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Governor Dan Evans Wins Coveted TVW “Cammy” Award

It seems unlikely that on day 53 of this 60-day session that our request legislation to provide $150 million in public financing to renovate Husky Stadium is going to leap to the forefront of “go home” issues (although I am still permitted to dream if I want).  But that doesn’t mean the UW is coming back from Olympia empty-handed.

At the annual TVW banquet on Monday evening at Olympia’s Red Lion Inn, Governor Dan Evans and Ways and Means committee chairwoman Sen. Margarita Prentice (D-Renton) were co-winners of a coveted “Cammy” award.  The Cammy’s are handed out each year at the TVW dinner to recognize some of the most unusual, humorous or embarassing moments from committee hearings or floor action covered by Washington’s public affairs station.  By audience vote, Governor Evans and Sen. Prentice won their Cammy for an exchange that occured in the Ways and Means committee on February 5th during the public hearing on the Husky Stadium bill.

In testimony about the deterioration of the stadium, Governor Evans described the precarious condition of the press box and lamented that it would be a terrible situation to have something happen to the box while it was filled with reporters and other media types.  Recognizing the “high esteem” that some legislators, staffers and lobbyists hold for members of the fourth estate, Evans quickly corrected himself and admitted that many of the committee members might not think that would have been such a horrible outcome.

Here’s a link to actual committee hearing on the TVW website.  The Cammy-winning exchange is between 20:30 and 20:50 of the clip.  Hopefully, we can use this Cammy awad as a springboard to stadium success in 2009.

Lots to Cover — Ready for a Quick Download?

Much has been happening today as we begin to countdown towards adjournment on March 13.  Here’s a brief summary of what’s making news in the state capitol today of interest to the UW.

Senate Democrats Challenge Initiative 960

Last Friday, Lt. Governor Brad Owen ruled that a legislative measure to apply a surcharge to the state liquor tax would require a two thirds majority of the Senate to pass the chamber.  SB 6931 would have imposed a 42 cent per liter surcharge on state liquor taxes.  It failed to gain the 33 votes needed for passage.

Today. Senate Majority Leader Lisa Brown filed a lawsuit asking the state Supreme Court to overturn Initiative 960’s two thirds vote requirement for tax increases.  Brown argues that I-960 — a state statute — cannot amend the state constitution which says the Legislature passes bills with a simple majority vote.

Highway 520 Bill Continues to Move

HB 3096, which would establish an implementation committee to evaluate tolling options for the state route 520 bridge replacement project cleared the House of Representatives 63-30 last Friday and was heared today in the Senate Transportation Committee where it is expected to pass and be referred to the Senate Rules Committee.

The measure also requires the bridge to be designed to accomodate effective connections for transit, including high capacity transit, to the light rail station at the University of Washington.

The Seattle Post-Intelligencer reports this afternoon on their website that Governor Gregoire announced today that the bridge replacement project can be completed as early as 2014 and for $500 to $700 million less based on work completed by the state Department of Transportation.

New Twist on Stadium Taxes

The House Finance Committee today passed a new measure (HB 3380) that would use some of the revenues currently pledged for Safeco Field bonds for low income housing, once those bonds are retired in 2012.  The measure, sponsored by Rep. Ross Hunter (D-Medina) also includes provisions of another bill (SB 6638) sponsored by Sen. Ed Murray (D-Seattle) which would dedicate future hotel/motel tax revenues currently pledged for Qwest Field to King County arts organizations beginning in 2021.

In related developments, representatives from the city of Seattle and other organizations have been meeting with the Governor, Senate and House leaders and other senior officials to discuss funding for the potential renovation of Key Arena.  As has been reported in the Seattle papers, much of the impetus for these new discussions are based on a new group of potential local buyers for the Supersonics or another NBA team which has recently been organized.

Chang Mook Sohn Announces Bid for State Treasurer

Dr. Chang Mook Sohn, the state’s longtime chief revenue forecaster, announced his candidacy today for State Treasurer.  Sohn recently retired from his position as director of the state’s economic and revenue forecast council.  He will challenge Rep. Jim McIntire (D-Seattle) in the Democratic primary this August.

Democratic incumbant Mike Murphy is retiring this year and backing his deputy Allan Martin who is running in the Republican primary.  Sohn is being endorsed by former Governor Gary Locke and former state treasurer Dan Grimm as well as many other state leaders.  This is his first bid for elective office.

Washington State Chosen One of Top Three Best State Governments

The Pew Center on the States have decided that Utah, Virginia and Washington (yes, our Washington) has one of the most effective state governments in the nation.  The center ranked states based on how well the manage budgets, staff, infrastructure and information.  Washington was lauded for Governor Gregoire’s “GMAP” efforts that bring agency leaders together with the Governor’s senior management team in a public setting to monitor how state programs are working.

