Byline: Kate Riley; Seattle Times editorial columnist
The late Rep. Bill Grant became a rare thing in Olympia. A robust, chisel-featured, karaoke-loving wheat farmer from rural Walla Walla County sat elbow to elbow in caucus leadership with Seattle liberals.
Elected in 1986 when Southeastern Washington enthusiastically sent Democrats to the Legislature and voted reliably for former Democratic Speaker of the U.S. House Tom Foley, Grant, as a rural Eastern Washington Democrat, eventually became as rare as the sage grouse. He died in 2009 after a brief illness that followed his 12th -- and easy -- election.
A few years ago, I marveled to Grant that his urban-dominated caucus still embraced a conservative Democrat so warmly. Matter-of-factly, he told me an important part of his role was to 'stop stupid stuff from happening.'
Oh, Bill, we sure need you now.
The legislative session just now concluded was a head-on collision between plummeting state revenues and the bow wave of the Legislature's four-year, pre-recession spending spree. Nobody won in the crunch, especially not those who will bear the burden of paying the $800 million in new taxes. Next year will be even worse, because the Legislature punted, again choosing not to begin authentic efforts to reform state government, which must be rejiggered to fit a dramatically different economy.
Another House Democrat, Rep. Christopher Hurst of Enumclaw, recently invoked Grant's name when I asked him why he was making a statement by filing for re-election under the label 'Independent Democrat.' Fresh from the bruising legislative session, Hurst was frustrated with the caucus' direction. Though Hurst says he supports Speaker Frank Chopp, he misses Grant's moderating influence and worries now that another moderate, House Majority Leader Lynn Kessler, D-Hoquiam, is not seeking re-election.
'The House Democrats can't be a caucus dominated by Seattle liberals and a couple of liberals from downtown Tacoma,' said Hurst, who is frustrated the Legislature didn't do more to make changes to put the state in better stead going forward.
'We didn't do the reforms we should have done,' he said, ticking off the now well-known proposals, such as shutting down the state printer and liquor stores. '... All we had to do was say no to our friends.'
Interestingly, some of those traditional friends are making clear their own dissatisfaction with Democratic leadership because, among other things, of the calls for privatization, closing institutions and making state employees pay more for health care. The Washington Federation of State Employees and the Washington State Labor Council recently announced their early endorsements in legislative races on the ballot in the fall, leaving off many incumbents who would have been shoo-ins in years past. Notably missing from these lists: Senate Majority Leader Lisa Brown, D-Spokane, and Speaker Chopp.
These snubs are a blow during what promises to be a feisty, potentially Legislature-reshaping election year. A third year of daunting budget challenges is bound to sort the authentic public servants from those of the special interests and the parties.
When resources diminish and voters' interest is not merely piqued, but provoked, because of significant household impacts, lawmakers are likely to find out who their real bosses are.
I still hold out hope Washington's new top-two primary will begin to flex its moderating muscle -- that more-moderate candidates from around the state will defeat their more-extreme challengers, whether from the left or the right.
A case in point from 2008 is Rep. Reuven Carlyle, the moderate Democrat elected over the party's more liberal choice, in one of Seattle's most liberal districts. Carlyle dares engage in heretofore heretical topics like zero-base budgeting -- 'We need to hit the refresh button' -- and some of the privatization issues.
This is the kind of thinking that should rule in Olympia, not the kind that clings to the path that set us up for such dire trouble in the first place.
Kate Riley's column appears regularly on editorial pages of The Times. Her e-mail address is kriley@seattletimes.com
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