By Bob Roegner, Inside Politics
“Whoa Nellie,” to quote sports analyst Keith Jackson, would best describe voters this past Election Day.
After weeks of bad economic news, voters put the brakes on. They turned thumbs down on Proposition 1 for transportation improvements while probably getting stuck in traffic prior to casting their ballot.
Proposition 1 had been constructed to include something for just about every transportation viewpoint.
The hope was that mass transit supporters and highway supporters would each be willing to vote for the other’s project if they also got their preferred improvements.
That ballooned the price tag and resulted in the Sierra Club and Kemper Freeman finding a point of agreement to oppose the project rather than support it. Those two have as much in common as the Hatfields and McCoys.
In the end the public said no, which may have felt good, but our transportation problems remain. Federal Way would have benefitted, but only 39 percent of our voters said yes.
As of this writing, voters were also saying no to substituting a simple majority requirement for the 60 percent threshold to approve school funding. Most had felt that if this issue could ever get out of the Legislature and onto the ballot, it would pass. There are still absentee ballots to count, so we’ll see.
Voters also decided they like insurance companies less than they like trial lawyers and passed Referendum 67. This will protect the insured from having claims “unreasonably denied.”
Now the lawyers get to argue over what is “reasonable” and what isn’t. That should be fun to watch. In Olympia, the Democrats usually support trial lawyers and Republicans are more aligned with insurance companies.
And much like a frustrated parent whose patience wears out, the public tired of the behavior at the Port of Seattle, and elected Gael Tarleton and Bill Bryant over incumbents Bob Edwards and Alec Fisken.
Another Election Day message was control, as the public voted for Tim Eyman’s Initiative 960, which requires a two-thirds vote of the Legislature to pass new taxes.
That loud sound you heard was the Legislature slapping its Democratic forehead as it tries to figure out how to reconcile that vote with the public’s constant demand for better services.
Getting two-thirds of the Legislature to agree on anything is a nightmare. As we approach the 2008 legislative session and statewide elections, minority Republicans are not likely to provide any crossover votes.
On the other hand, the Democrats won’t propose any new taxes this session and their goal will be to get out of Olympia with a minimum amount of political baggage confronting them during the election season. Initiative 960 will probably end up in court.
Control was also evident here in King County as the public decided having a politician run elections was preferable to a trained professional.
Actually, what voters did was vote to put the issue on the ballot next fall as a charter amendment. If that passes, it would set up an election for the new position of Auditor in 2009.
There are several names being circulated as possible candidates. However, many of them are people who were voted out of other offices, so voters need to remember to “be careful what you ask for” when they vote next fall.
During a recent speech, T.M. Sell, a well-respected teacher of politics and economics at Highline Community College, cautioned that the right of the people to petition their government through the referendum process had been hijacked by special interest groups and individuals with an agenda.
I was surprised at how many listeners also wondered if these efforts at a “true democracy” approach really didn’t undermine the responsibility of our elected leaders to take positions and be accountable for those positions at election time.
An interesting discussion for another time.
Next week we’ll take a closer look at some of the individual races in King County and here in Federal Way.
Federal Way resident Bob Roegner, a former mayor of Auburn, can be reached at bjroegner@comcast.net.
