The House passed this measure on a 70-26 vote after it was amended twice at the last minute.

House Bill 1114 would require 14-year-olds who are hunting birds or wild life on publicly owned lands to be accompanied by someone at least 18 years old. That adult must have taken a hunting safety class, but not necessarily be a licensed hunter.

And if this law is violated? It's not a crime. The hunter gets a ticket.

This is the Legislature's response to a teenage hunter mistaking another person for an animal and shooting her. The bill now goes to the Senate.

City of Tacoma Public Works street maintenance crew Russ Stone, left, and Erik Sloan, right, fill the potholes with a patching material on S. Hosmer Street near the S. 72nd Street in Tacoma. The city is facing the snow removal costs and pothole problems arising in the aftermath of the recent snow storm. (Lui Kit Wong/The News Tribune) (1/2/09)

Message received.

In response to a public outcry, City Manager Eric Anderson unveiled a plan to council members on Tuesday that aims to fix virtually all of the city’s potholes on its main arterials by this summer.

Anderson scoured the city’s capital budget and came up with $4.2 million to pay for the work, which will include a combination of individual pothole patches, wheel path replacements and some complete lane replacements.

The manager, who has spent most of his career in colder climes of the Midwest, called Tacoma’s current pothole trouble beyond the scale of what cities usually encounter. He blamed the dire road conditions on a combination of “failing streets and a much, much harder winter,” than last year.

Council members cautioned against raising expectations too high: The plan does not address the city’s residential streets. A separate program is funding gradual repair of the city’s the long-neglected residential streets.

In addition, the plan stops short of funding all of the arterial lanes that city officials identified as needing replacement. Anderson said he found money for 86 percent of the needed lane-width replacements.
And officials said the city has identified an additional $65 million in maintenance and repair work needed just on arterial streets.

Even so, council members – who hear from irate motorists – welcomed the manager’s announcement.

=> Read more!

The cumulative shortfall in actual tax collections since November, the last official revenue forecast, is $239 million.

This latest report, even though it is from Feb. 11 through March 10, actually reflects holiday spending because of a lag in tax collection payments and reporting.

Here is the link to the Revenue collection report.

Thanks to NARAL, here is one single list that has ALL of the town hall meetings that legislators are holding this upcoming weekend.

Most are on Saturday, the 14th. But a few are on the 12th and 13th.

Go. And tell them how YOU want them to balance the budget.

The Pierce County Council got some sobering news this morning as it began hearings on how to balance the county budget: cut spending now and plan to cut again later. And expect next year to be even worse.

The council convened the first of several meetings devoted to figuring out how to cover what originally was expected to be an $8 million revenue shortfall. As sales tax revenues continue to slump, the shortfall has grown to an estimated $10 million to $12 million.

Budget director Pat Kenney told the council this morning it could get worse. By June the county will have a better idea how property taxes, planning department fees and other revenue sources are shaping up for the year.

Until then, Kenney asked the council to stick with the $8 million figure as it decides how to balance the budget this month. But he also said he'll be back for more cuts.

“There are going to be more cuts that need to be made,” Kenney said.

The next round may not involve the kind of across-the-board cuts County Executive Pat McCarthy recently proposed.

Kenney said the executive’s staff is studying the budget with an eye toward eliminating entire programs that aren’t top priorities. He said the next round of cuts likely will force the council to see “what you’re willing to let go because you have to.”

Bad as 2009 may be, Kenney said 2010 will be even worse. The county has been relying on its general fund balance and other one-time fixes to shore up this year’s budget. Those fixes may not be available next year.

“I think 2010 is likely to be worse than what you’re facing now,” Kenney told the council.

Update: Pat Kenney called to clarify that additional budget cuts may come either this summer or as part of next year's budget.

"It could be either or it could be both," Kenney said.

I wish I'd thought of that. And I'd like to tell you who actually thought of it first, but I can't tell.

I heard Gov. Chris Gregoire mention parts of that idea Monday at her morning news conference. (Her mention of it reportedly surprised her staff, too.)

But two weeks earlier, a lobbyist told me to look for something like that coming out of the Legislature. I even interviewed new state Treasurer Jim McIntire to see what effect borrowing money and raiding other state funds and a whole bunch of other things would have on the state's bond rating. (Pretty much none, he said.)

UPDATE: Dave Ammons, who is now over at state elections HQ, has a memory for past voter-approved bond issues and access to the one he can't personally remember. Check out his blog posting from earlier today.

And I heard the Legislature might make a raid on the Public Works Trust Fund to help balance its 2009-11 operating budget in the face of an $8 billion-ish shortfall. There's would be almost $400 million to be grabbed from there. (They would take that money for the operating budget, but then go borrow money the same amount to lend out to cities, counties, fire, water, sewer districts, etc. So, presumably, no one would get hurt. I was wondering how they could do all this. More later.)

