Washington state voters proudly put a Republican in the Secretary of State’s office for 56 years, until Governor Jay Inslee got the chance to overrule their well-established preference by putting a Democrat in the office. That Democrat, former State Senator Steve Hobbs, is now providing another reason (via the Washington State Standard) for why voters kept his party out of the largely non-partisan office, for over a half century, by bending to the will of a Democrat activist and doing “something this month that lawmakers could not do the past two decades: increase the filing fee for an initiative.”

One can argue over the merit of raising any government fee, and indeed the legislature does that every year. That is their job, which a former legislator like Secretary Hobbs well knows.

What gives this decision a noxious aroma is that the accidental secretary of state appears to be acting at the urgency of a far-Left activist claiming “(E)lections are a public service just like highways, transit, parks, libraries, policing, and fire protection – they aren’t free,” though strangely the Left is normally against charging for anything related to elections (say, postage). Read on to see that this decision has nothing to do with elections – it is a reaction to conservatives filing initiatives that bother liberals. … Washington State Standard

Democrats are always looking for new ways to charge the public for things that have previously been free. A disturbing – and somewhat comical – example of this trend comes from the (Everett) Herald reporting that “Mayor Cassie Franklin’s annual State of the City speech Thursday” is a corporate-sponsored event, yet “the event will also cost $35 — part of a broader trend of commercializing and charging admission to keynote speeches.”

You’ll have to decide for yourself whether the mayor’s viewpoint is worth $35, but one open government leader reminds her that “(E)veryone should have an equal opportunity to see — in person — their public officials at work, especially when those officials deliver signature addresses.” Read on to see how you can listen to the mayor’s speech online, but you’ll miss the networking which “is allocated for one hour and fifteen minutes on the event’s agenda following Franklin’s speech.” … (Everett) Herald.

The tenure at the top has been a short one for Pierce County Sheriff Ed Troyer, but certainly filled with controversy (including a lawsuit alleging he misled the public over an incident with a Black paper carrier). That’s why it comes as little surprise that KUOW is reporting that “Sheriff Ed Troyer will not run for re-election in 2024.”

The former high-profile communications director “started working at the Pierce County Sheriff’s Office in 1985, and was elected to the sheriff’s job in November 2020.” Read on for background on why he will leave office on “the Brady List, a list maintained by prosecutors that identifies law enforcement officials with credibility issues.” … KUOW.

You can tell just how bad that Governor Jay Inslee’s carbon tax is turning out to be by the sheer number of reporters still trying to come up with an explanation for the Democrats’ cap-and-trade energy approach that actually makes sese. The latest attempt comes from the High Country News, which assures readers that all is well, because “(C)ap-and-trade initiatives are one method that Washington and several other states (along with quite a few other countries) have come up with to help prevent the world from barreling even more rapidly into climate catastrophe.”

Of course, even a liberal reporter has to admit that “in practice, cap-and-trade programs have had some … issues.” One of those issues is that the state which Gov. Inslee has us copying for emissions reductions – California – is failing massively and “(D)espite a cap-and-trade program launched in 2013, California is not on track to meet its emissions targets of 40% below 1990 levels by 2030. In fact, it would need to triple its emissions cuts to do so.” Read on for more fantasy from the Democrats about how this time they can make a carbon tax work without jacking up gas prices. … High Country News.

The story is now a few days old, but still worth highlighting as it highlights the dismal state of the how sexual assaults are handled in King County by the far-Left judicial establishment.  That’s what you find out as the Seattle Times does a deep dive on a “new report compiled by the King County Sexual Assault Resource Center (which) found the majority of victims’ 2021 sexual assault cases resulted in defendants pleading down to lesser charges.”

It turns out that after a generation of liberal prosecutors and judges having their way “reforming” the justice system to fit their policy preferences that for “60% of victims in the report, the defendants they accused pleaded down to lesser crimes, including misdemeanors and offenses other than sexual assault.” Read on to see how going easy on criminals is the Democrat way, even when sexual assault is involved. … Seattle Times.

The Boeing Company has been much in the news for manufacturing problems in recent years, so Shift will leave it to the readers to decide how seriously to take the union claim that Boeing executives are in such disarray that a 40% worker pay raise is the answer, as “(W)e need to bargain and save them from themselves.” You can see from the Northwest Labor Press that humility will not be part of these negotiations, the first in 16 years, even though “half the current Boeing workforce has never been through union bargaining. The current contract was hammered out in 2008 after a 58-day strike.” … NW Labor Press.

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