Peninsula Daily News news sources
OLYMPIA — An estimated 3,000 taxpayers lined the steps to the domed state Capitol building before noon to protest proposed tax increases.
And then double that number rallied in the afternoon to urge raising taxes to continue state programs.
The morning protesters, mostly conservative, vowed a reckoning in November if lawmakers and Gov. Chris Gregoire move ahead with the tax hikes.
They were followed on the Presidents Day holiday afternoon by demonstrators hoping the Legislature and governor increase taxes enough to maintain education and social services, among other state programs. Many of the afternoon demonstrators represented employee unions.
People waved “Yes on revenue” signs, and speakers used the r-word instead of the t-word when describing their solution to the state’s problems.
“There’s less revenue at a time when people need more help,” Leno Rose-Avila, director of Social Justice Fund Northwest, told the crowd, according to reports by the Tacoma News Tribune, www.thenewstribune.com .
The afternoon crowd numbered 6,000, according to the State Patrol.
“This is incredible. There’s so many more of us than the other side,” said Sen. Ed Murray, D-Seattle. “I think they’re running out of teabags.”
Earlier in the day, anti-tax demonstrators carried signs like “Deliver us from weasels.”
The Democrat-led state Legislature is planning to close a $2.8 billion budget gap with a combination of higher taxes and spending cuts.
It’s a big week for budget decisions at the Legislature. Democratic Gov. Chris Gregoire is expected to detail her preferences for specific taxes early in the week, with Senate budget writers hoping to unveil their spending plan a few days later.
“The powers that be have miscalculated the power of our numbers,” said Patrick Connor, state director of the National Federation of Independent Business, which lobbies on behalf of small businesses, “and one by one, we will take back the people’s Legislature.”
A State Patrol trooper estimated the morning crowd at 3,000.
The governor seemed to be a primary target of the morning crowd.
It chanted “liar,” after Seattle talk radio host Dori Monson quoted Gregoire as saying tough economic times aren’t the time for leaders to raise taxes. Monson agreed with their sentiment: “Christine Gregoire is a liar.”
“Don’t tell me, Madam Governor, that you have cut to the bone,” Monson said, “because everybody here can see there’s a lot of fat still hanging off that bone.”
