In Olympia, all eyes are on November instead of January. In other
words, it’s all about the ’08 legislative elections instead of the ’08
legislative session.
Skittish about rocking the boat with any big agenda items, the
supermajority Democrats don’t want to lose their dominant numbers. So
they’re putting the kibosh on any expectations for major
Democratic legislative victories—like expanding health-care
coverage or consumer protection.
Even minor items have Democrats watching their backs. Late in the
afternoon after the first day of the session on January 14, a carload
of environmental lobbyists laughed that it was their regular allies,
the Democrats, who were hesitant to sign on to a green-appliances sales
tax credit they were pushing, while some Republicans seemed happy to
oblige.
Sigh. The do-gooder lobbyists understand the Democratic mandate: low
expectations.
This is unacceptable. This is the second year in a row of heavy
Democratic majorities in both houses. It’s time for the Democrats to
deliver. This should be a time of high expectations, not low ones.
Thankfully, some Democratic legislators get it.
Senate Bill 6221
Last session the Democrats added 65,000 kids to the the state health
care program. Cool. Now Sen. Karen Keiser (D-33, Kent) wants to help
get coverage to the 600,000 uninsured adults. She’s also got a bill
queued up to guarantee women’s access to Plan B.
House Bills 2530 and 2531
Freshman representative Sharon Nelson (D-34, Vashon Island),
appointed by her district to fight against strip mining on Maury
Island, has queued up two bills that would check Glacier Northwest’s
mining expansion. The first one, for example, would challenge the
company’s Department of Fish and Wildlife permit on the grounds that
Glacier’s work has a negative impact on fisheries.
Senate Bill 6385 and House Bill 2837
Senator Brian Weinstein (D-41, Mercer Island) and Representative
Brendan Williams (D-22, Olympia) are pushing a bill, killed last year,
that would give homebuyers a cause of action for negligent
construction—a simple right consumers currently don’t have.
House Bills 2422, 2424, and 2425 (or “The Maralyn Chase
Agenda!”)
They laughed at Representative Maralyn Chase (D-32, Shoreline) last
year when she proposed a cap-and-trade bill on CO2 emissions and
leadership quickly killed it. This year the session started with a
Governor Christine Gregoire press conference in Seattle to announce a
cap-and-trade bill. Now Representative Chase wants to outlaw
nonrecyclable bottles and grocery bags, and outlaw
death-to-the-environment small-engine equipment like leaf blowers.
Listen to this woman. This year.
And based on last year’s work, there should be some other high
expectations for 2008: Let’s fully expand domestic
partnerships—and how about including young het couples? And let’s
put some regulations on the payday-loan industry’s rates and the
pharmaceutical industry’s marketing tactics. And let’s make sure
tolling dollars can go to transit, not just pavement.
If we don’t have high expectations of
the supermajority
Democrats in January, what’s the point of voting for them
next
November? 
I read recently that a bill has been proposed in Washington state which requires that plastic bags used in grocery stores be made out of PLA (a corn based plastic.) This proposed bill is based on misconceptions which have been spread by the PLA lobby, which sells plastics made out of corn. This lobby is funded by the Dow Chemical Company, Cargill Inc., and ADM. These corporate giants make non-food items out of corn. Making non-food items out of grain is what caused last year’s spike in grain prices. The part of oil, naphtha, that is made into plastic is not something that could be used for making anything else-it is not potential gasoline or diesel, for example. It was regarded as a waste product and burned off before we started making it into plastic.
There are a lot of problems with PLA – If we made all of the plastic disposable items used in the world every year out of PLA, it would take one hundred and fifty million tons of corn to make it. That would lead to mass starvation in the third world, as that represents at least 10% of the world’s grain supply. It also takes a huge amount of oil to grow, fertilize, ship, and process this corn, and as a practical matter, it is also not recyclable-In fact, the recyclers are trying to get PLA banned because it gets mistaken for PET, and ruins their PET batches. Restaurant owners and merchants find it annoying that PLA becomes gummy in water, gives water stored in it an odd taste, softens at soup temperatures, and has a short shelf life. PLA is weaker than conventional and biodegradable conventional plastic, and more expensive per pound, as well. Also, PLA can’t be composted at home-it takes the elevated temperatures of a commercial composter to compost PLA.
If PLA is placed into land fills, it gets buried so deeply that it is in a zone free of oxygen. Then anaerobic microorganisms digest it, releasing methane gas. PLA is consumed so quickly that the land fill is not capped before it creates methane, so all of that methane is released into the atmosphere, where it causes global warming. Some biodegradable plastics that are not corn based will also release methane if they are digested by anaerobic bacteria, but they do so so slowly that the land fill is capped before methane is released. When the land fills are capped, the methane is either burned off or it is used as a heat source for industrial uses, such as generating electricity.
In short, requiring grocery bags to be made out of PLA would be a counterproductive law which would enact a tax on the public for the benefit of socially irresponsible corporate giants. The alternative? Recyclable biodegradable plastics-Plastics made out of an otherwise useless industrial byproduct, naphtha, which have a harmless additive in them that makes them biodegrade. See http://biogreenproducts.biz for full information.
-Tim Dunn, Arlington WA