News & Updates

The September 2007 revenue forecast for Washington State was released today in Olympia and general fund tax collections are projected to be $282 million higher than predicted this past June.

Dr. Chang Mook Sohn, the state’s chief revenue forecaster, said that although economic and revenue growth is slowing, Washington State has yet to feel the full effects of the national housing slowdown (which has already impacted a number of eastern states including Virginia, Florida and Rhode Island).  He did caution that the risk of a major national economic downturn is higher now than it has been in several years.

Dr. Sohn also indicated that Washington’s aerospace and other export industries are benefiting from a strong global economy and favorable currency rates.  Since the first quarter of 2005, Washington exports have increased by more than $8 billion or 109 percent.

With the additional forecasted revenue, the state’s budget surplus has grown to more than $1.5 billion.  This includes $1.1 billion in unobligated reserves and $431 million in a protected Rainy Day Fund if voters approve the measure creating the fund at the November general election.

Governor Gregoire announced this past Monday the appointment of Boeing Commercial Airplanes President Scott Carson to the Washington State University (WSU) Board of Regents.  Carson, a Federal Way resident, graduated from WSU with a B.A. in Business Administration.  He received his M.B.A. from the University of Washington.

Carson is President and Chief Executive Officer of Boeing Commercial Airplanes and Executive Vice President of The Boeing Company.  He has served on the Board of Governors for the WSU Foundation as well as several WSU academic department advisory boards.

Some of you may already know that Carolyn Busch, the current chief of staff of the State Senate Democratic Caucus will be joining the UW Office of Planning and Budgeting on October 1 as a policy analyst, in part, to help support the Office of External Affairs including the Office of State Relations.

This morning Senate Majority Leader Lisa Brown announced that Rich Nafziger, currently the Chief Clerk of the State House of Representatives will replace Carolyn as Senate Democratic Caucus staff director.  In addition to his four years of experience as Chief Clerk, Rich has also worked as a policy advisor to the Governor as well as for the State Board for Community and Technical Colleges.  He is also a member of the Olympia School Board.

Seattle Times chief political reporter David Postman reports in his blog this morning that the State Supreme Court has unanimously rejected a challenge to Tim Eyman’s latest anti-tax initiative.  The court ruled against the Service Employees International Union and Futurewise who had argued that Initiative 960 should be kept off the November 2007 general election ballot because its requirement for a supermajority vote of the legislature on tax increase measures would be a defacto change in the state Constitution which is not permitted through the Initiative process.

As we discussed in the blog in July, I-960 is referred to as the “Taxpayer Protection Initiative.”  It would require a two thirds vote of the legislature or voter approval to enact any tax increase; ensure a public vote on any tax increase enacted with an emergency clause, and require the issuance of press releases by the Governor’s budget office on any proposed legislation which would increase taxes.

The Office of Financial Management (OFM) has recently released a potential fiscal impact statement for I-960.  OFM estimates that the initiative could cost up to $1.8 million annually from requirements to hold statewide advisory votes on legislatively enacted tax increases, preparation of 10-year cost projections for all proposed tax and fee increase proposals and notification of legislators and the public about any proposed revenue legislation.

• After only a few weeks as a candidate, State Senator Rodney Tom (D-Medina) announced today that he is giving up his campaign for the 8th congressional district and throwing his support to former Microsoft employee Darcy Burner who unsuccessfully challenged incumbant Rep. Dave Reichert last November.  Tom, a former Republican House member who switched parties last year, defeated former Senator Luke Esser in the 48th district Senate contest last year.
• Senate Democratic Caucus Chair Harriet Spanel (D-Bellingham), announced last week that she is undergoing treatment for breast cancer.  The Bellingham lawmaker has represented the 40th district since 1986 and in the Senate since 1992.  She has indicated that her prognosis for recovery is excellent.  Rep. Ross Hunter (D-Bellevue) and Rep. Mary Skinner (R-Yakima) are other legislators who are also currently battling cancer.
• Rep. Jamie Pederson (D-Seattle) is a new dad.  The 43rd district legislator and his partner Eric welcomed their first child Trygve Pederson on August 27.  The baby was born in San Diego to a surrogate mother and the entire family should be back to their home on Capitol Hill later this week.

Tell me if these higher education issues sound familiar?

• Lowest production of baccalaureate degrees in the nation at the same time it has the highest post-secondary education credentials in the country.
• Insufficient public funding for research.
• Mission creep among comprehensive institutions and two year schools.
• Lack of consistent accountability measures to assess higher education performance.
• Tuition that is either too high (student perspective) or too low (institutional perspective) and not enough financial aid.