(Quick explanation of that account: It's a revolving fund created in 1985, fed by some real estate excise taxes, utility taxes and the repayment of low-interest loans to cities, et. al. who use the 1-percent interest money to build stuff, and pay it back over 10 years, I think. Tacoma's second pipeline from the Green River got about $50 million from that pot of money.)

But I digress...

So, then I asked state Rep. Hans Dunshee, D-Snohomish, chairman of the House Capital Budget Committee, about that possibility and Dunshee said there is talk about grabbing that money and other funds to come up with $500 million more than the governor did in her budget proposal.

=> Read more!

A jail for federal detainees is located at 1623 East J Street, on Tacoma, Washington's tideflats. The Northwest Detention Center operates under the direction of the Department of Homeland Security. (Bruce Kellman/The News Tribune)

The Geo Group, Inc., operator of the federal immigration lockup on the Tacoma Tideflats, has gone to court to block the City of Tacoma from releasing building plans and other public records to a civil rights activist.

Releasing the approximately 11 volumes of information would pose a security risk to the Northwest Detention Center, attorney Joan Mell argued in a lawsuit filed March 4 in Pierce County Superior Court.

The company is asking a judge to block the release, citing security and trade secret grounds. "Access to the information increases the likelihood of escape attempts and makes power and phone lines vulnerable," Mell argued.

Florida-based Geo Group owns and operates the Northwest Detention Center. It has a contract with the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency. The company is expanding the facility from 1,000 to 1,500 beds and submitted detailed building records to the City of Tacoma, according to the lawsuit.

Tim Smith, an activist with the Bill of Rights Defense Committee-Tacoma, requested the records last month. On Feb. 25, city officials informed the Geo Group that the requested materials had been compiled and would be turned over to Smith on March 2.

In addition to building records, Smith asked for documents, studies, email and other correspondence related to the business for periods covering April 1, 2004 to January 2005, and from October 2008 to January 2009.

A hearing is scheduled for June 26.

Or, as the Senate prefers to describe Senate Bill 6048, "a work in progress."

That's because none of the major, hard, money-costing decisions about how to finance basic education will be done until sometime after 2011, assuming we get out of what might be classified as a depression by then.

Those hard choices would have been done in HB 1410 and SB 5444. But they died. And even those bills dodged the main issue, providing about $2-3 billion more for K-12 funding.

Former state Treasurer, Rep. and Sen. Dan Grimm, the chair of the Basic Ed Finance Task Force, must be rolling over in his grave. Oh, wait! He's not dead yet. His bills are. Whew!

The Senate also passed a bill last night that "fronts" money to teachers who want to get board certified by a national group so they will qualify for a $5,000-a-year bonus for at least 10 years.

They would get an advance of $2,000 under SB 5714.

Here's the news release for the package of education bills the Senate passed on Monday.

Senate passes comprehensive education package

OLYMPIA — The Senate Thursday night approved a new funding model for the state’s constitutionally-protected program of basic education in Washington, advancing Senate Bill 6048 as a work in progress.
Lawmakers also approved a raft of other education bills Thursday to improve student learning, establish an education data system and improve graduation rates. All now move to the House for consideration.

=> Read more!

As the Pierce County Council begins a series of budget hearings this morning, there’s more bad news.

The proposed $17.5 million sale of the county’s Elk Plain road shop property has fallen through. Buyer Madison Development Group informed the county two weeks ago it is backing out of the sale.

Here’s the problem: the money is already budgeted to be spent on various capital projects, including the purchase of the Tacoma Narrows Airport, transportation projects near 176th Street East and Canyon Road, the county’s new road maintenance facility in Frederickson and another maintenance facility near Bonney Lake. Another $1 million from the sale was set aside to begin developing a park in Graham.

Public works director Brian Ziegler told the council’s Rules Committee Monday the collapse of the sale is “a huge problem.” He said County Executive Pat McCarthy is considering several options to address it. Though the airport purchase apparently won’t be affected, cuts in road maintenance, operations, administration and other expenses are on the table.

But there’s a bigger problem. Gas, real estate and other taxes and fees that pay for road projects are down dramatically because of the sluggish economy. That jeopardizes the county’s entire roads budget.

“Our road fund and current construction program are not sustainable,” Ziegler told the Rules Committee.

Ziegler said he will ask the council to revisit the county’s long-term transportation plan in April. In the meantime, the council today will begin addressing an operating revenue shortfall that has grown to $10 to $12 million.

The House passed the so-called "Payday loan" bill Monday night on a 84-10 vote.

