The North Fork Palouse River seen from the McDonald Farm.

Photo submitted by Patrick McDonald

We invite you to e-mail your photos and stories to us as part of an ongoing feature called “From Your Corner of Washington” – we want to gather images of landscapes, homes, views, and personal narratives from all over the state.

Q) How do I submit a photo or story to be used in “From Your Corner of  Washington”?
A) Please send your text or image attachment (in JPG format) via e-mail to Stephanie Horn at Stephanie.Horn@sos.wa.gov .

Q) What are the guidelines for submissions?
A) All submissions will be screened according to our blog use policy .

By submitting a photo to us, you are acknowledging that you are the copyright owner of the image or have the owner’s authorized permission to supply this to the Secretary of State’s website for use on its blog.  For questions, please contact our communications staff .

Monday is the beginning of the signature check for Initiative 1107, the last of six initiatives submitted to the Secretary of State’s Elections Division earlier this summer. I-1107 would repeal new taxes on candy, pop, beer and bottled water. The 1107 sig check should be completed later this week.

Last Friday marked the end of an unheralded yet important step in the initiative signature check journey: The last petition sheet for I-1107 (shown above) was scanned by our Imaging Services staff, meaning the scanning work for all of those petition sheets and all of those signatures is now finished.

Before they are reviewed by signature checkers, petition sheets must be copied for official record-keeping.

And just how many petition sheets and sigs are we talking about in this monumental year for initiatives? Nearly 161,000 sheets and about 2.2 million signatures. That is a lot of scanning. (At 52,255 sheets, I-1107 had an unusually large number of petition sheets. ) These figures show that  signature gatherers were especially busy this year, and that Washington citizens are more willing than ever to get involved with our cherished initiative process.

Two liquor privatization measures will appear on the Washington state ballot this year.

The state Elections Division announced Friday afternoon that sponsors for Initiative 1105 submitted enough voter signatures to make the November ballot. Secretary of State Sam Reed is expected to officially certify I-1105 early next week.

Whereas the other liquor privatization proposal, Initiative1100, would let retailers buy liquor stock directly from manufacturers, I-1105 would require use of wholesalers.

I-1105, backed by wholesalers, submitted 358,525 signatures, a large enough cushion to allow a 3 percent random sample check. More than 81 percent of the 10,935 sample signatures were valid – 9,193 were accepted, and 1,742 were rejected. Nearly all of the rejections were because the signers were not registered voters. The error rate was 18.55 percent.

The last of the six initiatives to be checked will be I-1107. That review starts Monday. This measure would repeal new taxes on candy, pop, beer and bottled water. continue reading

Washington Gov.  Chris Gregoire, a White House favorite, makes the Top 50 `politicos to watch‘ list’ just released by the beltway insiders’ chatty Politico.  As you’ll recall, Gregoire has been mentioned for a variety of cabinet posts, and the Obama Administration made no secret that she’s on their short list to succeed Elena Kagan as Solicitor General.

Will she be offered the post, sometimes described as the 10th Supreme Court justice? Would she take it, given her previous reticence?  We’ll see. (If she resigned as governor by Oct. 3, there would be an all-comers race in November to fill out the remaining two years of her term.)

The Politico writeup already describes her as a “new administration face” to watch.  Here’s their writeup:

“It’s not surprising that Washington Gov. Chris Gregoire is on President Barack Obama’s shortlist to replace Supreme Court nominee Elena Kagan as solicitor general.

Gregoire, a superdelegate who backed Obama in the 2008 presidential race, has long been rumored as a candidate for various White House posts. Yet after the election, amid speculation that she could be nominated as commerce secretary or a Supreme Court justice, she told reporters she intended to run for reelection that year: “I made it clear early on I would not accept an appointment.”

She may feel differently now.

Gregoire, who got her law degree from Gonzaga University, has a strong legal background. She began her career in the state attorney general’s office, and she served for 12 years as Washington’s first female attorney general — taking on drug companies and joining lawsuits against Big Tobacco — before running for governor in 2004.”

