At the end of the work day yesterday, Mayor McGinn pushed out a video regarding the process of gathering community input on the Youth and Families Initiative. We tweeted it as soon as the press release came through our inboxes, but wanted to give an extra push to the dates of the public "engagement meetings" - the ones where you actually get to tell the mayor what you think.

This morning at 8:00 a.m., the Early Learning and K-12 Education of the State Legislature had a meeting. The Legislature's website describes the committee: "The Senate Early Learning&K-12 Education Committee considers policy and finance issues related to schools and learning from birth through twelfth grade and preparation for later learning experiences."

If you're interested in the nitty gritty of what's going on at the legislative level, they provide meeting agendas and, once each meeting begins, the meeting materials. (The links for meeting materials are located at the bottom of specific agenda pages.)

The Early Learning and K-12 Education Committee's main page lists, on the right sidebar, links to related committees and to TVW, for RealAudio files of committee hearings. All this is great, but it can be a challenge to wade through and translate all of this information! Thankfully, there are many organizations out there focused on, and interested in, education issues. Take a look below at our list of co-presenting organizations: they can be great resources of information, and potential places to get involved!

We love to include quotes from recent forums in our twice-monthly Enews - but sometimes we get over excited, and our quotes get way too long! Today we're using the blog as an extended Enews, specifically for some quotes picked up from 2010's Legislative Preview.

In January, moderator Essex Porter posed a question for the Republicans on our panel: What are some specific programs you would eliminate or cut, or specific reforms you would enact to avoid raising taxes, if you were writing this budget?

Representative Doug Erickson responded:
"What I would cut are the regulations on business that are driving jobs out of Washington State. Let's start there. Let's cut our workers compensation program out of state government and let the private sector run it. Let's cut the portion of governments out that sell liquor to the state and let Safeway and Hagen and Albertson's sell liquor to the people of Washington State. Let's cut  those things that the government shouldn't be doing anyway so we can focus in on the things that people say are priorities - K-12 education… Where's the priority in state government that's been exercised during the past twelve years in Olympia by the majority party when they say education is their priority, and education has become a smaller percentage of our general fund budget than it was in 1998?... What things that aren't priorities did the Governor propose cutting? I didn't see those in her list."

We wanted to include Senator Lisa Brown's response about what she says is actually eligible for cuts:
"With due respect to my colleagues, neither of them proposed a way to balance the budget. And the record we have is to balance the budget on an annual basis - that's what state government does. And we're going to do it again in a 60 day session. The building that's being built in Olympia is with capital bonds, it's a separate budget. Workers compensation is also a separate program. Neither of those things address the general fund. The general fund comes from the taxes that we pay - mostly sales tax, we're a very sales tax dependent state - property taxes and B&O taxes. Those are the three major sources it comes from. In a downturn economy sales, taxes fall like a rock because obviously people are out of work and they're cutting back on their spending. And so the challenge for balancing the budget is those major sources of revenue as well as where the money goes - which education (as you heard 40%),  higher education, health and human services and then a  very small percent going to natural resources and other areas… that's where the $2.6 billion has to come from. And because of Federal match requirements, a very large percentage of those expenditures are off the books because we get Federal match for our health care programs and we have maintainence of effort requirements for the Federal dollars that we accepted. So we're talking about state-only programs that are on the chopping block. And that's why we have to draw the line realistically about what we're willing to do and what we're not willing to loose ground on. It's easy to talk. It's hard to get someone to show you a balance sheet that adds up to $2.6 billion."

Were you a bit surprised to find a ballot in your mailbox this past week? Many people I've spoken with describe their reaction: holding their ballot in their hand, staring at it, and thinking hard - and not being able to figure out what they were supposed to be voting on.

The February 9, 2010 special election is made up of almost entirely school levies - you can find a full list of measures on the ballot here. Seattle voters will have only two propositions on their ballot: a capital levy and an operations levy. Click on each linked levy to go directly to the King County Elections webpage describing the levy, as well as for and against statements for each.

Happy voting!

Today's Legislative Preview was a packed-house success, complete with 2 other attendees tweeting in the room! The cameras were rolling, and our friends at TVW have already shared with us the first of the air dates:


We had our ever-popular lightning round (of which Senator Mike Hewitt said, "If you take away the flash cards I'm not coming back!" - referring to the yes/no/waffle cards) and here are today's responses:

This video was put out about a month ago, and although the transition town halls have already passed (Did you attend one? How was it? We'd love to hear it in the comments!), you still have time to give your feedback. In the video below, Mayor-elect McGinn asks for your input on three questions. His transition website includes a website dedicated to collecting the answers to these questions, as well as other feedback from Seattle citizens. Check out the video below, or go directly to the input page to see the questions and submit your thoughts. (You can also watch for more transition videos by subscribing to the McGinnTransition YouTube channel.)

We wanted to point your browsers over to our friends at The Seattle Channel - where Mayor Nickels and C.R. Douglas filmed the Mayor's final episode of Ask the Mayor.

From the program description: "Find out what the Mayor's plans are once he leaves office, what his biggest accomplishments are and what he believes are his biggest regrets. Plus find out how he'll work with Mayor-elect Mike McGinn as he begins his new job as Mayor of Seattle. Those topics and more including, SR 520 plans, Viaduct latest and the City budget are all discussed on this episode of Ask The Mayor."

Considering the nature of Twitter - that it provides a way to be the most updated to-the-second source of information and is constantly changing - it can be a great place to watch the election returns roll in.

If you're not sure who to follow, we recommend checking out the Seattle News and Government&Politics listing's in The Big Blog's working list of Who's on Twitter in Seattle. If not Twitter - where will you be going for your election day information?