Article by Erik Smith. Published on Friday, June 11, 2010 EST.

Washington Beverage Association Forced to Run With Vague Ballot Title – Now Must Set Record for Signature Gathering

By Erik Smith

Staff writer/ Washington State Wire

OLYMPIA, June 11.—A Thurston County Superior Court judge shuffled a few words in a ballot title late Thursday afternoon – and now the Washington Beverage Association is off and running with Initiative 1107 in a desperate gamble to beat the state deadline for signature gathering.

            The soda-pop distributors lost their fight for a ballot title that would have described the tax rollback as an attack on food and beverage taxes. Instead, it is saddled with a rather vague description written by the attorney general’s office. But that office says the authors have only themselves to blame.

            Now the pop distributors have until July 2 to collect 241,000 signatures for the measure, which would roll back about $100 million in annual tax increases approved by this year’s Legislature. It is one of two late-starting campaigns that got the go-ahead this week, joining five initiative campaigns already in the field. Also launching this week is Initiative 1105, one of two liquor-store privatization initiatives. That one made it through another ballot-title hearing Wednesday.

            Both campaigns are up against the wall – no Washington state campaign has ever collected that many signatures in so short a time. But both have enormous war-chests that will be used to pay signature gatherers – the pop distributors have $1.2 million from the American Beverage Association and the liquor distributors picked up $400,000 from a pair of liquor distributors active in other states.

            Said Tim Martin, president of the Washington Beverage Association, “I always like to set records.”

            Beverage Association Challenge Fails

            The Beverage Association challenged the ballot title the attorney general’s office had written for the measure, a move that delayed the measure’s debut for a week. It should be noted that two other challenges were filed to the ballot title as well, from groups that supported this year’s tax increases. One came from the Washington Education Association and the other was filed jointly by the Service Employees International Union, the Washington State Hospital Association and the Washington Association of Churches. Meaning that a delay was inevitable in any event.

            Every word counts in a ballot title – they’re the elements most voters read. The Beverage Association wanted the wording to reflect the idea that the initiative would roll back taxes on food and beverages. Its proposed wording: “Initiative Measure Number 1107 concerns ending the 2010 tax increases on certain foods and beverages.”

            But that wasn’t exactly fair, the attorney general’s office argued.

            The trouble is that the measure would roll back a wide variety of tax increases, and the only thing they really have in common is that they were imposed by the 2010 Legislature. The attorney general’s office favored this line:  “Initiative 1107 concerns reversing certain 2010 amendments to state tax laws.”

            Judge Richard Hicks ruled against the beverage association. The vague wording stands.

            Not Really a Food Tax

            The measure would eliminate a new wholesale tax on soda pop and eliminate new sales taxes on candy and bottled water. It also would reinstate a business and occupations tax exemption on certain food processors that had been expanded by a court decision, and which was narrowed by this year’s legislature.

            Try and convey the whole idea impartially in 10 words and you see the problem, the attorney general’s office maintained.

            What’s more, restoring a B & O tax break for food processors isn’t exactly the same thing as eliminating a tax increase on food, the office argued. And if you phrase it that way, people might get the idea that it has something to do with a general tax on food – an idea that always has been politically unpopular in Washington state.

            The only substantive change ordered by Judge Hicks was one that had been suggested by the ballot measure’s political opponents. They suggested that the words referring to the food-processing tax exemption be shuffled to the end of the 30-word “concise description” – because it only accounts for $4 million of the $104 million-a-year measure.

            Hicks said, “To have six lawyers in the same room write a ten-word description of an initiative, a 10-word statement, a 30-word concise description and a 75-word summary, you’d have a better chance of winning the Lotto than to have the lawyers write the same thing.”

            Did Political Ploy Backfire?

            Political opponents of the initiative said the Beverage Association blew it. By including food processors in a ballot measure that really is aimed at reversing the pop tax, they said the Beverage Association was really trying to get the word “food” into the title.

            “We suspect one of the main reasons for including them in this initiative was a political ploy to confuse voters about what this initiative was all about,” said Sandeep Kaushik, spokesman for last session’s revenue coalition.

            The end result was a ballot title that doesn’t say much of anything – and could diminish the measure’s appeal, unless the pop distributors finance a huge advertising campaign to explain I-1107 to voters, opponents said. Meanwhile, Kaushik said the opponents continue to consider a decline-to-sign campaign — but all depends on whether the signature-gathering effort gathers steam. “They only have three weeks,” he said.

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