That's what House Bill 1572 would do, and it was passed by the House today on a 54-43 vote.

Right now, Pierce County is the only remaining outlier, the only county that still lets some voters cast their ballots at the polls once in a while. And they are likely to keep allowing that if this bill fails to pass the Senate.

The bill now heads to the Senate. If it passes the Senate, the bill would take effect 90 days after the Legislature adjourns, so the August primary election in Pierce County would be entirely by mail.

King and Pierce were the only ones with poll voting in the November 2008 general election, but that was the last one for King. They are planning to change to all-mail ballots.

Here is a link to the bill report.

George Walk, Pierce County lobbyist, told me earlier this session he had to testify both for and against the bill when it was in committee. County Executive Pat McCarthy was in favor of all-mail voting (she's the former election chief for the county) but the County Council was against it.

Check out the roll call vote. The Pierce County delegation is split with Steve Conway, Steve Kirby, Dawn Morrell, Bruce Dammeier, Jan Angel, Tom Campbell, Jim McCune and Dan Roach voting AGAINST the bill.

Jeannie Darneille, Dennis Flannigan, Tami Green and Larry Seaquist voted FOR it.

A Pierce County Council committee this morning voted to kill a program designed to help small businesses win county contracts.

The Rules Committee voted 3-0 to scrap the Historically Underutilized Business Program. The program was launched in 2004 to help small businesses qualify for county contracts.

Originally, the program was to include goals for small-business participation in county contracts. But the program was never fully implemented, and it was suspended in early 2007.

Last fall a county economic stimulus report recommended the council either the make changes necessary to implement the program or eliminate it.

This morning several small business owners asked the committee to give the program a chance before scrapping it.

“You can’t get rid of a program that you never gave a chance to even function,” said Rollin Gray, owner of RBG Enterprises, which has benefited from a similar program operated by the City of Tacoma.

Councilman Dick Muri, R-Steilacoom, sponsored a resolution to repeal the program. He cited the county’s current revenue shortfall and the administrative cost of implementing the small business program, estimated to be $100,000 to $180,000.

“In today’s economic climate, we’re looking to streamline operations,” Muri said.

The measure now goes to the full council for consideration.

Put this in the rumor category. But mark it as plausible.

All the state universities have been told to run through budget-cutting scenarios that call for as much as 20 percent cuts in the 2009-11 budget. So it would not be surprising if closing the campus on Tacoma's Hilltop District were in that drastic budget scenario. (As I recall, it's fewer than 100 students.)

I have calls in to Sen. Derek Kilmer, D-Gig Harbor, chairman of the Senate Higher Education and Workforce Development Committee, to Artee Young, campus director of TESC in Tacoma, and to the main Evergreen offices outside Olympia.

UPDATE: Sen. Derek Kilmer, D-Gig Harbor, chairman of the Senate Higher Education and Workforce Development Committee, returned my call. He said when the president of Evergreen came before his committee in early February, he said pretty much the same thing, that a dire cutting scenario meant the would "have to consider" closing the Tacoma campus.

Jason Wettstein, spokesman for Evergreen also called and said, "We're committed to keeping the Tacoma campus open for the 2009-10. Beyond that, it depends on what our budget is."

Below is Rep. Jeannie Darneille, D-Tacoma, chairwoman of the General Government Appropriations Committee, responding to the rumor in an e-mail. The Tacoma campus lies in her 27th Legislative District.

I’m really hoping people will not panic (at least in the short-term). The budget you will see coming out of the House will not reflect the $!.2 Billion federal stimulus package (80% of which will eventually be spent on education), so our first budget draft will look more dire than the final product. I am unaware at this moment about the plans by TESC to close the branch campus, but I wouldn’t be surprised to find that they would consider their options…it’s what we are ALL doing on EVERY agency of government where General Funds-State are obligated. Inconceivable for the Legislature to consider cuts? I’m sorry, but we must, and many areas of government service will not benefit from the stimulus package.

State Rep. Jeannie Darneille

=> Read more!