CORRECTION: That 84-10 vote corrects an earlier posting that said it was 94-0. The vote was correct in one place online and wrong in another. Thanks, Rachel.

It doesn't appear to force lenders to charge lesser fees or interest. Instead, it sets a $700 limit on the total amount of money any person can borrow, altogether. Borrowers also can get no more than 30 percent of their monthly income in a payday loan.

The bill, prime sponsored by Rep. Sharon Nelson, D-Maury Island, also lets borrowers set up installment payment plans from 90 to 180 days if they become delinquent. The maximum duration of a pay-day loan today is 45 days.

I know some groups wanted to rein in payday lenders even more, but this appears to be the bill that's going to pass.

Rep. Steve Kirby, D-Tacoma, chairman of the House Financial Institutions and Insurance Committee, brokered parts of this bill.

Here is the bill report for House Bill 1709.

I'm not sure exactly what House Bill 1123 does anymore. I do know that it is much watered-down from its original form, thanks to opposition by the hospital and medical associations. (I know, I know, they say "concerns" but that's just code for, "Your honor, I object.")

It basically just requires hospitals to adopt a policy for MRSA, when to test people for it, what to do when they test positive, etc. by Jan. 1, 2010.

MRSA stands for Methicillin-Resistant Staphylococcus Aureaus. That's a hard-to-kill flesh-eating organism that many people actually get while they're in hospitals.

Rep. Tom Campbell, R-Roy, is the prime sponsor. He offered up a floor amendment that changed the bill quite a bit and I haven't had a chance to digest it. He's a pragmatist. This probably is all he could get, given the opposition of some pretty big players.

As I recall, his original bill would have forced hospitals to test for MRSA a lot. The final one doesn't. That's probably why it passed 97-0 late Monday night.

UPDATE: Campbell said the bill doesn't do as much as he wanted, but it still does a few things. It makes hospitals screen everyone in the intensive care unit for MRSA within 24 hours of admission. And it's stronger bill than the one in the Senate, he said.

Here is the bill report on HB 1123.

Here's Campbell's take on things:

=> Read more!

The House on Monday, on a 65-31 mostly partyline vote, passed House Bill 1329, measure that creates still another group of private-sector employees to be unionized.

Hence, the Republican opposition to the bill. The bill was sent to the Senate.

The bill lets the owner-operators, aka directors, and their workers form a union for purposes of bargaining with the state for wages and benefits. This is much like what happened with home-care workers, although the Service Employees International Union used a ballot measure to get most of the way there.

The independent providers and agency workers covered by these contracts are, indeed, a lot better off that $8.55-minimum wage workers they probably still would have been. Of course, state taxpayers are paying those higher wages and benefits. (This is a cue for SEIU 775NW's Adam Glickman to weigh in here to talk about how the union's members are getting screwed by the governor's decision to cancel funding for their most recent contract. The union is suing, and they have a better chance of winning than the Federation, which lost. Take it away, Adam!)

The connection to government in this bill is that the child care centers eligible for unionization must have at least one child of a parent who is getting state-subsidized child-care payments. This is a huge number because the WorkFirst program, the modern version of welfare, spends most of its money now on child-care so moms can work or look for work.

Exempt from the bill are chains of day care centers with 10 or more centers, as well as all the day cares run by state and local goverments or tribes.

Sen. Jeanne Kohl-Welles, D-Seattle, gave one of her constitutents an explanation of the rationale for the exemptions, although she was talking about the very similar Senate version of the bill.

"My understanding of why the exemption for the YMCAs, KinderCares, and other large entities that provide licensed child care is that they have operations around the state and as they are large organizations, provide higher wages and benefits than do other small programs," she wrote in a recent e-mail.

House Bill 1481 is the vehicle, if you will, to give a sales tax break on the sale of electric vehicles, batteries and installation of infrastructure such as charging outlets.

It also tells the state to start installing charging stations for electric cars at state agency fleet garages and at rest areas and accomplish that by Dec. 31, 2015. It would set a goal of 40 percent electric or biofuel vehicles in fleets for state agencies and local governments by mid-2013.

Lastly, the bill tells the Puget Sound Regional Council, which encompasses Pierce, King, Snohomish and Kitsap counties to study how to set up network for plug-in outlets all over the region and bring its recommendations back to the Legislature.

The bill, sponsored by Rep. Deb Eddy, D-Kirkland, passed on a 71-23 vote. (I wonder what ever happened to that other "Electric Eddy" bill to make schools turn out the lights when Elvis leaves the building.)

This bill may turn out to be the most dramatic environmental measure of the session in its own right, and also considering how other "green" proposals are faltering so far.

Here is Eddy's take on things:

House passes Eddy’s legislation to encourage use of electric cars

Promoting electric cars will support state’s environmental and economic health

=> Read more!