Author: Ross

I am the Director of the Department of Early Learning for Washington State. I formerly represented the 48th Legislative District in the State House of Representatives, chairing the Appropriations committee and spent many a year at Microsoft.

Current Budget Situation

Awesome budget Cutting GraphicLast week Kelli Linville, the chair of the House Ways and Means Committee, and I sent a letter to Gov Gregoire outlining our recommendation that she use the authority she has to make across the board cuts in the budget. We did this because changes in the economy and lack of action at the federal level have changed some of the underlying assumptions we made in drafting the budget last Spring. In particular,

  1. Congress has changed their mind about providing states with an extension to improved matching rates for the federal Medicaid program. This leaves about a $480 million hole in our budget.
  2. The state Revenue Forecast Council (www.erfc.wa.gov) lowered estimates of revenues in the 2009-2011 biennium by $200 million.
  3. Initial collections reports based on activity in May came in about $85 million below the revised estimates.

A budget is based on assumptions, and if changes on the ground affect the assumptions, it’s prudent to react as early as possible. The text of the letter is included below if you’re interested.

Continue reading “Current Budget Situation”

Viaduct Replacement Tunnel Angst

I spent an hour with The Stranger in an endorsement review last week and was astounded at the amount of time they spent on the McGinn-led hysteria about the tunnel project. I’ve talked to a couple of Seattle people since and they are all atwitter about it.

The big question to me was “who pays for overruns?” The answer is pretty clear – it’s a state project, run by WSDOT. Who do you think? The state will pay for overruns, so we should manage this carefully so there aren’t any. I agreed with them that property owners who will benefit hugely when they viaduct comes down should create a “Local Improvement District” and help pay for the project, particularly the city part creating the waterfront park.

The angst over the design baffles me though. I understand McGinn doesn’t want cars anywhere near Seattle, but we have 100,000+ cars a day on that road. If they don’t go there, they’ll come to I5 and I405. I’m not interested in turning 405 into a worse parking lot than it already is.

Continue reading “Viaduct Replacement Tunnel Angst”

Sales Tax Exemption for Canadian Residents?

British Columbia is making a minor change in their sales tax today that for some incomprehensible technical reasons winds up exempting all of their residents from paying sales tax in Washington. The City of Bellingham and Whatcom county will be heavily impacted by this and have sued the Department of Revenue to get them to change their interpretation.

The Court issued an injunction on the Department of Revenue (DOR) June 30th enjoining them from providing advice to retailers while this gets worked out. Retailers are kinda stuck between a rock and a hard place here – if they collect the tax and the customers are eventually found to be exempt they could get sued by the customer. If they don’t collect the tax and the city and county win their lawsuit they WILL be held responsible for the money by the DOR.

Here’s what the DOR is allowed to say:

I’m very sorry, but the Department has been sued by the City of Bellingham and Whatcom County. 

The City and County are challenging the Department’s interpretation of RCW 82.08.0273, the nonresident retail sales tax exemption statute.

The Skagit County Superior Court has issued a temporary restraining order barring the Department from providing advice to retailers on whether British Columbia residents qualify for the nonresident exemption.

The outcome of the pending litigation is unknown.

However, if a retailer sells goods to a B.C. resident without collecting tax, the retailer may be liable for the unpaid tax if the court eventually determines that B.C. residents do not qualify for the nonresident exemption.

If I were a retailer I’d collect the tax. I’ll try to unwind this situation in the Legislature next year, but won’t be able to do anything about the first 9-12 months of implementation of whichever way the court orders. It does not make sense to me that out of state people get an exemption from paying tax and in-state residents have to pay more as a result.

Interesting Study on Charter Schools

The US Dept of Education just released a study on charter middle schools that’s worth reading. Click Here for the report.

I’ve supported charter schools in the past as a way to experiment with new ways of building schools, but not as a panacea for all students. Just like regular schools, charter schools vary significantly in their performance. Most large scale studies find that there isn’t a huge difference in overall gains in student achievement between charters and traditional schools. This study of charter middle schools (funded by the federal government) isn’t any different.

The main conclusions:

  • On average, charter middle schools that hold lotteries are neither more nor less successful than traditional public schools in improving student achievement, behavior, and school progress.
  • The impact of charter middle schools on student achievement varies significantly across schools.
  • Study charter schools serving more low income or low achieving students had statistically significant positive effects on math test scores, while charter schools serving more advantaged students—those with higher income and prior achievement—had significant negative effects on math test scores.
  • Some operational features of charter middle schools are associated with more positive (or less negative) impacts on achievement.

This study looked at popular charter schools (presumably among the more effective) and found that they produced student gains in low-income urban areas and declines in student performance in higher-income populations.

I don’t find this surprising. In many lower-income urban areas that are served by charters the traditional public option is not compelling. Higher-income suburban areas often have much stronger schools.

It’s worth reading the executive summary of this study for the somewhat obvious insights – some schools are better than others, regardless of the charter/non-charter distinction. It’s up to us as policy makers to figure out how to make all the schools better – we should all have above average schools. (I understand that we can’t all live in Lake Woebegone, but we can hope, can’t we?)

