Tim Eyman

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Tim Eyman (b. 1966) is a political activist in the U.S. state of Washington who uses direct democracy (initiatives and referenda) to accomplish his goal of cutting taxes (framed as tax revolt) and limiting the power of the state government.

His critics consider him a political operative who uses media manipulation and scare tactics to accomplish his goal of overturning legislation his corporate clients don't agree with, as well other conservative causes. He owns a small business in Mukilteo, Washington, selling fraternity and sorority-branded watches.

Contents

[edit] Initiatives

Eyman launched his first initiative, Initiative 200, in 1997, which attempted to prohibit affirmative action in state higher education and government hiring and contracting. At first, Eyman had difficulty collecting enough signatures to place the initiative on the ballot (8% of the votes cast in the last gubernatorial election), so he creatively sought help from local talk show host John Carlson. After Carlson took over, the initiative received enough signatures to earn placement on the ballot. In November of 1998, voters approved the initiative.

In 1998, Eyman failed to gather enough signatures for a new initiative which would have eliminated Washington's motor vehicle excise tax, or MVET. Washington, which unlike most states does not have an income tax, had a rather high (though steeply progressive) MVET. Eyman sought to reduce public taxation by eliminating the MVET.

In 1999 Eyman tried again, with Initiative 695, which proposed replacing the old MVET with a flat $30 fee for yearly car registration fees, called "car tabs", while simultaneously requiring voter approval for any increases in any tax or fee increases at the state or local level. It was overwhelmingly supported by the public but opposed by state officials.

Enlisting a number of volunteers from different regions of the state, and working with fellow activists Monte Benham and Jack Fagan, Eyman succeeded in getting I-695 on the ballot, and it passed, despite opposition from a broad coalition—including some businesses, some labor groups, environmentalists, civic groups, and other organizations—who argued that the loss of revenue would wreak havoc on state government. Some major newspapers in Washington called for its rejection, and some cities, including officials in Seattle, passed resolutions opposing the initiative.

After I-695 was passed, opponents contested the initiative in court. The initiative was declared unconstitutional by the Washington State Supreme Court because it had two subjects. Fearing voter backlash, the Legislature, with the cooperation of Governor Gary Locke, quickly acted to maintain the lower car tabs.

After I-695, Eyman formed a political committee known as Permanent Offense. He began working on Initiative 722, which was designed to cap property taxes at 2%. With the support of groups such as the state asphalt pavers' union, he also sponsored Initiative 745, which would have mandated that 90% of all transportation funding go to roads (interpreted by some as an attack on mass transit spending).

Unlike I-695, I-722 and I-745 were placed on the ballot largely through educating the public through the use of paid signature gatherers. While there was some initial concern by his opponents, the courts have ruled that paid signiature gathering is protected by the First Amendment.

I-722 and I-745 both appeared on the November 2000 ballot. I-722 passed, but I-745 was soundly rejected by voters. Political opponents contested I-722 in court, and it was overturned on the same grounds as I-695: that it was unconstitutional because it contained two subjects. The initiative had tried to reduce existing property taxes and enact a 2% cap on future property tax growth. It was a set-back to both Eyman and the voting public who had voted on in his favor.

Eyman came back in 2001 with Initiative 747, which imposed a 1% cap on property tax growth in Washington. Like earlier initiatives, I-747 got on the ballot thanks to the use of paid signature gatherers.

The public voted for and I-747 passed despite well-funded and visible opposition from many of the same political interests which had opposed Eyman's previous initiatives. Opponents argued that it passed because voters didn't realize or comprehend that public services would actually be cut. Supporters contended that those same services and costs were unnecessary and could not be justified.

Opponents then attacked Eyman claiming he had received help from the Code Revisor's Office in drafting the initiative and sued to force disclosure of the work the code revisor did. They won that battle in May 2002. The initiative went into effect, as the public had voted, shortly after passing. On June 13, 2006, King County Judge Mary Roberts threw out the measure, arguing that "The voters were incorrectly led to believe they were voting to amend I-722. The voters were misled as to the nature and content of the law to be amended, and the effect of the amendment upon it. The (state) constitution forbids this." (see [1]).

