A Tourism Promotion Area would levy up to a $2 a bed hotel/motel tax with the money being used to promote visitors and conventions to Thurston County. Most hotels and motels in Olympia and Tumwater have come on board, but not in Lacey.

In order for the TPA to come into effect, hotels and motels representing 60 percent of the beds, must sign up. All of the major hotels in Olympia – - Phoenix Inn, Ramada, Red Lion and the Governor Hotel have indicated they favor the creation of such an organization.

But in Lacey, only two of the eight hotels and motels have agreed.

At a work session of the Lacey City Council on Thursday, Larry Donnelly, general manager of LaQuinta Inns and Suites in Lacey said it was a financial matter. “I’d like to get $2 extra profit from each bed, but the economy just doesn’t allow it.” he said. Donnelly also said that in areas where a TPA has been tried, no one could show any success in booking additional room nights.

If hotels and motels representing 60 percent of the beds were to sign up, an advisory board of hotel and motel managers would be created by the Thurston County Commission. This board would determine the tax rate of up to $2 a bed and would decide how the money would be used.

George Sharp, director of the Visitor and Convention Bureau said a $2 bed tax would raise about $990,000. The VCB currently operates on a budget of $322,000. The extra money would be used to promote Thurston County as a tourism area.

The Lacey City Council will take the proposal under consideration and attempt to get more information from Lacey hotels and motels as to their opposition to a TPA.

I know, I couldn’t believe it either.

But at its meeting on May 10, the Lacey City Council removed the requirement that all bicycles in the city be registered. First adopted in 1973, the purpose of the ordinance was to provide police with a system to recover and return stolen bicycles. In 2011, only 10 bikes in the entire city were registered. The ordinance proved obsolete.

The council also removed the requirement that anyone holding a garage sale must obtain a license from the city first. The purpose was to discourage the trafficking of stolen property through garage sales. In 2011, 1,210 licenses were issued. No citations for violations were issued, making the requirement moot.

It’s unusual for a city to remove an ordinance once adopted.

In this case, practicality won out of government largeness.

Congratulation to the City of Lacey.

Prior to Evergreen, Olympia had been a blue collar town. Plywood mills abounded on Port of Olympia property and downtown Olympia businessmen controlled the Olympia City Commission. State government played little role in local affairs and when the legislature was in town, gas prices went up a few cents and The Spar and Governor House were major meeting places.

Then in 1967 the Founding Faculty of The Evergreen State College came from all over the country, bringing their liberal and progressive ideas to this small Northwest town.

The opening of the college to students in October 1971 not only brought faculty from around the country, but students from around the country as well. In its early years, as much as 40 percent of Evergreen’s students were from out of state.

It wasn’t long before the ideas from outside began to conflict with the community ideas.

One of the first indications that Olympia was changing occurred when the city adopted the Optional Municipal Code and went from a commission form of government to a council/manager form of government, following in the footsteps of its neighbor Lacey, which had adopted the concept earlier.

But conflict happened in other ways. College students, with their long hair and unwashed jeans, began appearing around the city. While the times and the culture were partly to blame, it was an acknowledgement that things were going to be different.

Accompanying the students and the faculty, were the hanger on’s, those who moved to Olympia to be near or to be with student and faculty members. This group brought special skills and abilities. The downtown Olympia art scene can be laid at the feet of this group.

The liberal bent of the county however is a direct result of Evergreen and its curriculum. Colleges, by their very nature, encourage alternative viewpoints. Using the powers of government to affect the lives of individuals, and placing restrictions on business are a natural outcrop of the college’s teachings.

While the environmental movement was not started at Evergreen, faculty and students embraced the idea with heart and soul.

Over the four decades The Evergreen State College has graduated more than 30,000 students. Many of them live and work in the local community and many of them have entered state government service. They have brought the ideas they learned at Evergreen into the workplace and into their lives.

Still others, have become business owners and entrepreneurs. Many of the downtown Olympia businesses are owned and operated by former “Greeners”.

Evergreen celebrates 40 years of serving students with a college-wide celebration next weekend. But, the real impact of the college is on the community which has become Olympia.

Those driving on the new Carpenter Road can no longer see Lake Lois because the wall separating the roadbed from the lake is too high.

That’s what happens when engineers design a bridge and leave out the public in the review process, although I’m not certain a novice would even have understood the wall design even if they had seen the plans.

It’s not that Lake Lois is a significant lake in the city compared to the other eight or ten lakes. But, what made it special is that it was ever changing and was visible to thousands of drivers every day. All the other lakes are mainly invisible from the road.

When you drove over Lake Lois; when the roadbed was at lake level, you could see how high the water table was that year. If we had plenty of rain and if we were going to be free from watering, was known by looking at the lake.

