Governor Jay Inslee correctly blamed the Democrats who control the legislature for enabling him to undemocratically abuse his “emergency” powers (now on Day 818).  The governor evidently believes the Democrats who control the Washington State Legislature are incapable of fulfilling their constitutional role to help govern the state at even this stage of the pandemic, as nearly all other state legislatures across the country are doing. He showed his feelings while swatting at yet another softball question from the local media about his never-ending abuse of power.

In a Crosscut podcast, KUOW reporter Bill Radke asked Governor Inslee whether any governor should have this much power for this long of a period of time.  After the governor finished congratulating himself for having to make all those decisions all by himself he responded, “The legislature at any time could have counter mandated anyone of the probably several dozen decisions I have made, and they (the Democrat legislators) have agreed with every one of those decisions. The reason I say that is, they have not even made an attempt to uh, at least the majority, an attempt to remove our protocol.”

Governor Inslee basically threw all the legislative members of his own party under the bus for every one of the divisive decisions he has made over the last 818 days, because in his own words they “have agreed with every one of those decisions.”  While Republican legislators repeatedly attempted to reform the state’s emergency laws to allow the legislature to return to its constitutional role (and to allow local health officials to have input on decisions impacting their own community), nearly every single Democrat in the legislature refused to help, and instead they continue to allow the governor to divisively rule the state’s pandemic response without legislative involvement (let alone oversight).  So, if you don’t agree that the governor should be able to have this much power, Governor Inslee says you should blame Democrat legislators.  Fortunately, Washington voters can do that this November. (Crosscut podcast at the 20:30 time mark)

The Washington State Patrol claims that more than 900 drivers have failed to pull over after officers turned on their lights just since January, and the blame the Democrats anti-pursuit laws which they passed in the 2021 legislative session and refused to fix during the 2022 session.  Police departments across the state are also reporting a significant increase in failure-to-pull-over incidents since the passage of the Democrats’ anti-police package.  Police say that often these are suspected stolen vehicles, and drivers escape police questioning by simply speeding up since police officers are prohibited from pursuing.  (NW News Network)

Washington State taxpayers must pay $70,000 because of a legal settlement over the failure of Governor Jay Inslee’s office to provide materials sought in a public records request.  The Building Industry Association of Washington (BIAW) requested records regarding the governor’s appointment of two members to the Washington State Building Code Council (SBCC) after they were appointed illegally in the BIAW’s view.  The settlement included the governor’s office paying the settlement to BIAW and requiring the resignation of the two members from the SBCC.

Once again, the Inslee Administration is needlessly costing Washington taxpayers money.  Taxpayer money funded the additional cost of Governor Inslee’s security during his failed presidential campaign. Taxpayer money paid more than $12,500 for the governor and his wife to fly in luxury so they could attend the exclusive cocktail receptions at the Glasgow Climate Conference last December. Then once they were in Europe, taxpayers funded the rental of luxury villas and automobiles for the governor and his wife to travel in comfort. (We won’t even go into all the money his administration has cost Washington taxpayers – but it’s in the billions, with a B – due to Inslee’s poor administration at Western Washington Hospital, poor medical attention at the Monroe Corrections Complex, and poor internet security at the Employment Security Department).

Now taxpayers are picking up the tab because the governor’s office was fined because they didn’t want the public to know about how he illegally appointing members to a controversial regulatory council (which recently made news because it prohibited natural gas in new commercial and some residential construction projects).  Since the taxpayers (not the governor or his staff) will pay the $70,000 fine, there is no incentive for the Inslee gang to adhere to laws regarding public records requests. Maybe it’s time we change the law so that if an elected official or their staff is responsible for an offense drawing a fine, the politician, (or at least the campaign), and not the taxpayers, should pay the fine. (CenterSquare, KOMO News, Shift, Seattle Times, AP, and Washington State Auditor media release

The Sound Transit Board of Directors continues to force the financial responsibility to fund its massive cost overruns onto the region’s taxpayers and away from those relative few who actually use its services.  When voters approved the last expansive expansion of Sound Transit (ST3) in 2016, they were promised that riders would fund 40% of its operating costs.  The officials in charge obviously knew this was never going to happen, as today this “farebox recovery” figure is approximately 5% and the board’s decisions on Thursday will likely drive this percentage even lower.

