Gov. Inslee Plans “Assault” On What He Calls “Polluting Industries”

Inslee vows to "make polluting industries pay."   Whoa there, environmental cowboy.

According to ShiftWA and The Seattle Times,  Gov. Jay Inslee rolled out a peek at some of his ideas for the 2015-17 state budget while speaking at a liberal environmental conference last Friday.

Inslee claims his ideas will generate cash for needed state projects, but it's the strong-arm techniques he plans to utilize that are interesting.

Inslee spoke at the liberal Washington State Budget and Policy Center's conference, and said the cap-and-trade system he favors can be a "two-fer" or "three-fer" for the state.

By that he means,  money taken from what he calls polluting industries can be used for bridges, clean air and other projects.   He all but called out the fossil fuels-petroleum industry with this comment:

" What is coming is an assault by the polluting industries who hate the thought they’ll have to rein in their pollution."

This comment is rather interesting because the last time we checked, Washington state has only ONE oil refinery.     Wonder what else he considers to be a "polluting industry?"  Dairy farms?   Paint companies? Gas stations?     The Times also reports Inslee will apparently shed any and all memories of his campaign pledge of no new taxes.  Get ready for attempts to heft up big government spending rates:

"Inslee’s budget plan is expected to include more than $1 billion in new taxes and revenue to cover what his budget office says is a $2.35 billion budget gap to pay for needs including additional K-12 classroom funding required by the state Supreme Court’s McCleary decision, as well as pay raises for state employees and teachers.

Inslee has not said which taxes he’ll look to increase, but Democrats have talked about trying to impose a capital-gains tax and eliminating some tax breaks for businesses."   (Bold lettering added for emphasis).

So, when the legislature convenes after the first of the year, if you thought the last two years in Olympia were "fun,"  get ready for an assault on your wallet, the likes which has never yet been seen in the Evergreen State.