Next Campus Legislative Briefing

The next (and likely final) campus legislative briefing will be held next Tuesday, March 4 from 11:00 a.m. to noon in the Regents Room in Gerberding Hall.

House and Senate budget proposals have passed their respective chambers so negotiations begin in earnest next week.  Today is the last day for policy committees to consider bills from the opposite house and fiscal committees must complete their work by Monday.  The end of session is near and by Tuesday, most legislators, staffers and lobbyists will be counting backwards from the scheduled adjournment date of March 13.

See all of you Tuesday morning.

Funding for eScience Institute Added to Senate Budget

During their executive session on the 2008 supplemental operating budget this afternoon, the Senate Ways and Means committee added $1 million to the University’s budget for the eScience Institute proposal that was part of the UW’s original supplemental budget request.  The amendment was co-sponsored by Senators Jeanne Kohl-Welles (D-Seattle) and Senator Brian Hatfield (D-Raymond).  Senator Ed Murray (D-Seattle) who is not on the committee also played an important role in advocating for the amendment.

The committee also added funding for a Ruckelshaus Center study related to patient safety (which was included in the House budget) and funding related to bills dealing with improving medical care for persons with developmental disabilities.

The funding for the eScience Institute comes from the state general fund, but a corresponding transfer from a state convention and trade center account was made in order to maintain the Senate’s existing general fund reserve.

The full Senate should take action on the supplemental budget tomorrow or Friday.  Negotiations on differences between the two chambers will begin next week.

Senate Budget Released

The Senate released their versions of the operating and capital budgets today at a noon press conference in Olympia.  For the UW, the news was much improved from what was unveiled last week in the House of Representatives.

OPERATING BUDGET

Of most importance, the Senate not only maintained funding in the underlying budget for the Star Researchers program, they also enhanced the program with an increase of $253,000.  Having this funding retained will insure that both the UW and WSU are able to finalize their respective researcher recruitments which are currently in progress.  If you haven’t seen it already, the Seattle Times wrote a nice editorial this morning in support of maintaining these funds.

The Senate budget also provides $500,000 for additional childcare institutional grants for students at the six public baccalaureate institutions as provided for in SB 6730.

As for the rest of the Senate operating budget, there’s not a lot to crow about.  None of the University’s supplemental operating budget request items were funded, with the exception of $88,000 for one additional mental health counselor position, a component of our larger campus safety budget request.  The rest of the operating enhancements are related to specific bills passed by the Senate including:

  • $125,000 for the Ruckelshaus Center to conduct a land use and property rights tudy.
  • $408,000 to implement the WA Trade Corps Fellowship program (SSB 5367)
  • $340,000 to cover the difference between in-state and out-of-state tuition for certain foreign nationals and their children who will now qualify for in-state tuition (SB 6849).
  • $65,000 for the State Climatologist at the UW who is assigned additional responsibilities (SB 6308).

CAPITAL BUDGET

The Senate capital budget is essentially a carbon copy of the capital budget issued by the House last week.  One UW request item was partially funded, that being the land acquisition and soils remediation request for the UW Tacoma campus.  A total of $3 million is provided of the $7.4 million original request, $2 million for land acquisition and $1 million for soils remediation.

In addition, the Senate budget provides $300,000 pre-design funding for a proposed expansion of the Burke Museum.

One item that is of concern to the UW is the reduction in the capital budget cost allocation pool that was established just last year but reduced by about 50% in both the House and Senate capital budgets.  The UW has a pending request before OFM of about $670,000 due to projected cost overruns on the Playhouse Theater project funded in the 2007-09 capital budget.  If the cost allocation pool reduction is not changed, there would not be sufficient funds remaining for OFM to fund this pending request.

The Senate Ways and Means committee took public testimony on these budget proposals this afternoon and will consider amendments to both the operating and capital budgets at their afternoon hearing tomorrow.

Budget Update

The House of Representatives is debating the 2008 supplemental operating budget as I post this entry.  Unfortunately for the UW and WSU Star Researchers program, an amendment sponsored by Rep. Larry Haler (R-Richland) which would have restored the $1.5 million cut out in the House budget proposal failed on a voice vote less than a half hour ago.  It appears the cut will remain and our efforts will shift to retaining the funding in the Senate budget so that the program has a chance to be fully restored in conference negotiations.

Speaking of the Senate, they are delaying the release of their 2008 operating and capital budget proposals by a day since the House budgets are being acted on this afternoon.  The Senate did release its supplemental transportation budget at noon today and we expect the Senate to unveil it’s remaining spending plans tomorrow at noon.