After the November 2001 election, Eyman began work on his next initiative, Initiative 776, which he called the "son of 695". Its aim was to cut local car tabs fees which I-695 and the Legislature had failed to remove earlier. The local car tab fees funded regional transportation in four Washington counties, including Sound Transit, a multi-county transportation agency in the Puget Sound area.

Opponents complained that the initiative asked voters statewide to vote on an issue which only affected four counties. Opponents questioned the constitutionality of allowing voters across Washington to vote on fees they were not paying nor seeing the benefit of. But supporters feared that the fees would eventually be charged statewide.

[edit] List of initiatives and outcomes

  • I-200 (1998) - Prohibit affirmative action in public employment, education and contracting.
    • Passed by voters.
  • I-695 (1999) - Cut the state motor vehicle excise tax and required voter approval for all tax increases.
    • Passed by voters but declared unconstitutional.
  • I-722 (2000) - Cut state and local property taxes, which fund public services.
    • Passed by voters but declared unconstitutional.
  • I-745 (2000) - Required 90% of transportation funding to be spent on road building.
    • Defeated by voters.
  • I-747 (2001) - Cut state and local property taxes
    • Passed by voters but declared unconstitutional in Superior Court. Currently on appeal to Supreme Court.
  • I-776 (2002) - Cut local motor vehicle excise taxes.
    • Passed by voters
  • I-267 (2002) - Divert money from the general fund for road building.
    • Failed to qualify for ballot.
  • I-807 (2003) - Require a supermajority vote for all tax increases.
    • Failed to qualify for ballot.
  • I-864 (2003) - Cut property taxes by 25%.
    • Failed to qualify for ballot.
  • I-892 (2004) - Legalize slot machines.
    • Defeated by voters.
  • I-900 (2004) - Give state auditor ability to conduct performance audits.
    • Passed by voters.
  • Referendum 65 (2006) - Repeal ESHB 2661 legalizing sexual orientation discrimination.
    • Failed to qualify for ballot.
  • I-917 (2006) - Cap motor vehicle registration charge at $30 a year.
    • Failed to qualify for ballot.

[edit] Eyman's salary

In February 2002, as Eyman was about to mail out the petitions for I-776, the Seattle Post-Intelligencer reported that Eyman had paid himself during the months he was working on I-745 causing some confusion in an earlier statement that he was working for free.

Eyman set up Permanent Offense Inc. - a corporation which did not have to report its finances to the Public Disclosure Commission (Washington's equivalent of the Federal Elections Commission) and began transferring funds from his political action committee of the same name.

After initially denying news reports, Eyman confessed to taking around $50,000 in funds for himself. Eyman's co-sponsors and chairmen in the Permanent Offense political committee became more actively involved, Monte Benham of Kennewick then headed Permanent Offense though Eyman remained politically involved.

It was shortly after this time that the first anti-Eyman websites appeared on the Internet site known as "Permanent Defense."

[edit] Return to politics

After a slow start, a last ditch plea for funds from direct-mail donors ensured that enough paid signature gatherers could be hired to get I-776 onto the ballot.

Eyman appeared in July 2002 as the chief spokesman for I-776. In November 2002, the initiative passed. Sound Transit had by then declared its local motor vehicle excise tax would not be affected because the tax was pledged to repay bonds.

Opponents challenged the initiative, and had it declared unconstitutional in February 2003, using the same "two-subject rule" argument. The ruling was reversed by the Washington State Supreme Court in October 2003, putting I-776 into effect. While light rail eventually received federal funding, Eyman was successful in retaining local funds and taxes for other purposes.

Immediately following the 2002 election, Eyman announced his next initiative number 807. Initiatve 807 would have required a supermajority for new taxes to be passed in the state Legislature. A lack of funding and mishaps cost the initiative its place on the ballot. Eyman still claimed the year was a success, saying he had worked hard to ensure a "no new taxes budget."

Opponents claimed that Eyman was taking credit for the efforts of Governor Gary Locke and Senator Dino Rossi, who had worked together for the goal of a no-new-taxes budget. The Legislature however raised the gas tax by five cents during the session. In the past, they had consistently opposed Eyman's measures to slash taxes.

Eyman quickly promised "revenge" for the raising of the gas tax, and soon announced his 2004 initiative, which would have slashed state property taxes (which exclusively funds education) by the same amount that the gas tax had been raised.

