booth gardner - Washington Secretary of State

into. They went on to draft an ambitious plan to provide additional debt capacity to fund
capital construction projects at the universities, then hit the road to sell it. They lobbied
the Legislature, visited editorial boards and did the service-club circuit – “all of that all over
again.”
By then, the cocktail of new drugs that had given Booth such a boost was no
longer potent. He had trouble buttoning his shirt. His voice was frequently reduced to a
whisper. The man with the perpetual spring in his step was now a lurcher. He called it the
“Muhammad Ali Shuffle,” in honor of a fellow sufferer. “I’ll never forget the day when we
were walking across the capital campus,” Evans says. “I had two bad knees, and I was kind
of hobbling along. Booth was alongside me, having a little trouble moving himself. Finally
he turned to me with that inimitable wry smile and said, ‘What the hell are a couple of old
punks like us doing down here?’ ”
What they were doing, Evans says, was helping create “a legacy to leave for my
grandchildren and Booth’s grandchildren and the grandchildren of all of us.” The Washington
Legislature in 2003 adopted the Building Washington’s Future Act, better known as the
Gardner-Evans Plan. It authorized $750 million in general obligation bonds to fund new
buildings and improve facilities on college campuses statewide over the next six years.
They couldn’t have done it without another old Olympia hand, Bob Edie. Edie
worked for the State Senate for 10 years and was staff director for the Senate Ways &
Means Committee in the mid-1980s when Jim McDermott was the chairman. Edie became
director of government relations for the University of Washington and a vice president at
Western Washington University. With their bipartisan political moxie and experience as
academics, Evans and Gardner became what Edie views as the most formidable highered
tag team in state history. A progressive three-term governor who’d gone on to head a
college and serve in the U.S. Senate, Evans’ bona fides gave anything he lent his name to
instant credibility. Gardner, a former grad school director and CEO, had resuscitated higher
education when “it was on its knees” in the 1980s, Edie says. “He’s the only politician I’ve
ever met who could go to the Rainier Club for lunch and the bowling alley on the way home
and win votes at both places.” Before revenues went south at the beginning of the end
of his second term, Booth had succeeded in dramatically boosting faculty salaries. “That
was huge,” Edie says. “Competitiveness was the issue, and Booth hit it head on. With the
support of great legislators like Helen Sommers and Dan McDonald, he got those raises.
Next, they created the branch campuses, which expanded access to higher ed.” Then, at a
time in their lives when he and Evans could have been playing golf every afternoon, they
were back at it. “They know a state can’t be great without great universities.”
When Edie suffered health problems of his own, Booth visited him in the hospital.
They became good friends. Life is laced with ironies, Edie says with a laugh. “I tried like
hell to beat him” in that bruising 1984 campaign for governor. It was Edie who helped prep
McDermott for the Rotary Club debate where he ate Gardner’s lunch.
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