Friday, October 21, 2016

STATE ELECTIONS

► From KNKX — Wealthy Washingtonians dump $350K into effort to defeat Supreme Court justice — Southwest Washington billionaire Ken Fisher, Mariners owner John Stanton and Bellevue developer Kemper Freeman just put 350,000 into a PAC to fund a TV ad campaign against incumbent Justice Charles Wiggins.

ALSO TODAY at The Stand — Support incumbent Supreme Court justices — Rather than focusing on improving school funding, the Washington State Republican Party and their billionaire financiers are actively campaigning to unseat Supreme Court justices whose rulings attempt to hold legislators accountable for underfunding public schools. By voting and supporting three labor-endorsed incumbent Justices Mary Yu, Barbara Madsen and Charles Wiggins, voters can turn away this brazen political attack against the Supreme Court and re-elect justices with a proven record of making sure our constitution and laws are applied fairly for all Washington citizens.

► A related story in the PSBJ — Kemper Freeman gives $100,000 to Trump Victory Fund

► In The Stranger — We believe you should vote NO on Initiative 732 (by four staff writers) — I-732 is not good climate policy. It is not good tax policy. I-732 is an actively bad policy disguised as a ground-breaking progressive idea. In our opinion, it threatens not just the climate movement but much needed state revenues that fund social services, education, and other basic needs. It also fails to center the climate movement on those most adversely affected by climate change: communities of color. Supporters will try to convince you to support the initiative because it is something — anything — to address climate change (any policy is better than no policy). We agree climate change is urgent. But I-732 does not actually effectively address climate change. And it may torpedo the state’s best efforts to pass future, better climate standards.

ALSO at The Stand — NO on I-732: It’s a giant misstep on climate (by Jeff Johnson)

► In the P.S. Business Journal — Minimum wage increase, paid sick leave is good for business (by Tiffany Turner) subscription required — Tiffany Turner is the CEO of Adrift Hotels. She says the minimum wage increase as proposed gives businesses like hers enough time to prepare, and will be good for small town economies.

ALSO at The Stand — YES on 1433: Good for workers, good for our state economy (by Jeff Johnson)

► In today’s Seattle Times — Panic button for hotel cleaners part of Seattle’s I-124 to protect, help housekeepers — Seattle Initiative 124 would require hotels to provide housekeepers with panic buttons, track guests accused of harassment, limit housekeeper workloads, help thousands of low-wage employees pay for health care and retain workers during ownership transfers, among other things. The Unite Here! Local 8 hospitality-workers union, which wrote and advanced I-124, argues the measure would protect a workforce of mostly immigrant women from sexual harassment and on-the-job injuries while helping them better provide for their families.

ALSO at The Stand — YES on Seattle I-124 to protect hotel workers (by Jeff Johnson)

NATIONAL ELECTIONS

► In today’s Washington Post — GOP braces for Trump loss, roiled by refusal to accept election results — A wave of apprehension and anguish swept the Republican Party on Thursday, with many GOP leaders alarmed by Donald Trump’s refusal to accept the outcome of the election and concluding that it is probably too late to salvage his flailing presidential campaign.

► From The Nation — Voter suppression is a much bigger problem than voter fraud (by Ari Berman) — You’re more likely to be struck by lightning than impersonate another voter at the polls. The real danger to American democracy stems from GOP efforts to make it harder to vote. New voting restrictions — like voter-ID laws, cuts to early voting and barriers to voter registration — that are in place in 14 states for the first time in 2016 will make it harder for millions of eligible voters to cast a ballot. And voters are lacking crucial protections because this is the first presidential election in 50 years without the full provisions of the Voting Rights Act.

► In today’s NY Times — Trump jests, and a tough room jeers — The Alfred E. Smith dinner is traditionally a chance for rivals to let off a little steam. But when Trump’s jokes turned into attacks, the crowd turned on him.

LOCAL

► In today’s Seattle Times — Seattle skyline is tops in construction cranes — more than any other U.S. city — Seattle’s crane count has surged in the last year, overtaking New York as the city with the most such construction rigs transforming the urban landscape.

► In today’s Columbian — New overtime rules to impact 3,800 Clark County workers — A new rule revising which salaried employees are paid for clocking extra hours will go into effect soon, impacting about 3,800 Clark County employees and their bosses. The U.S. Department of Labor decided in May to change the so-called “white collar exemption,” an earnings threshold under which employers must pay an employee overtime wages. The ruling makes salaried employees who earn up to $47,476 eligible for overtime pay. Previously, employees who earned more than $23,600 were exempted. The ruling goes into effect Dec. 1. It will apply to an estimated 4.2 million workers nationwide and 76,000 workers in Washington state.

ALSO at The Stand:

New overtime pay rule will mean raises for 4.2 million Americans (May 18)

State Republicans vote to delay overtime pay for millions (Sept. 29)

► In today’s (Everett) Herald — 777X supplier MTorres plans plant by Boeing Everett factory — Aerospace supplier MTorres has big plans for its new facility under construction near Boeing’s Everett plant… Since buying Pacifica Engineering, it has more than doubled its U.S. workforce to about 125. It should be about 140 when the $15 million Innovation Center opens in May 2017.

NATIONAL

► In the Wall St. Journal — Blacks see fastest wage growth in more than 15 years — Median usual weekly earnings for full-time black workers rose 9.8% in the third quarter from a year earlier, the fastest rate of growth on records back to 2000. The recent gains mean the increase in earnings for blacks since the recession ended in mid-2009, 15.7%, is now outpacing the gain for whites, 13.3%, and Latinos, 15.5%. But bulk of the improvement for blacks and Latinos has occurred in the past two years.

► From CBS News — The gender pay gap is real, and here’s who is hit hardest — The data clearly show that women are paid less than men for doing the same work, even after controlling for issues such as education and experience. One of the reasons why some may debate its existence is that the gap can be measured in different ways, although the results consistently show depressed earnings for women, according to a new study from the Economic Policy Institute.

T.G.I.F.

► How is it that The Entire Staff of The Stand has never featured “Weird” Al Yankovic?! We guess this is as good a time as any. Enjoy.

The Stand posts links to Washington state and national news of interest every weekday morning by 10 a.m.