After I-807's failure, Eyman asked supporters to donate money to a personal compensation fund, which he called "Help Us Help Taxpayers". While he received no salary as promised during the initiative, he did ask for voluntary financial support after the effort.

[edit] Initiative 831

During the campaign to collect signatures for I-807, a Seattle computer programmer named David Goldstein launched an initiative to have Tim Eyman declared a "horse's ass". Mr. Goldstein declared that he was attempting to parody the initiative process to highlight its shortcomings and problems. After a brief period of support and funding by liberals, the initiative died in court after a challenge by the state Attorney General.

[edit] 2004 projects

[edit] Property tax cut

In 2004, Eyman announced Initiative 864, his refined initiative which now targeted local property taxes with a 25% cut. Opponents sought to raise public fear calling the proposal outrageous and said it would gut public services such as libraries, pools, parks, fire districts, and police departments. The idea for I-864 was originally announced in June 2003, but from July 2003 to January 2004, Eyman collected money to support his efforts. From January 2004 to July 2004, Eyman collected money for Initiative 864.

Despite Eyman and his group's best efforts, the initiative died on July 2, 2004. The group gathered about 155,000 signatures. 198,000 valid signatures were required for the Washington ballot in 2004, in effect requiring Eyman to secure nearly 230,000 to account for various anomalies.

Critics, such as Andrew Villeneuve of Permanent Defense, Steve Zemke of Taxpayers For Washington's Future, David Goldstein of TaxSanity.org, and Christian Sinderman, a Democratic campaign consultant, attributed Eyman's defeat to the fact that his base of supporters had shrunk and his initiatives were not as popular as he claimed they were. But the public in general had supported the majority of his initiatives in the past and Eyman attributed the failure to lack of edcation and mis-education of the voting public.

[edit] Slot machines

In March 2004, Eyman unveiled Initiative 892, a proposal to allow "electronic scratch ticket machines", otherwise known as slot machines, beyond just Washington's tribal casinos.

Unlike prior initiatives, the financial and political backing for I-892 was given by potential benefactors of the initiative rather than at a grassroots level. I-892 was quickly embraced by the entertainment and gambling industry, which provided all of its funding, and it subsequently earned a place on the ballot in July 2004.

Critics again organized a campaign against I-892 to fight the measure on the ballot. The campaign included groups such as Permanent Defense, TaxSanity.org, Taxpayers For Washington's Future, the Christian Coalition, Association of Washington Churches, 1000 Friends of Washington, and was endorsed by important individuals such as Governor Gary Locke and King County Prosecutor Norm Maleng.

Voters defeated I-892 with over 60% voting no on the initiative. It was a defeat for Eyman, who had predicted a victory. The defeat was considered by Eyman's critics to be a victory for communities and neighborhoods. Eyman claimed that he won a minor victory with the passage of a county charter amendment reducing the size of the King County Council. The initiative was sponsored by the county jail guards' union. Critics accused Eyman of using I-18 to promote himself - Eyman was a consultant to the sponsors of the measure.

[edit] 2005 projects

After the defeat of Initiative 892 in November of 2004, Eyman immediately set to work on his next initiative, which eventually became Initiative 900. Eyman continued to promote I-900 throughout the winter and into the spring.

With public support and backing from Michael Dunmire, Eyman gathered enough funds to pay paid-signature gatherers to educate the public and obtain more than enough signatures to ensure Initiative 900 a spot on the 2005 general election ballot in Washington.

In the summer of 2005, after Initiative 900 had qualified, The Olympian (see [2]) reported on Eyman's funding: Eyman's I-900, which proposes an expansion of performance audits for state and local agencies - with the intent of increasing accountability of government employees and agencies.

Critics of Eyman contended that Initiative 900 was a poorly drafted, flawed measure that didn't do anything to help government. However, because many critics saw it as ineffective and not very harmful, it attracted little opposition. The public passed the measure in November of 2005.

[edit] 2006 Projects

On January 30, Eyman filed an initiative and a referendum, both intended to repeal a recently passed gay rights measure which added sexual orientation to the list of categories against which discrimination in housing, lending, and employment is banned in the state of Washington. Supporters of the initiative argued the law it was attempting to repeal did nothing more than give preferential treatment to certain groups. In addition to seeking to remove "sexual orientation" from the law, Eyman is pushing an initiative that would prohibit state government from requiring quotas or other preferential treatment for any person or group "based on sexual orientation or sexual preference."

