Campaign signs are popping up across Washington saying “I-933, It’s Only Fair.” But that’s not the impression a spokesman for the measure left at a recent Seattle forum.

Initiative backer Steve Hammond, a former King County Council member, confirmed the issue is about fighting government. Speaking at an election forum last week in the Eastlake neighborhood, he said the measure would prevent the sort of oppression he felt a few years ago when the county passed restrictions on rural development.

Apparently rural landowners need a blunt instrument like a statewide initiative because they don’t have the numbers to change the state’s leadership.

“Why not just vote for new representation? Because you need representation that represents you,” he said, noting that during the council’s vote he was the only of 13 council members who was personally affected by the land-use rules. “If they vote (on issues) outside urban growth boundaries, they need to live outside urban areas.”

According to the voter’s guide, Initiative 933 would require government to compensate property owners when “regulation damages the use or value of private property.” Hammond agreed that the government wouldn’t have the funds to compensate landowners. Instead it “would be forced to act differently,” he said. Such a rule would turn back the clock on community planning, essentially giving rural property owners the right to dictate development of the state’s open land.

Indeed Hammond explained that small landowners currently bear most of the cost of the state’s land-use rules. He told Eastlake residents who worry about gutted development laws that their urban neighborhood would be mostly unaffected. In other words, voters should let rural property owners do whatever they want with the land, regardless of the consequences.

It’s true that policy needs to be fair, consistent and not hurt the little guy. That’s a good reason to reopen debate in the legislature about land-use laws — but not to support I-933.

Seattle’s political leaders rage against President Bush and the support liberal events. But their way of governing, which effectively delivers spoils to their buddies and corporations, isn’t liberalism.

So says Ted Van Dyk in the Seattle Post-Intelligencer. He decries the big-government land grabs by local transit agencies, massive subsidies to companies like Boeing and perennial blackmail in order to raise taxes.

“No city, even our Emerald City, can govern itself this way without in time becoming New Orleans or Jersey City,” he writes. “Grandiose public works projects go hand in hand with payoffs and public corruption.”

He’s mostly right. The area needs activists who are willing to question the status quo way of doing business. For example, someone needs to hold the Port of Seattle accountable for financial misses, mismanagement and waning competitiveness.

But Van Dyk misses a key point. Cascadia and the Seattle area need to invest in better infrastructure in order to cope with growth, and that means steppingon some toes. The region also needs a tax structure that encourages companies to expand here and makes it easier for start-ups to fluourish. The key is picking competent representatives who will do this in the most efficient way.