In October of 1871, prominent national suffrage advocate Susan B. Anthony traveled to Washington Territory and became the first woman to address the Washington Territorial Legislature.  Anthony and Oregon suffragist Abigail Scott Duniway toured Washington Territory to promote women’s suffrage, spurring the creation of Suffrage Associations throughout the area. 

Fast-forward to 2010, and plans are in the works to celebrate the 139th anniversary of Susan B. Anthony’s history-making visit this October in Olympia.  Stay tuned for more details!

As we’ve noted in this space, initiatives are very popular this year and likely will equal the modern record set 10 years ago.  The folks over at the Public Disclosure Commission, which tracks contributions and spending by supporters and foes of ballot measures, report that as of mid-July, over $10 million has been raised and over $9 million spent, much of it to pay for signature-gathering.

In an analysis presented to the Public Disclosure Commission, staffer Tony Perkins traced the large flow of big-dollar contributions from well-heeled interests.  His conclusion:

“The citizen initiative was once seen as a remedy for the domination of industry and other powerful interests over the legislative process. Today, contribution and expenditure reports filed with the PDC reveal that these same well‐funded interests—corporations, unions, trade and professional associations—use paid signature gatherers to accomplish their goals.”

Hardly seems possible, but Washington’s Top 2 Primary gets underway next week!

Mail ballots will be available for pick-up at the county elections offices next Wednesday and by law must be mailed out to voters by Friday.  That means most of us can start voting in little more than a week from now.  The postmark deadline is Aug. 17.

Secretary of State Sam Reed urged a big turnout for the run-up to this key mid-term election:

“This is an excellent opportunity for you to have your voice heard. We are hearing a huge amount of debate over the direction of the state and country, and we all deeply care about the future of our local communities, as well.  This Top 2 Primary will give you and your neighbors a chance to help shape that future by picking your favorites for each office.”

This is the third running of the Top 2 Primary, which voters approved and the Supreme Court upheld.  In short, it’s no longer a nominating primary where you get a standard-bearer for each continue reading

Photograph courtesy of Bernadette Griffin

From camping, hiking, boating to a show at the outdoor amphitheatre, the Gorge in George, Washington is well worth a visit this summer.

UPDATE:  The Friday hearing referred to by anti-gay marriage activists will not occur. The judge has temporarily dismissed their motion to ban release of R-71 petitions, but they can re-file the request after the U.S. Supreme Court officially returns the case to the U.S. District Court in Tacoma.

Original post, with the new timing information added:

It’s back to court again, as foes of last year’s Referendum 71 renew a request that the petitions be sealed from public disclosure.

Protect Marriage Washington is  the group that forced a public vote last fall on the so-called  “everything but marriage” domestic partnership law. Now they’re asking the U.S. District Court in Tacoma to continue blocking release of the names and addresses of people who signed R-71 petitions. It’s not clear when the court hearing will be.  It was originally expected by challengers to occur Friday,  but the  judge has dismissed the request until he gets formal notice from the Supreme Court transferring the case back to his courtroom.

Secretary of State Sam Reed and Attorney General Rob McKenna will continue fighting for release under terms of the state’s voter-approved Public Records Act.

The U.S. Supreme Court, in a case called Doe v. Reed, ruled 8-1 on June 24 that as a general continue reading

Initiative activist Tim Eyman and his partners will again appear on the Washington state ballot this year.  Their Initiative 1053, making it harder for Olympia to raise taxes, cleared its last major hurdle on Monday when the state Elections Division announced that the sponsors submitted enough voter signatures to make the November ballot.

I-1053 became the fourth initiative to qualify for the ballot, and two others are widely expected to qualify, too.  That would equal the modern record set in 2000. The all-time record is seven, set in 1914, the first year the initiative process was available.

The I-1053 campaign turned in nearly 338,000 signatures, a large enough pad to allow a 3 percent random test.  More than 80 percent of the 10,325 signatures were valid — 9,187 were accepted and 1,138 were rejected, most because they weren’t registered voters. The error rate was 19.62 percent.

The measure would restore the two-thirds voting requirement for the Legislature to raise taxes. Lawmakers can also refer taxes to the voters.  Lawmakers suspended the supermajority continue reading