One of the most persistent Olympia-area history myths is that Interstate 5 destroyed Tumwater’s downtown. I’ve written about this before, so what follows you can find in different forms in other places, but I tidied it up for this post. Daisy Ackley in her “Wagon Wheel’s A’Rolling” history tells what has become common knowledge in…
The scale of out of town real estate investment in Thurston County is small
A candidate for Olympia City Council recently released a list of ideas to prevent out-of-towners and corporations from buying homes in Olympia. The end would be to make housing was more affordable by making it harder for people who don’t live here to bid up houses. This is an interesting line of thinking, but first…
Lacey has been bigger than Olympia for some time, and why that matters
Once the actual census data is publically released in August, we’re all going to hear officially that Lacey has more residents that Olympia. Lacey has been nipping on our heals for decades, and has significantly closed the gap in the last 10 years. In 2010, Lacey was within 5,000 of Olympia. This has narrowed to…
The long history of anti-corporatism in Cascadia (again) and I wonder where that might take the Washington State Republican Party
Just some social media that I hung onto. But it tells a consistent tale. Not only government can be trusted, big business can’t be either. During the peak of the restaurant-centered protest wave during our COVID-19 winter, I started noticing a consistent talking point among speakers at protests and on social media posts. It…
Olympia’s rising tax exempt skyline that will start paying off
One thing about Dan Leahy’s analysis of the multifamily housing tax exemption that bothers me almost two years later is that he stopped at the eight-year life span of the tax exemption. He illustrated that over the life of the exemption, the tax-paying owners (for example) of the 123 4th would not pay the $2.2…
The ongoing legacy of Initiative 456 and why we should pass HB 1172
In Washington state law, there is a section that is unenforceable and takes a clear shot at tribal treaty rights. In addition to telling congress that steelhead should be a nationwide gamefish, RCW 77.110 declares that treaties should not be taken into consideration when managing natural resources. And now HB 1172 looks like after more than…
Rural broadband and the policy cleave in Republican politics
Or, how did a socialist candidate win the most conservative precinct in Thurston County? There is a lot of talk about the just now starting civil war within the ranks or Republicans. My favorite example of this is the King County Republican chair demanding the Mainstream Republicans remove “Republican” from their name. But however this…
The semi-rural breakwater in Thurston County politics
I’ve oftentimes described the geographic nature of (mostly) partisan politics in Thurston County. If you are a Democrat or left of center, you try to drive up your margins in the areas close to downtown Olympia. Then you drive outwards in all directions and try to win as many other precincts as possible until you…
Olympia’s failed experiment with single-family zoning
I was not able to make it to the Housing Options hearing with the Planning Commission tonight. But here is what I sent them (and what I planned on saying). I am asking for you to consider relegalizing housing types that have traditionally been allowed in Olympia. Up until 1980, housing patterns in Olympia followed…