WWW . THESKANNER . COM
J ANUARY 30, 2013
S EATTLE , W ASHINGTON
V OLUME XXXV, N O . 17
25
CENTS
For The Skanner
news alerts
Text "NEWS" to
503-715-0890 or
scan this QR code
C HALLENGING P EOPLE TO S HAPE A B ETTER F UTURE N OW
Faster
Election
Nights
GUNS,
CHEAP
Measure would
require ballot
counting til midnight
By Rachel La Corte
The Associated Press
PHOTO BY SUSAN FRIED
A man holds an inactive missile
launcher he purchased near the
Seattle Police Gun Buy Back on
Saturday, Jan. 26. The missile launcher
was later confiscated by the police.
The event, which was held in a
parking lot underneath the freeway
between James and Cherry Streets,
was forced to close up 3 hours early
because so many people showed up
to trade in their guns that they ran out
of gift certificates. There were
numerous people carrying signs
offering to pay more for the guns on
some of the streets near the buy back
location.
Money Fuels Fight on Time Off
Dueling bills put paid family leave law on the chopping block
By Rachel La Corte
The Associated Press
OLYMPIA, Wash. (AP) —
Six years ago, Washington state
lawmakers approved a program
giving parents five weeks of
paid time off to be with a new
child.
But the question of how to pay
for the program was never
answered, and now some law-
makers are looking to remove it
from the books, while the sena-
tor who introduced the bill is
looking to expand the program.
Its start already has been
delayed until 2015.
The bill, passed with much
fanfare in 2007, was supposed
to start paying benefits of up to
$250 a week starting in October
2009. But without an agreed-
upon funding source, the Legis-
lature has postponed its
implementation twice.
``It may have seemed like a
good idea, but we don’t have the
money to do it,’’ said Sen. John
Braun, R-Centralia, who is
sponsoring the measure to
repeal the law. ``We need to face
INDEX
News ........................2,3
Calendar ....................2
Opinion .......................4
A&E ....................2,5,6,8
Bids/Classifieds............7
the reality and deal with it.’’
Sen. Karen Keiser, a Democ-
rat from Kent who sponsored
the initial bill, decried any effort
to repeal the law.
``It’s an appalling move at a
time when middleclass families
are having a hard time making
things work,’’ she said. ``We’re
getting steady again in our econ-
omy. It’s time to look forward.’’
Keiser on Thursday intro-
duced her own bill to expand the
underlying measure to include
caring for a family member or
an employee’s own disability.
Her bill would pay two-thirds of
a worker’s pay a week, up to
$1,000 a week, and would
expand the time allowed from
five weeks to 12 weeks. The
program would be paid for with
a .01 percent payroll tax on both
employees and employers start-
ing in 2014, and benefits would
start in October 2015.
Keiser said she based her new
measure on laws in California
and New Jersey.
``I am not backing off and not
going to give up this endeavor
See LEAVE on page 3
OLYMPIA, Wash. (AP) — It’s well
known that in Washington state, elections
often don’t end on election night, because
the state’s vote-by-mail system ensures that
any close race will be unsettled for days
afterward.
But one measure introduced by Rep.
Kevin Van De Wege, D-Sequim, would
require ballots on election night to be
processed and counted until midnight,
unless there are no more ballots on hand to
count. However, because current law only
requires that ballots be postmarked by Elec-
tion Day, many voters drop ballots in the
mail or into special drop boxes that day,
meaning the forms often don’t reach elec-
tion officials for several more days. The sys-
tem usually leaves about half of the vote
outstanding at the end of the night.
There are special elections ending Feb. 12
in 32 of Washington’s 39 counties.
The secretary of state’s office says 80
measures in 68 districts are going before
more than a million voters — nearly a third
of the voters in Washington.
Most of the issues are school levies.
Among the largest are two in Seattle — a
$552 million operations levy to provide
about a quarter of the district’s budget and a
$695 million capital levy for school con-
struction and upgrades including Wi-Fi in
every school.
During this past election in November, all
of the state’s counties — except for Pierce,
which did three — did one count shortly
after the 8 p.m. ``poll close’’ deadline and
then resumed tally updates in the following
days and weeks. The governor’s race wasn’t
called until the end of election week, and
other races that were too close to call went
even longer.
Van De Wege said after increasingly
longer election cycles end, voters ``want to
know it’s over and what the results are.’’
See ELECTIONS on page 3
Inslee Stays Put on Marijuana Law
Local officials still wait in vain for some sign of what Feds will do
By Gene Johnson
The Associated Press
OLYMPIA, Wash. (AP) — Washington
Gov. Jay Inslee and Attorney General Bob
Ferguson met with U.S. Attorney General
Eric Holder on Tuesday, but came away no
further enlightened about how the federal
government will respond to last fall’s votes
in Washington and Colorado that set up
legal markets for marijuana.
The two states voted to legalize recre-
ational marijuana use by adults over 21 and
to create state-licensed systems of growers,
processors and retail stores that sell heavily
taxed pot. The creation of those regulatory
schemes poses a possible conflict with fed-
eral law, which outlaws marijuana, and the
Justice Department hasn’t said whether it
will sue to block the state laws.
Inslee, a former Democratic congressman
who was sworn in as governor last week,
told reporters after the meeting in Washing-
ton, D.C., that the state will move forward
to establish rules for the market.
Hundreds on Tuesday night attended the
state Liquor Control Board’s inaugural pub-
lic forum on developing those rules. The
See POT on page 3