Seattle has its third mayor in less than a week
Happening in Olympia
Republican lawmakers continue to look for a solution to the Hirst issue while Democrats are happy to simply ignore it. A recent report by the Building Industry Association of Washington suggests that unless Hirst is addressed, the state will lose $6.9 billion in economic activity every year.
Flipping the script, staff workers of the Washington Education Association are planning a strike against WEA union executives themselves. Liv Finne with the Washington Policy Center writes, “Members of the WEA Staff Organization (WEASO) have been working without a contract, and are calling on union executives to provide them with basic respect and a fair contract.”
Western Washington
Just like that Seattle has another mayor. On Monday The Seattle City Council selected Councilmember Tim Burgess to serve for the next 70 days until a new mayor is elected in November. The council voted 5-1 in favor of his confirmation, with the only dissenting vote coming from Councilmember Kshama Sawant.
The recent resignation of Scott Stanzel, the now former Amazon public relations director, has some speculating about his political future. Stanzel, who was also George W. Bush’s deputy press secretary, may add his name to the list of contenders to replace Rep. Dave Reichert in the 8th Congressional District.
Olympia’s mayor and city council may get a bump in pay with an independent salary commission scheduled to discuss the proposal today at 5:30pm. The new pay structure would increase the mayor’s annual salary to about $25,000, the mayor pro-tempore’s salary to about $23,000.
Internal Washington State Department of Transportation email show a desire to add a toll to every road in Washington state. You can read more about the email obtained by the Dori Monson Show here.
Eastern Washington
Parts of Eastern Washington spent Monday singing in the rain. After an 80 day dry spell, rain finally made an appearance in Spokane.
The Washington State Department of Health’s study concluded that there was no single factor to blame for a collection of fatal birth defects in Yakima, Benton and Franklin counties. The study came after 45 babies in the three counties were born with anencephaly, a neural tube defect that is regularly fatal, over a six year period.
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