We, the League of Women Voters, are a nonpartisan political organization that encourages the informed and active participation of citizens in government and influences public policy through education and advocacy. This is, in fact, the LWV's two-pronged mission statement. On a local level, what we do to implement the first element of the League's mission is something we call our "voter service program". This program involves everything from assisting in various ways with voter registration activities to participating in national programs to build citizen trust in the processes of government.

County Finance Forums

The League of Women Voters of Snohomish County has had a meeting with the County Executive and the County staff who prepare the county budget for each of the past four years. The meeting occurs after the County Executive has presented his proposed budget to the County Council and to news media.

Interest in the County Budget was stimulated by the LWVSC study on financing county government. The study was later adopted by the LWVWA and published by them in conjunction with the Institute for Washington's Future under the title, County Finances: Tax and Revenue Systems in Washington Counties. A copy of the study is available on request.

The purpose of the meeting is to educate the audience about the budget and to invite comments. In 2001 and 2002, other community organizations were invited by the League to participate. The 2001 meeting was held in the evening and was aggressively promoted by the County Executive's office and by League. An interactive technique involving wireless devices enabling the audience to indicate individual responses to budget proposals was used. This meeting was an attempt to involve the public in the budget-making process. Although the attendance was about 100 people, most of them were League members, local politicians and staff members. Very few were from the public at large.

The League of Women Voters of Snohomish County is evaluating ways to make participation in the budget process more meaningful.

Campaign Conduct Project

The League of Women Voters of Snohomish County is one of forty teams nationwide participating in the Institute for Global Ethics (IGE) Code of Conduct Project. The Pew Charitable Trusts funded a pilot project in Washington and Ohio in 2000 to see if candidates in congressional races could mutually negotiate a code of conduct that all of the candidates would abide by to raise the level of fairness in campaign conduct. The success of that pilot project (e.g., the Metcalf-Kammermeyer race) encouraged the foundation to expand the pilot project to races in approximately seventeen other states including Washington.

Four people in Washington, including two LWVSC members, have been working with IGE staff person Theresa Purcell to facilitate development of codes of conduct in Washington races. We attended a two-day training session in June 2002 to learn how to work with the media, consolidate a coalition of supporters, and bring all the candidates to the table to negotiate a code of conduct of behavior.

During the 2002 campaigning season in Snohomish County, we were ultimately unable to get a code drafted for any race. However, we plan to use what we have learned in our first year and try again next season. Clearly, a goal of code-drafting efforts such as this one is to compel candidates to focus more on issues and less on smearing other candidates in the same race, with the result that citizens would get better information and develop over time a higher level of trust in campaign processes.