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No. 1: State budget
Washington's lawmakers closed another massive budget gap in 2011, cutting an estimated $4.8 billion in projected spending and raising fees, but not raising general taxes to balance their two-year operating budget.
But the budget patch ñ which required a 30-day special session in May to apply ñ didn't hold for long.
By fall, a new $2 billion gap had emerged, forcing lawmakers into another special session ñ this time lasting 17 days between Thanksgiving Day and Christmas. They were able to close about $480 million of the gap, mostly with bookkeeping moves and few new cuts.
The hard work is left for January.
In a big break from recent budget fights, Gov. Chris Gregoire said she now wants voters to approve a temporary tax increase to help close part of the gap and preserve funding for education and health care programs.
The state also spent less than it was predicted to take in as revenues for 2011-13 ñ for the first time in several budget cycles.
No. 2: Occupy Olympia
Occupy Olympia began Oct. 15 in Sylvester Park as a protest of corporate greed, held in solidarity with a similar movement in New York City that eventually spread to numerous U.S. cities, Seattle and Bellingham among them.
Most campers agreed the following day to move to Heritage Park because it had restrooms and the grass was hardier. Eventually, about 100 tents dotted the park. The Department of Enterprise Services asked campers Nov. 11 to leave voluntarily, citing health and safety concerns.
On Dec. 16, about 30 state troopers in riot gear moved in to clear out the camp, hours after campers defied a midnight deadline to leave. A short time later, a group of people who had holed up in an abandoned building on Fourth Avenue left peacefully.
No. 3: City Hall opens
After more than two decades of talk, several proposed locations and an arson, Olympia's new City Hall opened to the public March 14.
The four-story, 89,000-square-foot building at 601 Fourth Ave. E. consolidates departments from eight buildings, five of which the city leases. It injected about 240 employees into the heart of downtown.
An arson in July 2010 did $2.3 million in damage and delayed the project by two months. A transient and sex offender, Joshua A. Stacy, was sentenced to eight years and four months in jail for the crime.
No. 4: Elections
Washington voters made history in 2011, passing Costco's initiative to take the state out of the liquor-sales and-distribution business for the first time since Prohibition ended in the 1930s. Costco set records by donating $22.5 million to the Initiative 1183 campaign.
The measure is expected to eliminate about 1,100 jobs when state stores close in May.
In local races, Olympia City Council member Steve Buxbaum won election as mayor, replacing Doug Mah, who retired. The vote completed an overhaul of the council membership in the aftermath of a controversial rezoning vote on the city's isthmus, between Capitol Lake and Budd Inlet. The vote later was rescinded
No. 5: Parking pay stations
Parking pay stations installed in downtown Olympia proved unpopular with users and businesses alike. Business owners said the stations were harming their business, and residents said they were inconvenient and difficult to use.
The city improved instructions for the machines and relocated several.
The city offered shoppers a holiday gift in early December, allowing free two-hour parking through Dec. 26 at the sites served by the stations.
No. 6: Boy kills father
A 13-year-old Littlerock-area boy was accused of shooting and killing his father Oct. 23, leaving officials wondering whether the slaying was intentional.
The Thurston County Sheriff' s Office' s investigation of Jimmie Asher Jr.'s slaying revealed " some discord between father and son," according to a news release.
The boy is charged with second-degree murder. According to court papers, he shot his father about 11 p.m. at their home in the 10900 block of Delphi Road as the man slept next to his fiancee.
The sheriff' s office referred a charge of first-degree murder against the boy, but the Prosecuting Attorney' s Office decided on the lesser charge.
Asher Jr.'s father ñ the boy's grandfather ñ said in court that the entire family believes the boy shot his father by accident.
The boy pleaded not guilty at an arraignment Nov. 9. He has a pre-trial hearing scheduled in early 2012.
No. 7: Lattin's shooting sentencing
Roy Franco was sentenced Jan. 10 to 34 years in prison for fatally shooting his ex-girlfriend with a sawed-off shotgun at Lattin's Country Cider Mill in September 2009.
Franco shot himself in the head immediately after chasing down Kay Langford and shooting her in the head Sept. 24. He is missing part of his jaw and has trouble speaking.
Franco had pleaded guilty to one count of first-degree murder, two counts of second-degree assault, one count of third-degree assault and one count of possession of a short-barreled shotgun.
No. 8: Critical-areas ordinance
The debate over development in Thurston County prairies has taken center stage as the county updates its critical-areas ordinance, a requirement of the 1990 state Growth Management Act.
County officials must review and, if necessary, revise it every seven years.
The Mazama pocket gopher, listed as threatened by the state Department of Fish and Wildlife, exists in its highest concentration in the prairies of Thurston County, according to wildlife officials. Its presence has complicated development plans for some prairie properties.
Stop Taking Our Property Thurston County, a project of the Freedom Foundation, was created in part to question county regulations in the prairies and broader updates to its critical-areas ordinance. After forming this year, STOP began holding town-hall meetings attended by hundreds. Thousands of signs large and small popped up on the landscape of South Thurston County and in the cities.
Prairies aren't the only critical areas getting a closer look in the updated ordinance. Buffers for development would increase for streams, marine shorelines and bluffs, and landslide hazard areas. The draft ordinance also creates habitat-management zones for streams and shorelines.
No. 9: OlyPMR infiltration case
In January, the City of Tacoma released 133 pages of records showing that Pierce County detective Christopher Adamson recruited a former Joint Base Lewis-McChord employee to spy on the anti-war group Olympia Port Militarization Resistance.
That employee, John Towery, was a confidential informant as part of his work with what's called the South Sound Regional Intelligence Group.
The documents also contain personal information about anti-war activists, including former Olympia City Councilman T.J. Johnson.
A federal judge ruled in May that group members could pursue allegations that their rights were violated. Judge Ronald Leighton dismissed a number of other claims OlyPMR had pursued, including that the alleged spying had violated the federal Posse Comitatus Act that prohibits the military from engaging in law enforcement activities against citizens.
No. 10: Co-op lawsuits
Residents were deeply divided when the Olympia Food Co-op began boycotting Israeli products at its two stores in July 2010. The dispute entered the legal arena in 2011.
Five people filed a civil lawsuit in September claiming that the boycott was unfair and violated the co-op's own rules and bylaws.
The suit states that the co-op's rules require the board to make decisions by consensus, and that not all members had agreed to the boycott.
The suit, filed by Seattle attorneys Robert Sulkin and Avi J. Lipman, seeks unspecified damages. Sulkin said that if the co-op follows its policies and reaches true consensus on the issue of boycotting Israeli goods, his clients will accept that.
Staff writers Brad Shannon, Matt Batcheldor and Jerre Redecker contributed to this report.
Brian Sandford:bsandford@theolympian.com
