Remember when Queen Christine promised in 2004, in her bid for election, that she would not raise taxes in her first year of office? Dino Rossi, the GOP candidate, told Washington’s electorate not to believe her. True to her DemonRAT DNA she raised the gasoline tax by 9.5-cents-a-gallon at a time when gas prices were going up (Some people think that the nation’s increase in gas prices at that time precipitated the Housing Market Collapse). She also raised taxes on cigarettes, liquor, hospitals, and vehicles. She also re-established an estate tax after a previous version had been struck down by the courts.
To add to the insult, this new gas tax was to be spent primarily in King County—the hell with the rest of the state.
Did Gregoire’s new taxes help? Have they gone where they were promised? I have not found anything on the web to look at this subject. All we know is, with all this new revenue, why is Gregoire going after more of Washington’s citizen’s life’s blood?
The city took their property using eminent domain claiming that they needed it for a construction yard for equipment and materials to be used on the Monorail extension. Of course, the property was never given back. I think the same thing happened to business owners along the proposed route extension.