Requiring a 2/3 vote to sunset Tax exemptions/expenditures under I-1053 makes that initiative the Tax Loophole Protection Act. Putting an exemption in place only requires a majority vote. Requiring a 2/3 to repeal is absurd.
A bill to revise the tax expenditure process by returning to majority votes as mandated by the Washington State Constitution is being circulated for comment. You can see it at http://www.majorityrules.org/2012/01/feedback-wanted-on-proposed-wa-legislative-bill-on-tax-expenditure-reform.html

Known as the Taxpayers Fiscal Reform Act it is being introduced in the Washington State Legislature asking them to put it on the ballot. If the Legislature doesn't act, it will be filed as an initiative to the people for Nov. 2012.

Steve Zemke
Chair - King County Democrats

The ironically named Fiscal Reform Act it will fail if it makes it to the ballot. The legislature in it's current configuration has proven itself incapable of fiscal restraint over the last several years. Nothing short of regime change in Olympia will give taxpayers a chance for a return to Priorities of Government.

Washington State ranks 29th lowest in terms of state and local taxes nationally yet its income per capita ranks it 9th highest.Hardly an example of overtaxing people's ability to pay for educating our kids and helping seniors and others with needs.

How much is enough Steve? What is the amount that will get the job done for education and all of the the other Social Services that you want to fund through Government? How would you collect it? Instead of complaining come up with your proposal and run with it. Since you bring it up, how much do you make a year ( Round numbers), approximately how much are you paying now in total taxation as a percentage of your income? HOw much more should you be paying to satisfy your perfect world scenario? Merely citing a study of where we rank as a State, is useless unless you are willing to ascribe a correlation of negative outcomes based on that funding. This logically leads us to the conclusion that the Democrats which have controlled the politics in Washington State for almost three decades have failed miserably in leadership and management of the Government here. Since you self identify as being the King County Democrat Chair/ blogger, voters should ask why they should continue to support a failed political model and expect different results? Do you have any answer other than higher taxes?

When there was a will, there was a way.

Forget all this Tweedledum and Tweedledeeing. Restore the paramount duty of state government—assure all those of modest means an education that enables self-fulfillment and furthers the democracy as opposed to socialism-for-the-rich, subject only to periodic conning of an ill-informed electorate, contemptuously referred to as the "great beast."

I don't get a "tax exemption." Not $100 million. Not $1. And I don't have $50 billion in the bank. I thought that conservatives believed in "fairness" and "personal responsibility" Well, if corporations are people, its time that they were responsible and paid their fair share.

Is somebody here saying that the State shouldn't remove tax exemptions? Some work, some don't. If the majority party is willing to live with the consequences of removing them, go ahead. I wonder what will happen if exemptions for Green Energy Production and Sustainability projects are on the list?

Progressives don't understand science or economics, but they do understand politics.

Senator Murray's office refused to investigate OSHA when I provided evidence of their collusion with certain part of the chemical VCI industry that were hiding toxic formulations on the MSDSs. I had shown where an OSHA official tried burying their own Technical Services Center determination. Even a NIOSH official admitted I was right and OSHA wrong. Why would Murray's office protect OSHA? Because Murray's aide, who was excited about the original signed evidence I provided, realized the problem couldn't be solely pinned on the Bush Administration, that the problem started under Clinton. They dropped it like a hot potato and refused to respond to my communications to this day.

Progressives are lying when they say they want to block all hazardous chemicals from children because it is they who mandated ethanol into our fuel. A Dept of Ecology official told me directly in 2008 during my legislative campaign that any more than 2% ethanol in our fuel and Seattle EXCEEDS EPA Ozone Attainment Levels. Ground level ozone is known to cause respiratory illness and death but progressives FORCE even the EPA to authorize E15 despite EPA knowing of the risks AND that it burns out many of the catalytic converters in older cars, which are intended to reduce pollution. The auto industry found that HALF the cars tested with E15 were damaged or destroyed.

Then this article mentions the fire retardants that should be banned but conveniently neglects to mention what acceptable fire retardants they approve. WHY? And what happens when effective flame retardants are removed from clothes and furniture? People get burned and die in fires.