While you might recognize these as challenges currently facing the state of Washington, they are actually drawn from a recent comprehensive study of British Columbia’s higher education system.  Known in the province as Campus 2020, the report which was released this past April represents the first comprehensive look at B.C. higher education in 45 years.

Similar to Washington Learns (although it focuses only on the higher education system), Campus 2020 makes more than 50 separate recommendations for improving post secondary education and establishes several ambitious targets for the year 2020 including having B.C. achieve the highest level of participation in higher education per capita in Canada.

So far, reaction from the higher education and political communities has been mostly positive.  As you might expect, success will eventually come down to how much additional funding the province can commit to the effort.

State Rep. Jim McIntire (D-Seattle) who represents the 46th district in Seattle and also teaches part-time at the University of Washington announced Tuesday that he will give up his seat to make a run for State Treasurer in 2008.  Three-term incumbant Mike Murphy has decided to retire when his term ends next year and McIntire is the first Democrat to announce his candidacy for the office.  McIntire has served in the House since 1998 and most recently was chairman of the House Finance Committee.  He lost his chairmanship of that panel last session.

McIntire has already received endorsements from Speaker Frank Chopp, Senate Majority Leader Lisa Brown and former Governor Booth Gardner.  Treasurer Mike Murphy, a Democrat, has endorsed his Deputy Allan Martin who is running as a Republican.

Here’s a story from Wednesday’s Olympian newspaper titled “Professor Begins Race for State Treasurer.”

Sen. Erik Poulsen (D-Seattle), the chairman of the Senate Water, Energy and Telecommunications Committee announced this afternoon that he will be resigning his seat in the Senate effective October 1st to become the government affairs director for the Washington Public Utility Districts Association.

Poulsen, who’s district encompasses West Seattle, Burien and Vashon Island was first elected to the state House of Representatives in 1994 where he served three terms.  He has been in the Senate since 2002 and was just re-elected last November.  There is no indication yet of who would be appointed to fill his unexpired term, although his two House seatmates, Rep. Eileen Cody and Rep. Joe McDermott are potential candidates.

The “dog days” of summer are upon us and the postings are indeed light.  I’ve been in B.C. the past couple of days meeting with some higher education officials from our neighbor to the north (more about that in the next posting), but I hope most of you saw the announcement this week about the more recent developments in the UW North Puget Sound site selection process.

As reported in Thursday’s Everett Herald, the UW and OFM (working with NBBJ consultants) has reduced the original list of potential UW North campus sites from 73 to nine.  Six of these sites are in Marysville, two in Everett and one in Arlington.  What they have in common, though, is proximity to Interstate 5 and other forms of transportation and they are all relatively close to work opportunities, particularly for future students of the new campus who will be expected to include at least one experiential learning opportunity outside the university as part of their academic experience.

The UW’s academic planning group has concluded that such experiential learning opportunities are critical to preparing student’s to be successful in the 21st century competitive marketplace and UW campuses in Seattle, Bothell and Tacoma are already implementing these changes within their own respective campus environments.  In addition, research gathered as part of the academic planning effort has found that a significant majority of these future students will be working at least part-time, so proximity to other retail and service sector job opportunities are also important in siting the new campus.

The next site selection phase will focus in more detail on these nine sites as well as requesting additional site submittals from the communities between Arlington and Everett within five miles of I-5.

Been back from vacation for less than a week an already it seems like a distant memory.  Have been on the road much of this week visiting elected officials and other stakeholders in the Snohomish, Island and Skagit county areas discussing progress on planning for the new UW campus called for in the 2007-09 capital budget.

As you may know, the UW has formed an academic planning group headed by Lee Huntsman and Ana Mari Cauce to develop a preliminary academic master plan for the new campus.  That group has met several times and is well underway to putting together a campus design that is intended to offer a range of interdisciplinary arts and sciences degrees as well as a concentration of some offerings in the science, technology, engineering and math — the so-called “STEM” disciplines.  Also under active consideration is the notion of developing a strong “experiential learning” component for the campus that would have students working directly with local businesses, non-profit agencies and the like to provide real world experiences as part of a student’s academic requirements.

The general outline of this “working vision” of the UW North Puget Sound campus has been very well received in the Snohomish, Island and Skagit communities.  As you can imagine, though, most of the interest has been on the site selection process being managed by our consultants NBBJ.  A total of 73 campus sites were submitted to NBBJ in July ranging from less than one acre to more than 1,000 and covering the breadth of the three county region.  Shortly, that list will get paired down to a smaller working group of sites based on criteria related to the requirements of the preliminary academic plan, transportation access and other site accessibility factors.

The goal is to continue to evaluate and refine the list of sites in order to meet a November 15 reporting deadline to the Governor and Legislature that must include a draft academic master plan as well as three site recommendations for placement of the campus.