 

 

Retire-Rehire Program Abuse

The Seattle Times has a great story on the use of the “retire-rehire” provision in state law that allows someone to retire, and then be hired back by the state or another governmnet but still collect his or her retirement. When I searched on the issue on the internet I hit a bunch of similar stories from 2003, the last time this program came up. Same problem.

Retired, then rehired: How college workers use loophole to boost pay

A Seattle Times investigation has found that at least 40 university or community-college employees in Washington retired and were rehired within weeks, often returning to the same job without the position ever being advertised. That has allowed them to double dip by collecting both a salary and a pension.

Seattle Times June 26, 2010

I’ve gotten some mail from constituents about it and am sending the following reply:

Continue reading “Retire-Rehire Program Abuse”

Education Data

For a number of years we’ve been working on improving the collection of data about education. This has been painful – there are 17 different data systems across K-12, plus different systems in each of the higher ed silos and no data collection at all in early learning. We’re trying to make sure we understand what works and what doesn’t. Good data is like History – without it we’re likely to repeat what we’ve been doing, regardless of how well it works.

Of course, none of the individual people who control their existing system want to change, so this has been a bit painful. We just got a big grant form the feds to improve our system. The following is from the Governor’s press release on the topic:

Washington Awarded $17.3 Million for Education Data System

For Immediate Release: May 21, 2010

OLYMPIA — Washington state was awarded $17.3 million for the design and implementation of a statewide data system, U.S. Secretary of Education Arne Duncan announced this morning.
The money is being funded through the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act. Known as a statewide longitudinal data systems grant, the money will support the development of an integrated data system from early childhood education to adult employment.

There’s more – click here: http://www.governor.wa.gov/news/news-view.asp?pressRelease=1504&newsType=1

Conservation NW – People who do real work

Tricie and I spent last weekend in the Okanogan looking at the work of the local land trust and of Conservation NW, the umbrella organization that is working to protect a corridor between the Rockies and the Cascades. It’s an amazing place. Here are a couple of pictures from the trip – one mine, two others from a Park Ranger at a wildlife area a couple of miles from where we stayed.

We saw over 30 different types of birds in a 3-hour tour. The second photo from Assistant Manager Justin Haug is one of the many songbirds. The last picture is one of mine – a casual snapshot as we drove along Palmer Lake.

Birding tour at Sinlahekin wildlife area
Nashville Warbler
White horse in a yellow field

Tax Evasion for Dummies, the video

During the session this year I did a number of presentations of a slideshow on how people evade taxes in Washington and the key points of a bill that would limit the ability for some of these scams to work. Eventually I recorded the show so that other people could see it. This is my first cut at the “new media” approach to politics so it’s not that good yet, (e.g. it’s too long) but enough people wanted access that I’m posting it here.

You can access it directly on youtube at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3uAe-mZZyO4

You can search youtube for “tax evasion for dummies”.

And, barring blogging software disasters you can watch it here.

Town Hall Meeting Tonight – Tuesday May 18, 2010

We sent this notice out 2 weeks ago, but I wanted to re-post it today so that you can change all of your plans to come. We intend to have an interchange with constituents on budgets, education, transportation and any other topic that comes up. We’d love to see you.

Washington State Legislature
Sen. Rodney Tom, Rep. Ross Hunter and Rep. Deb Eddy

48th Legislative District

 CALENDAR ANNOUNCEMENT

Eastside residents invited to May 18 town hall with local legislators

May 5, 2010

State Sen. Rodney Tom (D-Bellevue) and Reps. Ross Hunter (D-Medina) and Deb Eddy (D-Kirkland) invite Eastside residents to a Town Hall on Tuesday, May 18 for a recap of the 2010 legislative session and a look ahead at upcoming work on the 520 project, education reform and more.

Residents are encouraged to come with questions or ideas about other issues of interest.

When: Tuesday, May 18 at 6 p.m.
Where: Bellevue City Hall (450 110th Ave. NE)

For more information, contact Rep. Hunter’s Legislative Assistant Marilyn Pedersen at (425) 453-3064 or pedersen.marilyn@leg.wa.gov.

# # #

Contacts:                  Sen. Rodney Tom – (360) 786-7694 or tom.rodney@leg.wa.gov

Rep. Ross Hunter – (425) 453-3064 or hunter.ross@leg.wa.gov

Rep. Deb Eddy – (360) 786-7848 or eddy.deb@leg.wa.gov

Media Staff:           Jaime Smith – (360) 786-7631 or smith.jaime@leg.wa.gov

What’s candy?

Kit Kat - is it a cookie or a candy bar?

This year the Legislature extended the sales tax to candy. Earlier this week the Dept. of Revenue released a list of products that will be taxed. The list also identifies similar items that don’t fall under the definition of “candy” so that retailers can easily re-program their cash registers.

Of course, this provided lots of fodder for the media to have some fun, and they didn’t pass up the opportunity. 🙂

Seattle Times: Will your favorite candy be taxed? Not if it contains flour

Seattle PI: Candy tax takes effect June 1 in Washington

Chicago Tribune: Candy or food? Confusion grows as new tax looms

Continue reading “What’s candy?”