I'm not justifying the flame retardants they cite because I've researched the chemicals, rather, the negligence of offering an equally effective alternative, and of the press for not asking the full story.

Green energy isn't so green. Here's what legislators and environmentalists won't tell you. Subsidizing biofuel feedstock increased fertilizer, pesticide, herbicide use and runoff and requires massive irrigation resources. It expands ocean dead zones, and ethanol increases ground level ozone and the fertilizer increases N2O emissions, which is 298X worse as a GW gas than CO2.
But new to the argument is growing feedstock for fuel forces the earlier depletion of the global phosphate supply to make the fertilizer used to grow feedstock. Peak phosphate now is estimated in less than 50 years. When phosphate is in short supply, ALL agriculture will suffer.

there also is no such thing as totally clean energy as I’ve discovered in writing my eco-political thriller, The Carbon Trap, due out this month.

Let’s look at wind turbines, which are touted by environmentalists as clean energy. Read the report at www.iags.org/rareearth0310hurst.pdf and you’ll see that each large wind turbines requires a massive amount of rare earth elements (REE), upwards of 4,000 pounds. REEs are 97% monopolized by China, so the manner in which they mine and refine them should matter to environmentalists. When you promote wind turbines, you also have to accept the process to make the components can be extremely dirty.
According to an article published by the Chinese Society of Rare Earths, ‘Every ton of rare earth produced, generates approximately 8.5 kilograms of fluorine and 13 kilograms of dust; and using concentrated sulfuric acid high temperature calcination techniques to produce approximately one ton of calcined rare earth ore generates 9,600 to 12,000 cubic meters of waste gas containing dust concentrate, hydrofluoric acid, sulfur dioxide, and sulfuric acid, approximately 75 cubic meters of acidic wastewater, and about one ton of radioactive waste residue (containing water).’ Furthermore, according to statistics conducted within Baotou, where China’s primary rare earth production occurs, ‘all the rare earth enterprises in the Baotou region produce approximately ten million tons of all varieties of wastewater every year’ and most of that waste water is ‘discharged without being effectively treated, which not only contaminates potable water for daily living, but also contaminates the surrounding water environment and irrigated farmlands.’
The disposal of tailings, which are the ground up materials left behind once the rare earth has been extracted, often contain thorium, which is radioactive. According the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology, producing one ton of rare earth elements creates 2,000 tons of mine tailings. And much of these tailings have gone into the Yellow River, which dumps into the Pacific.
This isn’t the fault of capitalism, which actually has a motivation to take precautions, rather, the Communist government owns the land, controls the media and has cheapened life. This has disincentivized operators from taking cautions. Sounds rather progressive to me!
Also know that photocells, advanced car batteries, lasers, and computers require REEs. So next time someone says to get rid of dirty energy and only use clean energy, tell them there is no such thing.

So before you swallow the environmental message that life can be green and clean, know the facts. Life is messy - always has been, always will be.

Dear Legislature,

Stormwater is a sensitive issue for me. Its been 20 years since I went through the "process" of trying to get a filter for storm drains recogized as a viable solution to stormwater pollution. When I started out no one had heard of a filter for storm drains. At the time, according to the Department of Ecology my filter was considered an AKART,the acronym "All Known And Reasonable Technology".

What I discovered is that Department of Ecology and WA Department of Transportation literally railroaded any solutions to fix stormwater pollution. Their motive was to monopolize it. I lobbied many people at the legislature, King County and City of Seattle to name a few. All that happened was a bloatation of bureaucracy. Every agency loaded up on staff to study it, analyze it, report it, educate people about it and eventually there was no money left to implement a solution.

To make a long story short, there are no jobs manufacturing filters to remove pollution from stormwater, there are no people maintaining the filters and we have a huge unsustainable bureaucracy with a continually declining Puget Sound.

Honestly, I don't think our state legislature will figure out that the horse is supposed to be in the front of the cart.

I like being environment or clean like everybody but I understand that my local transfer station in Enumclaw is going to close the recycling part in February. What do I do with my glass, cardboard etc?
I also occasionally remind myself of one of my favorite bumper stickers. "There is more to life that gas milage"
I suppose I coud just throw the bottle out the window like the old days.