Washblog

In summary, Gary will fail to get a referendum on the ballot because 1) Washingtonians don't want anti-LGBT referenda, and have rejected previous signature gathering attempts; 2) The polls are against them, and getting more so; and 3) Gary's more intelligent friends have seen the writing on the wall and begged off this losing proposition.

Section II. What's in it for Gary?
1.  A Paycheck.
I'm not the first to wonder whether Gary might be tilting at the referendum windmill because he needs to justify ongoing fundraising for the organizations he and friends draw salaries from.  But I might be the first to actually dig up the numbers that support the thought.

Non-profit organizations like Gary's Faith & Freedom Foundation (FFF; a 501(c)3; EIN 83-0388829) and Faith & Freedom Network (FFN; a 501(c)4; EIN 91-1616476) have to file an annual report to the IRS called Form 990.  Form 990s are public information.  The 990s for Gary's organizations can be found here:
FFF 2005 (received by IRS 1/22/2007)
FFF 2006 (received by IRS 7/8/2008)
FFF 2007 (received by IRS 7/8/2008)
FFN 2005 (received by IRS 1/22/2007)
FFN 2006 (received by IRS 7/8/2008)
FFN 2007 (received by IRS 7/8/2008)

Review of these documents provide some startling and, frankly, quite damning information.  The picture that emerges is one of fundraising to cover salaries and further fundraising, with precious little left over to carry out the mission of the organizations ("program services").  Note that the year that Gary paid himself over $53K was 2006, the year he spearheaded the FAILED I-65 referendum campaign.

A.  63% of annual revenue (R) was spent on fundraising expenses (FRE), on average.

C.  Gary Randall paid himself a nice salary.

I would never begrudge anyone a salary for work done.  However, Gary Randall clearly has mismanaged his organizations largely for the benefit of his salary and fundraising (which apparently gets funneled into salary).  Given the exceedingly low allocation of funds to real program work by FFF and FFN, donors to these organizations or to the Faith & Freedom PAC Gary has set up to receive referendum funds could reasonably expect their money to be frittered away on Gary's salary, Gary's fund raising fees and payments to professional fund raisers. Potential donors should know that Gary Randall has a horrible record of NOT spending funds on the actual program he's selling.

Incidentally, I noticed that Gary's FFF and FFN are registered with the IRS in Lake Oswego, Oregon.  According to his personal website, most of his life and business history have centered around Oregon, not Washington.  So, although he has a Bellevue, WA PO Box for people to send checks to, could it be that Gary Randall is a CARPETBAGGER?  If so, this would explain why he never signed up to testify on SB 5688 before the House and Senate committees - he isn't a Washingtonian.

Section II. What's in it for Gary?
2.  Petitions provide a fresh set of names for a) further fund raising and b) GOP gotv.
Members of The Washington Hate Coalition have a long history of getting out the vote for the GOP, and have been happy to talk up the fact.  Gary included.  Although Gary has denied using referenda like the failed I-65 as a means of collecting voter data, he betrays himself on his blog (emphasis mine).

Here are the facts of the now broken agreement between Tim Eyman and Faith and Freedom Network: On the first day that petitions were available for Referendum 65, Faith and Freedom published petitions. The FFN Referendum petitions had the FFN name on them as a return address and avoided the controversial titles of the Eyman version. Eyman's version said "no quotas" even though there was nothing about quotas in the bill and the phrase alienated African American leaders. Eyman's version was also titled "no gay marriage" even though the bill was only very obliquely related to gay marriage. FFN was concerned that the misleading titles might be used by opponents in a legal challenge to overturn the Referendum as they have done to other Eyman initiatives. FFN printed thousands of their version of the Referendum petition but without the questionable titles and without Eyman's name attached. Eyman was upset and wanted all the petitions to come through his office and to bear only his name. In conversations that first weekend, Tim Eyman and FFN agreed that if FFN would withdraw its petitions, Tim Eyman would give copies of all petitions that came in to FFN. It was a simple agreement. That was the full agreement. There were no other conditions to it.

[D]espite being fully cognizant of this blatant dishonesty [in petition wording], they cut a deal with Eyman anyway, knowingly permitting misleading petitions to be distributed in their churches.

During the whole "Referendum Sunday" spat I had strongly criticized ministers for repeating Eyman's lies from the pulpit, suggesting that there might be a Commandment against that. Now it seems clear that Fuiten and Randall at least tacitly endorsed such lies.

In summary, Gary is dangling the referendum carrot to justify ongoing fundraising for the organizations he draws salaries from, and as a future mechanism for gathering voter data.  And voter data can translate into power and more money.  Gary will fail to get a referendum on the ballot, but if his history is any clue, he'll make a nice living off of the attempt.

Cross-posted at Pam's House Blend.