On March 2, Eyman filed an initiative which would prevent universities in Washington from having prior knowledge of an applicant's race and gender before admitting them on grounds that such knowledge necessarily invades the public's privacy and again gives preferential treatment to some groups. This initiative was specifically targeted at the University of Washington, which introduced a new admissions process in 2005 that gave preferential treatment to race. Many Washingtonians viewed this as an attempt to dodge the I-200 initiative which passed in 1998 prohibiting affirmative action in higher education admissions.

Eyman had announced he would be turning in the signatures for the gay-rights referendum on June 5. Instead, he showed up at the State Capitol dressed as Darth Vader and then announced he would turn in petitions the next day, at the deadline. He reportedly wasn't carrying any of the signatures, but instead was carrying signed petitions for another car-tab measure unrelated to the referendum (see[3]). The theatrics amounted to nothing: the next day, June 6, Eyman announced he had fallen more than 7,000 signatures short of the 112,440 required to get the measure placed on the November ballot. The state law that he had attempted to put to a public vote took effect on the same day (see[4]).

On January 9, Eyman filed an initiative to cap motor vehicle registration charges at $30 per year and repeal taxes and fees exceeding the $30 limit. On June 29, Eyman submitted 14,270 pages of signatures for this initiative to the Secretary of State's office. On July 7, Eyman submitted an additional 2,716 pages. While at the front desk, and prior to the counting of any signatures, Eyman requested that the receptionist date stamp a piece of note pad with the number 300,353 on it (see [5]).

The note was stamped twice, as photographers failed to record the first stamping. Eyman then announced to the media in attendance that he had received a receipt from the Secretary of State for 300,353 signatures. On July 13 the Secretary of State's office announced that it had counted 265,809 signatures. Upon request of a recount, witnessed by an initiative supporter, the office amended the final number to 266,006 the next day. This number is above the 224,880 required to qualify for the ballot, but well below the amount normally required to account for duplicate or invalid signatures.

On July 23 Eyman charged the Secretary of State's office with either "gross incompetence, purposeful sabotage, or blatant dishonesty" ([6]) for the discrepancy of 34,347 signatures. Along with the "receipt" with the number 300,353, Eyman claimed to have kept weekly logs of the number of signatures collected, and wrote the weight (although not the number of pages or signatures) of each box of petitions on the boxes themselves. The Secretary of State's office could not provide the boxes, as they were recycled upon the cataloging of the signatures. It also denied the credibility of Eyman's receipt, noting that official counting had not even begun at that point, and calling attention to their own official receipts (see[7]). Eyman has been unable to substantiate his claim of submitting 300,353 signatures, as he claims to have not made copies of the petitions. On July 28, the Secretary of State's office announced (see[8]) that it had conducted a random sample test of 4% of the signatures, finding an invalidation rate of 17.96%. Based upon this number, the initiative failed to make the ballot. A full check of all signatures collected confirmed this conclusion.

[edit] Personal life

Eyman was born in 1966. He was adopted as a baby by his parents, Don and Dolores Eyman of Yakima, Washington, who also had a biological son and daughter. The family lived in the West Valley neighborhood of Yakima (see [9]).

He graduated in 1988 from Washington State University in Business, where he was a member of the Delta Tau Delta fraternity and was on the wrestling team. He married, adopted two sons, and moved to Seattle [citation needed]. (see [10]).

[edit] External links

  • [11] Voters Want More Choices - A grassroots taxpayer-protection organization, with Tim Eyman, Jack Fagan, and Mike Fagan directing the effort.
  • [12] Let The Voters Decide - A referendum to repeal HB 2661, adding sexual orientation to the state's antidiscrimination laws, sponsored by Voters Want More Choices: A grassroots taxpayer-protection organization, with Tim Eyman, Jack Fagan, and Mike Fagan directing the effort.
  • [13] - Permanent Defense, an opposition group working to defeat Eyman, promote the value of public services, and work for tax reform
  • [14] TaxSanity.org
  • [15] horsesass.org
  • [16] MajorityRules.org sponsored by the Taxpayers for Washington's Future
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