The board voted to extend and expand its “fare ambassador” program which had replaced its previous “fare enforcement” effort because board members believe that enforcing the law and requiring people to pay to ride the system was not equitable. The board (which is made up of mostly liberal elected officials from King, Pierce, and Snohomish counties) also reduced the fares for low-income riders from $1.50 to one dollar.

The fare ambassador program provides multiple warnings to non-paying riders and only imposes easily dismissed fines after a third infraction.  Yet this system is also based on the fare evader providing identification to the fare ambassador, which currently only 25% agree to do,  Also, by Sound Transit’s own studies, the fare ambassadors only encounter one out of 23 individuals who ride the system without paying.  Even without doing the math, basically Sound Transit’s out-of-touch Board of Directors authorized hiring more people to staff a fare program which doesn’t actually seek to collect fares and thus will do very little (if anything) to increase the number of riders who actually pay to ride its trains and buses.

When voters approved ST3 six years ago, they were promised that construction of the expanded light rail system would cost $54 billion. Today estimates are nearly three times that amount at $142 billion and many of the rail links won’t be completed until well over a decade later than originally promised. Meanwhile it is not clear how much the pandemic trend of people working from home will reduce ridership.

The only thing that is certain is that taxpayers will continue to have promises broken to them by Sound Transit’s leadership while at the same time being forced to pay even more for all of the bad decisions driven by partisan politics and mistakes made by far lefties trying to change how people live. The system has become symbolic of the region’s liberal establishment.  The taxpayers are promised certain results if we fund their homelessness, public safety, and climate proposals. Yet the results end up costing taxpayers far more, and in return the taxpayer receives far less than what was promised. And the Democrat officials just keep laughing at the voters for falling for the same trick again. (Seattle Times, Sound Transit Board of Directors, and New Geography)

While car thefts have skyrocketed in Seattle (more than 2,000 thus far this year!) due to liberal soft-on-crime policies at both the city and state level, one man with a drone is helping some car owners find their cars.  Because the Seattle Police Department does not have the resources to shut down all of the out-in-the-open crime activity, a stolen car chop shop is operating just underneath the 1^st Avenue Bridge.  A West Seattle man, who has had his car broken into and a trailer stolen, has flown his drone over the location and has captured videos of homeless individuals and car thieves tearing apart stolen vehicles. Thus far he has helped a couple of people locate their stolen vehicles. (Q13 Fox News)

The City of Olympia is handing out permits that allow unlimited long-term parking to RV owners if they agree to certain conditions.  If they fail to adhere to the conditions than the permit is revoked, and the RV can be towed. The city has had multiple RV encampments over the past couple of years, with the largest on Ensign Road near St. Peter’s Providence Hospital.  The conditions required by the city involve keeping the area clean and ensuring no illegal activity takes place.  It will be interesting to watch if there is the typical liberal softening on the conditions and penalties as the days and weeks go by. (Q13 Fox News)

Northeast Washington ranchers are becoming frustrated by the lack of action by the Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife concerning a pack of wolves which is responsible for five attacks on livestock in the past 10 months.  The Togo pack of seven wolves, which has been identified as responsible for numerous attacks since 2018, has attacked livestock five times in the past 10 months. The WDFW is supposed to determine whether lethal removal is appropriate after four incidents in 10 months. Director Kelly Susewind opted against removal of one or two wolves.  This has many ranchers upset, including State Representative Joel Kretz (R – Wauconda), who stated the WDFW is unprepared to protect the livestock which are preyed on by the wolves. “The whole thing is botched,” he said. “We’re just not getting any results.” (Capital Press)

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