You could also tell if we had little snow in the mountains and would have a bad water year along with watering restrictions. All of this by just looking at the lake. There were years when it almost overflowed the road and other years when the lake was almost dry.

Lake Lois changed almost on a weekly basis and those who drove the road everyday could see the current environment by just looking at the lake.

But, Carpenter Road was getting a lot of traffic and it was clear the road needed to be expanded. So, city planners drew up a design for the roadway encompassing all of the latest safety features as well as sidewalks and bike paths.

And, because there was a bike path along the new bridge, it needed a higher wall.

But now, we can no longer see the lake. We can’t judge the climate, the water level, even the beauty of the lake. It’s like we lost an old friend.

I know engineers were just trying to design a road that was safe to drive and would speed motorists along in safety and security.

But, I sure do miss seeing the lake.

There’s nothing special about Carpenter Road – - anymore.

All I know about the conflict is what I read in the papers. But, I do know one thing. It’s a normal conflict in Olympia. The Not In My Back Yard mentality is alive and flourishing all over the city.

It doesn’t really matter if its a housing development, a new convenience store, an off-leash dog park or a Boys and Girls Club. If the neighbors don’t want it, then it doesn’t get done.

That’s what happens when neighborhood groups control city government. What’s in the common interest of the city takes a backseat to their special interests.

It’s the city’s fault. For years now they’ve been creating these neighborhood groups. They’re formed for several reasons, but from the city’s standpoint, it gives them a better means of keeping control, while at the same time being able to avoid responsibility.

It isn’t just Olympia, but Lacey and Tumwater do the same thing. The difference, is that in Olympia, these neighborhood group leaders have started to get elected to the city council and have started to control city activities.

And since they owe their election to their neighborhood activism they also owe their allegiance to these neighborhood groups and what’s good for the entire city, often has an impact on a neighborhood.

A Boys and Girls Club is good for the entire city, and yet one Westside resident was quoted as being concerned that kids from all over the city would use the facility, thus impacting her way of life.

Nothing gets done in Olympia without running the gauntlet of neighborhood groups. Usually they’re a nuisance, but when they control city government, they’re an obstruction.

Olympia needs some citywide leaders. Unfortunately that’s not what they have.

Johnson said that Puget Sound Energy’s assets in Thurston County total $500 million. When other costs are added, the price for public power could climb to nearly $1 billion.

Johnson made those remarks at a meeting of the Gateway Rotary Club.

The company lobbyist said that preliminary estimates by those in favor of public power were less, but the figures probably weren’t accurate. He pointed to Jefferson County, which converted to public power in 2008. A feasibility study estimated the company’s assets at $47 million for the 17,000 customers. The actual cost was $103 million.

Puget Sound Energy has 118,000 customers in Thurston County.

A signature gathering campaign is currently underway with the goal of presenting the Thurston County Commissioners with 12,000 signatures favoring public power. The commissioners can place a measure of the fall ballot with any number of alternatives and options.

It’s estimated, by people more knowable than I, that the average American creates four and a half pounds of garbage each day. That’s on the low side. Some estimates has it as much as seven pounds per person per day.

The average European on the other hand creates less than four pounds each day while the average Asian creates about two and a half pounds. By whatever measure, we create a lot of garbage.

And, among the garbage thrown out each year is a lot of plastic. Each year, right here in the United States, we throw away about 19 billion pounds of those styrofoam peanuts and another 40 billion pounds of plastic knife, forks and spoons. That’s billions of pounds we’re talking about.

We recycle, but less than three percent of our garbage is recycled. A good portion of the rest goes into landfills.

I like to think I’m a good recycler. I fill up my recycle container with paper, aluminum cans, plastic pop bottles and plastic water bottles. I know those can be recycled. But I don’t know about the rest of my plastic – - except plastic bags. I know they can’t be recycled.

Those are the ones that you get at the supermarket. The fall back bag for the markets. Unless you bring your own bag or ask for paper, you’ll get plastic. The ones that can’t be recycled.

Some ardent environmentalists have been working to get plastic bags banned and have been successful in a few Northwest cities including Seattle. They’re probably looking at such a move here in Thurston County.

So far, our garbage people haven’t jumped on that bag wagon. They’re still trying to educate us about the problems with plastic grocery bags and hope we’ll use our own bags or ask for paper.

I have my own bags, but like you, I just forget to take them with me, or leave them in the car and am too lazy to go back and get them. So, at checkout, the clerk puts my groceries in a plastic bag.

Why don’t they ask me anymore if I want paper or plastic? Why do they just assume I want plastic?

