NEWS ROUNDUP
News from Idaho, Kansas, Indiana and, yes, Washington…
LOCAL
► From AP — New rail safeguards where 3 died in Washington — Burlington Northern Santa Fe Railway says automatic flashing lights and crossing gates have been installed at a rail crossing where three people died last March when a freight train struck their van.
BOEING
► In today’s Wichita Eagle — Wichita facility’s closing will affect 2,160 workers — Boeing said layoffs won’t begin until the second half of this year as it plans to close its Wichita facility by the end of 2013 and move the work to other sites, officials said.
► In today’s LA Times — Boeing to close historic Wichita facility — The company’s decision may augur more cuts in the defense industry as federal spending on weapons procurement shrinks in the coming decade.
► In today’s Seattle Times — Wichita closure to bring 100 jobs here — Kansas employees and politicians fumed Wednesday at Boeing’s decision to close its defense plant in Wichita. And the move didn’t meet expectations here, delivering fewer jobs in the Puget Sound region than anticipated when rumors of the closure first surfaced in November.
Kansas is a union-busting “right-to-work” state that runs its unemployment insurance and workers’ compensation systems on the cheap and sports a $7.25 minimum wage. As right-wingers in Washington fantasize about bringing that corporate utopia here, perhaps Republicans in Kansas will now begin a decade of investment in aerospace apprenticeship and training to try to overcome those clear competitive disadvantages.
STATE GOVERNMENT
► Breaking from the Seattle Times — Supreme Court: State isn’t fully funding education — In a highly anticipated court ruling released Thursday morning, the Washington State Supreme Court agreed the state is failing to meet its constitutional duty to fully fund education and said it would retain jurisdiction to make sure the Legislature does so. But the court did not require the Legislature to take specific action to remedy the situation, as some education advocates had hoped.
► In today’s Yakima H-R — Rep. Hunter to discuss education ‘levy swap’ — State Rep. Ross Hunter (D-Medina) will be in Yakima tonight to talk to educators about his new proposal to change the way public education is funded in Washington. Hunter devised a “revenue-neutral levy swap” as a way to make K-12 funding more consistent and less dependent on unstable local levies, which must be approved every two to four years by district voters.
► In today’s Olympian — Gregoire supports same-sex marriage — State Rep. Laurie Jinkins (D-Tacoma) says her 11-year-old son, Wulf, wants her to have a wedding cake with green frosting. The date is not on the calendar yet, but after Gov. Chris Gregoire lent public support for same-sex marriage on Wednesday, it no longer seems as far-fetched as it once did in Washington state.
► In today’s Wenatchee World — Local leaders will move forward with sales tax idea— Mayors and commissioners from Chelan and Douglas counties appear to favor asking voters for a sales tax increase to pay off the Town Toyota Center’s debt.
N.L.R.B.
► At AFL-CIO Now — Operating Engineers’ counsel among picks for NLRB — IUOE President James T. Callahan says that Richard Griffin is “highly respected by lawyers on both the labor and business side of labor law.”
► In The Hill — Romney ad: Obama’s NLRB appointees are ‘union stooges’ — Republican Mitt Romney is calling President Obama’s appointees to the labor board “union stooges” who practice un-American political playback, in a new ad his campaign is airing in South Carolina.
NATIONAL
► In today’s NY Times — ‘Right to work’ Republicans denied quorum in Indiana — On what was to be the first day of a new lawmaking session in Indiana, most Democratic state representatives stayed away from the House floor on Wednesday, preventing the Republican majority, which has made “right to work” legislation a top priority, from doing business.
► At Politico — How to fight liberals: Imitate them — Impressed by the effectiveness of the liberal Center for American Progress, a group of conservative journalists and operatives are preparing to engage in their own sincerest form of flattery — launching an advocacy group with a similar name and mission but very different target.
TODAY’S MUST-READ
The Stand posts links to Washington state and national news of interest every weekday morning by 9 a.m. These links are functional at the date of posting, but sometimes expire.