By Tim Eyman

Over the past 15 years, our team of supporters has sponsored and given the voters the opportunity to vote on our tax limiting initiatives. Their goals were the same:to send a clear message to Olympia that tax increases need to be a last resort, not a first resort. Using existing resources more effectively and prioritizing spending are what the people want, but it is not a message that elected officials tend to listen to.

So when the 2013 legislative session started, there was no reason to think this year was going to be any different.

So we did what we always do:We filed an initiative to make it tougher to raise taxes. A few months later, the state Supreme Court found that a constitutional amendment is now required, and so we’re on a mission to do exactly what the court said to do.

During the legislative session, we asked our supporters to contact their legislators and remind them that the people strongly oppose higher taxes. But by the time we were ready to begin our initiative’s signature drive, only a few tax increase bills were pending and only a handful of tax increases were passed.

Maybe it was the threat of our newest initiative that got Olympia to not raise taxes. But by the time we were ready to begin our initiative’s signature drive, only a few tax increase bills were pending. The Senate Majority Coalition Caucus, citing the voters’ approval of our two-thirds-for-taxes initiative, took a hard line on tax increases. When the dust settled, only a handful of tax increases were passed.

We think on taxes this year, the Legislature scored an A-.

But Olympia’s appetite for tax increases has not ended; it’s only been suspended. The battle over tax increases will heat up again next year and the year after.

And it’s for that reason we will continue to pursue letting the voters vote on our initiative putting a 2/3-for-taxes constitutional amendment on the ballot.

Tim Eyman is an initiative activist. He can be contacted at 425-493-9127, tim_eyman@comcast. net or VotersWantMoreChoices. com