Governor Gregoire’s statement last week on the House budget did mention an interest in seeing the House doing more on campus safety (their budget removed virtually all of her operating and capital campus safety items) and to maintain a larger budget reserve.

House Budget Cuts STAR Researcher Funding for UW and WSU

My bad.  I testified yesterday in House Appropriations and praised committee members for at least protecting the base level of funding for the UW and other four year institutions.  Well, turns out I was wrong, at least for the state’s research universities.

Staff from the Higher Education Coordinating Board brought to our attention this morning a proposed reduction in budget for the Department of Community, Trade and Economic Development (CTED) that will have a direct impact on funding for both the UW and WSU.  It’s a $1.5 million cut to the STAR Researcher program that was implemented in the underlying 2007-09 budget based upon legislation pushed by Sen. Jim Kastama (D-Puyallup).

A total of $2.4 million was provided in the budget last year for the state Economic Development Commission to work with the UW, WSU and the HECB on a plan to recruit entrepreneurial researchers to the state lead innovation research teams and help promote commercialization within the states’ research universities.  The UW and WSU worked on this plan during the fall and are actively recruiting the first STAR researchers for each campus.

What makes this budget cut so devastating is that the UW and WSU star researcher recruitments are actively underway.  The UW is targeting Dr. Michael Hochberg from the California Institute of Technology who is an international expert in the field of Nanophotonics.  WSU is recruiting Birgitte Kiaer Ahring, a microbiologist from the Technical University of Denmark and a renowned expert in clean technology solutions.  I am told Ms. Ahring recently was in Olympia for a meeting with Governor Gregoire.

The UW and WSU are working hard to get these funds restored to the budget, for without them, a tremendous opportunity to bring two internationally respected researchers to Washington State will be missed.

House Budgets Released

The House of Representatives released its versions of the operating, capital and transportation budgets today in Olympia.  As expected, they were pretty lean and mostly devoid of new spending initiatives for the UW and the other four year institutions.  Briefly, here is a summary of how the University fared.

OPERATING BUDGET

The House budget provides a total of $582,000 of new operating resources for the UW.  Most all of these items were not requested by the University.  They are:

  • $88,000 for one new mental health counselor position.
  • $100,000 to continue academic planning activities related to a UW North Sound campus.
  • $125,000 for a land use study to be conducted by the Ruckelshaus Center.
  • $119,000 for a patient safety study to be conducted by the Ruckelshaus Center.
  • $150,000 for the Institute for the Study of the Brain (ILABS).

CAPITAL BUDGET

The House capital budget includes a total of $3.3 million in new funding for the UW for two items.  They are:

A total of $3 million for land acquisition ($2 million) and soils remediation ($1 million) for the UW Tacoma.  The University had requested a total of $7.4 million, $5.5 for land acquisition and $1.9 million for soils remediation.

  • $300,000 to conduct a pre-design study for a future expansion of the Burke Museum.

A public hearing on the House operating budget was held this afternoon and the House Capital Budget committee will take public testimony tomorrow morning.  The Senate budgets are expected to be released early next week.

Performance Agreement Legislation Moving Forward

With a strong 95-2 vote in the House of Representatives, it seems that Rep. Fred Jarrett’s (D-Mercer Island) long-time goal of using performance agreements to link higher education funding with clearly understood accountability measures may actually be on the brink of becoming state law.

EHB 2641 would establish six-year pilot performance agreements with all of the state’s four year institutions beginning with the next biennial budget cycle.  The idea, however, is not new.  Rep. Jarrett and Rep. Skip Priest (R-Federal Way) have been championing this idea ever since the state’s last economic downturn in 2002 when they watched the state slash spending for higher education, increase tuition significantly, but not adjust any expectations for what could be reasonably be accomplished by the institutions.

Today’s Seattle Times published an editorial in favor of the legislation as it heads to the Senate and a public hearing tomorrow in the Higher Education Committee.  For those of you interested in how the performance agreement process would work, here’s a link to the current version of the bill.

Whither UW North Sound?

Well, there are two days left for floor action on both House and Senate bills and I’m still getting plenty of inquiries on the status of the UW North Sound campus.  Last Tuesday, the Senate Ways and Means committee failed to advance ANY of the measures related to the new school that would have favored, Everett, Marysville and Lake Stevens.  HB 2548 (Dunshee) remains on the second reading calendar in the House and must be acted on by tomorrow unless it is deemed necessary to implement the budget.

Here are a couple of new viewpoints on this issue.  The first is a column written by Tacoma News Tribune columnist Dan Voepel which worries about the impact of the new college on UW Tacoma, particularly their technology institute.

The second is from Everett Herald political reporter Jerry Cornfield with his handicapping of Rep. Dunshee’s bills chances over the next 48 hours.