Governor Jay Inslee is required by law to release his latest budget plan next week.  Given his record of always proposing tax increases (primarily to benefit his special interest donors), we’re not optimistic about his ability to refrain from – once again – demanding tax hikes. After all, Democrats – led by Inslee – went so far as to jam through new taxes last session in the middle of a pandemic, despite record-high revenues coming in.  Meanwhile Republican lawmakers are pushing for ways to reduce the tax burden and eliminate many of the failed policies which have negatively impacted our state.  Let us know which taxes you believe should be repealed and what policies should be removed by participating in Shift’s Holiday Madness Match-Up.  By participating in the three-round tournament, you can let Republican leaders know where they should focus their 2022 legislative session efforts.  (Play Holiday Madness Match-up by clicking on the link)

A new report from the Washington Policy Center makes an extremely worthy point about Governor Jay Inslee and the liberals who control our state’s budget: “If Washington State can’t provide broad-based tax relief with the current revenue forecast and budget outlook, it’s hard to see when it ever will.”  The report reveals that the four-year increase in projected tax revenues since lawmakers adopted the 2021-23 budget is approximately $8 billion dollars.

Governor Inslee has already committed part of this extra revenue to fund the third pay raise in just over two years for state employees (whose unions are the largest contributors to Democrat campaigns, including the governor’s – funny how that works).  At a recent political event the governor was asked by Everett Herald reporter Jerry Cornfield if sales tax relief (which would benefit low-income households the most) will be part of his supplemental budget his office will release next week. Governor Inslee sarcastically responded, “I doubt this will be part of my proposal.” To reiterate the point in the WPC’s report, if not now then when will Washington taxpayers ever receive tax relief while Democrats are in control of the state’s budget? (Washington Policy Center report)

As expected, Socialist Seattle City Councilmember Kshama Sawant erased most of the lead the Recall Sawant campaign had amassed in Tuesday night’s vote count, and is now within 246 votes of continuing to plague the public as the face of elected socialism in the city, with approximately 2,000 votes still to be counted.  The “Yes” votes are currently 19,733 (50.3%), with 19,487 (49.7%) “No” votes.  Of the 7,117 votes counted on Wednesday afternoon, the Yes side received 2,685 (37.7%) votes, while Sawant supporters tallied 4,432 (63.3%). King County Elections official state there are approximately 1,200 ballots still to be processed, and 656 ballots which either don’t have a signature or the ballot envelope signatures did not match what was on file. Both campaigns will be engaged in a “signature rehab” process where they will be checking the list of questioned ballots to make sure their identified supporters’ ballots have approved signatures.

It appears there will be a little over 41,000 total votes cast in the recall election. Washington State law requires that all elections within 0.5% (one-half of 1%) are automatically recounted, and this one may end being within the automatic recall margin of approximately 205 votes. (Seattle Times)

A new survey finds that the lack of an effective response by Seattle’s liberal leaders to the city’s skyrocketing violent crime and growing homelessness are among the top three reasons (along with rising housing cost due to government regulations) listed for why people want to leave.  Downtown Seattle, where the crime and homeless problems are the most severe, saw an “out-migration” of 13% since January 2020.  The survey also found a strange misperception among those who responded –some 41% believed that building more housing would actually increase the cost of housing, the type of confusion which might lead to electing the very people making the problem worse. The survey of 501 King County residents was funded by the Washington Multifamily Housing Association.   (Puget Sound Business Journal)

The person the Seattle Public Schools is paying to lead the effort to remove a large homeless encampment on its property (next to a North Seattle elementary school) shot meth with one of the women he was supposed to be assisting.  Mike Mathias, of the homeless advocacy group Anything Helps, was selected by Seattle school officials to coordinate the removal of the Bitter Lake homeless encampment, which is next to the Broadview-Thomson K-8 school.  Soon after Anything Helps was tagged to lead the process, Mathias admits he had a female resident give him a shot of methamphetamine.

Full stop here – this public employee admitted to having himself injected with meth, while public funds were paying him to help clean up this situation.  Is there any Democrat official out there willing to say they made a mistake here?

While Mathias admits to this illegal activity, he refutes other allegations of purchasing drugs with money Anything Helps received from the district and harassing female residents. Mathias has agreed to step down from “leading” Anything Helps. (MyNorthwest and LinkedIn)

It appears the majority of the Tacoma City Council is content to allow “camping” (i.e. encampments on public property. By a 6 – 3 vote, the council removed from its agenda an item to discuss bringing back a city ordinance to prohibit camping on public property (which ended in 2019).  The ordinance would make camping or storing personal property on public property a misdemeanor subject to a fine of $1,000 or a 90-day jail sentence.

Proponents of the measure say it is a necessary tool to help encourage people to accept assistance for addiction or mental illness, and to remove them from the cruel existence of living on the streets. Councilmember Conor McCarthy said the council’s actions to even deny discussion of the topic was “is probably at the bottom of my experience here in six years on City Council.” (News Tribune)

Simply Seattle was forced to close its Pioneer Square retail store last year due to repeated break ins, but its downtown location remains open (and its workers employed) despite being the target of multiple brazen thefts and smashed windows.  Owner Jamie Munson said the robberies occur because criminals understand that in Seattle “there are no consequences” for their illegal activities. In order to keep his downtown location from joining the other 500 retail outlets which have closed in downtown during the Democrat-enabled riots and crime wave during the pandemic, Munson has been forced to devote more resources to online sales because many customers are unwilling to come downtown.  Despite the many setbacks, the business continues to be a positive contributor to the city by giving away more than 70,000 facemasks and selling specialized apparel which has resulted in the company donating $10,000 to local food efforts. (KOMO News)

A new University of Washington report finds that “Seattle’s minimum wage (laws) did little to offset widening inequality of earnings among workers in the city.”  Like the city’s efforts to decrease carbon emissions, reduce homelessness, prevent crime, and lower housing costs, the Democrats’ attempt to diminish earnings inequality is yet another failed and expensive liberal policy.  Seems that Seattle politicians never quite achieve the objectives they promise to deliver.  The report stated that when employers were faced with increased labor costs due to the government wage mandates, many found substitutes (automation, reduced workforce, fewer hours, etc.) to maintain business expenses.  (University of Washington report)

The Washington beef growers were recognized by the Yakima Herald for their annual efforts to provide lower income households with quality holiday meals. The newspaper stated, “It’s a great example of an industry giving back to its community.” Every year the Washington Beef Commission partners with local area food banks to provide free beef and groceries to local individuals and families.  The “Beef Counts” program began in 2010 and has provided 2.5 million meals in Yakima and Kittitas counties during that time. (Yakima Herald)

Because of the Democrats’ pro-criminal legislation passed during the 2021 legislative session (to reward the political violence committed by their liberal supporters), two separate law enforcement agencies were forced to end pursuit of a vehicle which was towing a trailer with a suspected stolen tractor.  Here are the reported facts: many tools and a tractor were reported stolen from a Chelan County wastewater facility on Sunday evening.  An East Wenatchee police officer attempted to pull over a vehicle which matched the description of the suspected criminal. Yet the vehicle refused to pull over and instead increased speed.  The police officer was forced to end her pursuit due to the new state laws.  The vehicle then travelled East into Grant County where a Quincy police officer followed for a short time until it once again increased speed (over 100 miles an hour hauling a flatbed trailer with a tractor) which forced the police officer to halt his pursuit. No word if the driver was thanking Democrat legislators as he drove away. (KOZI Radio)

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