If they’d ask, I’d say paper, and I wouldn’t have to worry about getting rid of my plastic grocery bags anymore.

I paid for parking in downtown Olympia.

I know, I said I’d never pay to park in Olympia, and yet, love seemed to trump that remark.

I asked my wife where she wanted to go to lunch on her birthday and she said she wanted to eat at a specific restaurant in downtown Olympia. When we were first married, we used to eat at this restaurant just about every week, she wanted to do it again. It had been years since we had done so.

I suggested that we do dinner, that way I wouldn’t have to pay for parking. But, she insisted we do lunch, and so we did.

I found a spot, right in front. It was lunch hour but there were plenty of parking spots. The one right in front of the restaurant seemed to be the best choice.

But, there were no parking meters. Then I remembered those “parking stations” somewhere in the middle of the block. I found it pretty easily but operating it was something else again.

I could barely read the screen and when I determined that I needed a dollar and a half for the lunch hour, I also discovered that the machine wouldn’t take a dollar bill. It would only take change or a credit card. I was determined that I wouldn’t use a card to pay for parking. It was then that a friendly shopper stopped by to show me how to operate the machine and to give me change.

It was now starting to rain, and he stepped back under an awning while I fumbled around and finally got my permit.

It was my first experience with the parking stations and my first experience in paying for parking in downtown Olympia. But, I was doing it for love.

The meal wasn’t as good as we remembered and we probably won’t eat at that restaurant again.

But I had the opportunity to contribute to the city’s significant revenue stream.

If I had my way, I’d only come to downtown Olympia after 5 p.m. or on the weekends, when parking is free. But sometimes, you have to sacrifice your beliefs for something higher – love.

Alexander made those remarks at the Thursday meeting of the Lacey Rotary Club.

The Republican budget, released by the House contained the principals of the party, Alexander said. Those principals included funding education first, protecting vulnerable populations, improving public safety and balancing the budget in a two-year cycle. “Those were accomplished in our approved budget,” Alexander said.

“Early on we recognized that we had to change the way we budget and needed to work on reform,” the local legislator said. To that end, the legislature passed pension reform, balanced the budget over a four-year period and improved health care for classified educational staff. “We had strong bi-partisan support for all of those,” Alexander said.

He gave recognition to Governor Christine Gregoire for her involvement in the budget process. “It was an intense and long process,” he said. “The Governor is one of the best managers I’ve ever seen. She helped us get to a resolution.”

Alexander said the budget passed with overwhelming bi-partisan support. “For the first time in a decade I felt comfortable in pushing my green button,” he said.

There were few good choices left for the Democrat leaders in the Washington State House of Representatives as they debated the final hours of the 2012 legislative session. They were forced to accept a lot of what the State Senate wanted or risk another special session that would keep the Democrats from fundraising for their re-elections. Another extension would have made them look bad. The public keeps watching these debates and wondering what takes so long.

It grew evident that the House Democrat resistance was fueled by unions. Three issues that unions care about were causing the delays: public school employee health insurance offerings consolidated (takes control out of unions’ hands); future (new) public employee pension plan cuts (unions hate this benefit cut); and a four-year budget planning bill (it changes the unions’ power in the legislature).

Some Democrats don’t care how they look to the public because they are in safe seats or they are not running (Governor Gregoire, for instance). And, they have a strong belief that the new Governor is likely to be Rob McKenna who will be fiscally conservative as the state recovers from the long grinding recession. So they resisted until they had no choice. They got a few compromises, but essentially, the Democrat leaders doing the negotiations unwillingly ended debate and agreed to take the votes needed to end the session.

But the reality was that many Democrats in the Senate voted for two of these bills last Saturday, so some Democrats believe the final three budget ideas will help the state. For instance, the school employee health insurance bill passed the Senate 29-17. Senator Karen Kaiser, D-Des Moines, her party’s expert on health care, voted for it. The budget bill passed the Senate 30-16 with 10 Democrats voting in support.

Governor Gregoire proposed the pension reform idea last year and now that the Senate Republicans have embraced the measure, it seems to have chilled the Democrats’ interest. It’s pretty hard to politically explain the philosophical split among the Democrats and their governor, other than union resistance.

That gets back to my point that what was really going on was the unions desperately trying to kill these ideas and putting as much pressure as they could on Democrats who they thought they could get to vote their way.

I see no unintended consequences for the taxpayers and no job loss for state employees. These ideas were passed by the Legislature with some changes. I think most people would agree that the Democrats needed to shrug their shoulders at the unions and admit they were stuck, say they were sorry, and that they had to get on with making their decision. Political thinking is shifting and conservative philosophies will be demanded by voters who have already faced their own budget problems and done something about it.