Recent Blog Entries
Restoring Honor to Olympia
August 7, 2010
Human Life
August 7, 2010
Because of my belief that human life should be protected from its very beginning to its natural end, I am the only candidate in this race to be endorsed by the Human Life PAC and the Washington Values Alliance.
NW Digest: ONE-ON-ONE with Mark Hargrove
July 11, 2010
Recently, I was interviewed by blogger Tom Forbes from NW Digest:
As part of 47th Legislative District Week, today we meet Mark Hargrove, who is running for a second time against Rep. Geoff Simpson (D-Covington), who is in the news again for domestic violence. Hargrove lost by less than 3,000 votes to Simpson in 2008.
Hargrove is an Air Force Academy graduate and veteran Air Force pilot. He has lived in the Covington area for the last 21 years. Mark currently works for Boeing as an instructor pilot, teaching from around the world how to fly their new 777’s and 747’s.
Save the Sun Break Café!
July 6, 2010
On Father’s Day, my family and I had a late breakfast at the Sun Break Café in Auburn, just a couple of blocks from City Hall and the train station. After a great meal, the owner, Bruce, told me that his charming restaurant had been declared “blighted.” With that designation, with 60 days notice, by the power of eminent domain, the city of Auburn could force him to sell his restaurant to the city for the price of the land only to allow a developer to tear down the restaurant and build an apartment building.
Because we’ve seen this type of abuse of the power of eminent domain in other states, during the most recent legislative session, State Attorney General Rob McKenna proposed bills to limit eminent domain as a tool of economic development and limit the power to define blight. However, these bills never received hearings, because the chairman of the Local Government and Housing Committee said his hearing schedule had filled up. And he faulted the Attorney General for not providing the argument that the law changes are necessary.
That committee chairman happens to be our current state representative. For the sake of the Sun Break Café, I am more passionate than ever in my commitment to being elected to replace him.
Solving the Legislature’s Spending Problem
March 10, 2010
The Problem
In 2008, long before the economic crisis hit, the state legislature had spent away the largest surplus in state history and had a projected $9 billion deficit. They were only able to reach a constitutionally mandated balanced 2009 budget by accepting billions in stimulus money, not funding pension accounts and playing shell games with other money. Any reasonable person can see that when 2010 came around, we could not maintain that level of spending with no more stimulus money coming, the debt we already owed to pension accounts and the $710 million that was cut from the education budget. And yet our budget in 2010 is greater than in 2009!
The Legislature’s Proposed Solution
A plethora of tax increases are being considered, and we are certain to get several of them. No matter which ones they choose, analysts predict significant job losses as a result. Small businesses as a group are the largest employer in the state. We make profitability so difficult for them that tax increases will force many of them to lay off workers and in many cases, close up shop. And when businesses suffer and layoff employees or close, state revenues will drop. The legislature’s solution is leading us down the wrong path.
The Right Solution
We can and must make three common sense steps to get us back on the right path.
First, the legislature needs to reign in out of control spending. We should start with reviewing what we have added over the past several years and eliminate those items that aren’t absolutely essential. We lived without them before. Many of them we can probably do without now.
Second, acting on performance audit recommendations by our Democrat State Auditor Brian Sonntag would save millions. He’s already done the work to find the possible savings. We just need to act on them!
And third, most importantly, we are killing our state’s largest source of revenue, small business. We need to eliminate burdensome regulations that inhibit productivity. We need to replace the B&O tax that unfairly taxes revenue even if a business actually lost money. And we need to eliminate health insurance mandates that drive competition out of state, raising prices. Thriving businesses mean more employment and more revenue for the state.
Despite the economic crisis we are in, there is no reason our state should be in this mess. I am disgusted with the choices our state legislature made to get us here. But all is not lost. I’ve laid out straightforward, common sense solutions. Unfortunately the current legislature will surely not heed these recommendations. Therefore, the voters need to get us on the right path by voting in legislators this November who will.