Senate Majority Leader Lisa Brown, D-Spokane, briefed members of her Democratic caucus on Friday or Saturday about the polling that has been done to find out what kinds of taxes voters would be mostly likely to support and what kinds of things they want that new money spent on.

(Just for the record, on Thursday, Brown told reporters she had not yet been told the results of that tax polling. What a difference a few hours makes.)

According to a fly on the wall of the caucus room, during her briefing Brown told her fellow Democrats that polling showed "90 percent of the public knows we have a serious financial problem..."

And Sen. Craig Pridemore, D-Vancouver, immediately quipped, "..and the other 10 percent are in the Legislature."

That's my latest nominee for Quote of the Session.

Curt Woodward of the Associated Press broke that tax polling story on Saturday, but we didn't have room in our Sunday newspaper to run it. So most folks didn't see it until Monday in print. But if you read this blog, you saw Curt's story on Saturday evening.

The thing is, Pridemore is the guy mainly responsible for that "preliminary" revenue forcast back on Feb. 19, a month ahead of the March 19 regular forecast. He got some of his fellow members of the state Economic Review and Revenue Forecast Council to urge state chief economist Arun Raha to hold a hurry-up meeting. Pridemore thought a forecast more current than the one from November 2008 would be a Come-to-Jesus moment, a wakeup call for his fellow legislators.

Nope. Didn't work. And they need one, too. The deficit is $7.7 billion. Or $8.3 billion if you use Lisa Brown's number and put $1 billion in reserves instead of only the $416 million the governor held back in savings in her budget proposal.

You should see how many bills have been introduced that either spend a lot of money or give more or longer tax breaks to groups of people, all in the past two months! This is a Legislature that is in serious denial. Each lawmaker must think the cuts will come to someone else's favorite program, not his or hers.

Do not ask for whom the bell tolls.....

Today is Day 57 of a scheduled 105-day legislative session, just over halfway.

I'm writing a story for Sunday's print edition of The News Tribune, but it won't be nearly as long as this. (Unless, of course, lawyers buy some more full-page ads.) But there's virtually unlimited space on line.

I'll be updating many of these items and adding more as the House and Senate continue to pass or kill bills through Thursday. That's the deadline for the House to pass any bill that was introduced in the House and the Senate to do the same for its bills.

Budget bills and others "necessary to implement the budget" are exempt from that deadline.

BY Joseph Turner
joe.turner@thenewstribune.com

Budget and taxes: The state now faces an estimated $7.7 billion deficit over the next 28 months. Gov. Chris Gregoire has proposed a no-new-taxes budget. Senate Democrats say they will unveil they budget proposal sometime after the March 19 revenue forecast. The state is getting about $3 billion of help from Uncle Sam, but the Legislature will have to make deeper cuts than the governor did in her proposal. Lawmakers are likely to ask voters in November to raise taxes and polling indicates voters might go for temporary taxes, especially if they are on liquor, cigarettes, candy, gum and pop.

Capital budget: Pots of money ordinarily earmarked for construction projects might be raided to help the state out of its $7.5 billion shortfall on the operating side of the budget, perhaps $300-800 million. Some, but not all, of the projects that are losing money would be replenished by borrowed funds. Part of budget discussion.

Transportation budget: There is a $500 million shortfall in the 2009-11 budget and several projects in Pierce County are at risk of being delayed to death, including carpool lanes on Interstate 5 from Tacoma Mall to Fife and property purchases for the eventual extension of Highway 167 from the Port of Tacoma to Puyallup. Part of budget discussion.

Children’s health care: HB 2128 would delay until Jan. 1, 2010 state-subsidized health care program that would let children of families who make as much as $63,600 a year enroll in the program, and tells the state agency to develop another program for children in families wiht higher incomes. House passed 68-28.

Youth concussions: HB 1824 would require coaches to remove players from games if they suffer concussions and not let the return until a license health professional certifies the athlete has recovered from the head injury. House passed 94-0.

Prostitution penalties: HB 1362 would allow cops to impound vehicles used in prostitution offenses by hookers, pimps or customers and make them pay an additional $500 fee to reclaim vehicles, if the act of prostitution took place in areas designated by the city or county councils. House passed 91-4.

=> Read more!