Legislative news: 

►  In today's Seattle P-I -- Excise tax for ferries resurfaces -- Should car-tab taxes be resurrected to help keep state ferries running? The idea is being discussed again as a way to support Washington State Ferries, which estimates it will need to find $3.2 billion more in cash to meet its needs in the next 21 years. (Also see coverage in the Everett Herald and Kitsap Sun.)

►  At TheOlympian.com -- Dome of silence: Legislature lacks answers for fixing budget -- If they don’t have a public willing to pay for tax increases, and they don’t think they have time to build a case before the session ends April 26, maybe it makes sense to hide the cuts until after the March 19 revenue update. Then they'd have five weeks to pass an ugly budget and run home.

►  In today's Tri-City Herald -- House committee OKs B&O tax bill for Hanford contractors -- The legislation is intended to clarify what kinds of businesses are directly involved in cleanup of radioactive waste, thereby qualifying for a preferential tax rate enacted in 1996.

►  In today's Columbian -- Legislature begins to sharpen its focus -- As of Monday, 1,296 bills had been introduced in the House, and 1,106 in the Senate. About 1,560 of those passed the first hurdle, making it out of their committees of origin by Feb. 25.

Employee Free Choice Act news: 

►  Today at AFL-CIO Now -- In the states, opponents of freedom to form unions spread disinformation -- ”SOS Ballot,” a shady corporate front group headed by anti-worker ex-congressman and Big Business crony Ernie Istook, is trying to maintain corporate dominance over workers’ ability to form a union. We previously reported Istook and his non-disclosed donors are hoping to get anti-majority sign-up initiatives on the ballot in at least five states -- Arizona, Arkansas, Missouri, Nevada and Utah. Now they’ve expanded their reach, investing big dollars to push anti-worker ballot initiatives in Florida, Georgia, Illinois, South Carolina and Washington.

Local news:  

►  Today from AP -- One in 30 state adults under correctional control -- With more than 165,000 people either incarcerated or on parole or probation, Washington ranks 17th out of all the states. But we rank 44th for the number of people we put behind bars -- just over 32,000.

►  In today's Daily News -- New jail paying off, county officials say -- Two-and-a-half years after opening, the new Cowlitz County Jail has proven to be a cost-effective way of reducing local crime. Jail bookings increased 51% between 2005 and 2008, but the jail budget increased by only 24%. Over the same time period, the crime rate fell dramatically countywide.

►  Today from AP -- UW cuts 70 jobs from fundraising office -- Another 16 full-time positions are being reduced to part-time. Half of the jobs being cut are currently filled; the rest are vacant.

►  At TheStranger.com -- The P-I countdown -- More than 50 days after Hearst started a 60-day countdown to the near-certain death of the Seattle Post-Intelligencer's print edition, we still don't have the official word on when, exactly, the paper will cease printing.

►  In today's Seattle P-I -- Seattle P-I building goes up for sale (brief) 

►  In today's Seattle P-I -- Contractors protest Microsoft wage cuts -- Staffing agencies are forcing 10% wage cuts on contract workers, who say they agreed to a fixed pay rate for their typically year-long assignments. Asks one: "What's the point of a contract if it's not honored?"

►  In today's Seattle P-I -- Region needs good jobs (David West op-ed) -- "More jobs" isn't the answer to our crushing recession. We need more quality jobs that pay the kinds of wages and provide the kinds of benefits that sustain workers and their families -- that don't simply run them into a deeper and more humiliating working poverty.

National news: 

►  In the American Prospect -- Disunite there -- UNITE HERE -- one of America's stellar unions -- is splitting apart in a bitter civil war that pits the UNITE side against the HERE side in a vicious, ugly fight. Some of the savviest and most dedicated union leaders and staffers ever to work in American labor are savaging each other as the UNITE side endeavors to break away from the larger HERE side and a custody battle rages over the union's financial assets.

►  In today's Washington Post -- Democrats likely to run cross-border trucking project off the road -- The Senate is close to passing a catch-all spending bill that would seal the U.S. border to Mexican long-haul trucks, ending a 15-year NAFTA-inspired project whose goal was to let U.S. and Mexican trucks carry products from Albany to Acapulco. 

►  In today's Washington Post -- Tens of thousands of federal hires needed for Obama budget -- President Obama's budget is so ambitious, with vast new spending on health care, energy independence, education and services for veterans, that experts say he probably will need to hire tens of thousands of new federal government workers to realize his goals.

►  In today's Ft. Mill Times -- Solis: Enforcement to be stepped up at Labor Dept. -- Labor Secretary Hilda Solis says she will step up enforcement and put life back into the agency.

►  In today's Miami Herald -- Labor Secretary inspires union crowd in Miami -- ''(The old DOL) were prioritizing going after unions. You can rest assured that there is now a new sheriff in town.''

►  In today's NY Times -- Wars, endless wars (Bob Herbert column) -- The nation as we’ve known it is fading before our very eyes, but we’re still pouring billions of dollars into wars in Afghanistan and Iraq with missions we are still unable to define.