed a refund for tax they paid to Sound Transit have contacted me wanting to know where to direct their questions.

Here's what the agency has on it's Web site:

People with questions can call 1-877-755-4550, e-mail main@soundtransit.org or visit www.soundtransit.org, where information about the Sound Transit District is located under the “About Us” menu at top right.

Sen. Jim Hargrove, D-Hoquiam, is looking decidedly slimmer these days. So is Sen. Derek Kilmer, D-Gig Harbor.

Hargrove was notorious for his penchant for Twinkies. No longer. He said he's dropped 30 pounds since last session and has a new diet.

"You can each all the salad you want," he told me yesterday.

(I think he was looking at my own paunch, something I've added since quitting smoking almost a year ago.)

But Kilmer has Hargrove beat by a long shot. He's dropped 63 pounds, from 252 to 189, he said.

"It's belt-tightening in Washington these days," he joked, alluding to the state's looming $5-6 billion budget deficit. "And belt-tightening begins at home."

(Photo courtesy of skampy.)

Washington's $5 billion or $6 billion budget shortfall is only part of an estimated $97 billion worth of budget problems across the nation.

Our projected shortfall over the next 31 months is about 16 to 18 percent of our $30 billion two-year (state portion, only) operating budget.

Arizona, on the other hand, is looking at something like 24 percent. (Isn't that John McCain country?) Imagine for a moment what sort of outcry there would be if the Washington Legislature cut one-fourth of its budget. Why, they'd probably hear our stakeholders screaming...way over in Kansas.

Check out this story on Stateline.org. It shows Washington's problems are pretty middlin' compared to some other states.

University of Washington president Mark Emmert says the Huskies are one of only 14 athletic departments in the country that are self-sustaining, and that the football program accounts for 85 percent of the $60 million a year that UW sports takes in.

Of course, the Husky program probably would not have been self-sustaining if the university had actually set aside money every year, as most well-run businesses do, to pay for needed facility maintenance.

Last legislative session, Emmert, football coach Tyrone Willingham and former Gov. Dan Evans came down to Olympia to make a pitch for $150 million of the $300 million they say they need to fix up and expand facilities at Husky Stadium. (Most of the other $150 million will come from boosters, etc.)

Public taxes would pay for safety improvements and boosters would pay for the fancy new stuff. Hard to sell if you did it the other way around.

The trio showed members of Sen. Margarita Prentice's Ways and Means Committee a slide show of rusty and dangerous stuff. They were safety hazards that can be created only by decades of neglect.

The UW will be one of several groups seeking to feed at the trough of rental car, hotel-motel and restaurant sales taxes in King County to pay for something they want. (The hoped-for new Seattle Sonics will be another. So will Seattle's International District, which -- believe it or not -- has been just devastated by the presence of two world-class professional athetic facilities, Safeco Field and Qwest Field. That's according to Rep. Sharon Tomiko Santos, D-Seattle.)

Read Emmert's letter to the Faculty Senate, which is posted by UW lobbyist Randy Hodgins on his blog.

Turns out the holiday display by the Freedom from Religion folks has turned into quite a catalyst for religious conservatives.

Two more groups have emerged and are trying to set up their own Christmas displays at the state capital.

Larry Stickney, executive director of Washington Values Alliance, sent out an e-mail early this morning, saying the organization has applied for a permit to put up its own holiday display at the capital "to counter atheist's display."

He said he expects to get permission so the group can set up its display on Monday.

Scroll down to read about the tree-lighting ceremony tonight and about another protest demonstration on Sunday, led by grass-roots organizers.

And KIRO is reporting there's one more group jumping onto the bandwagon, too.

Jerry Cornfield of The (Everett) Herald wrote a piece back in April that gives some background on the consolidation of two family value groups.

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