Contact Information

  • Governor's Office, 360-902-4111

Governor Gregoire Delivers on Promise to Reduce Middle Management

For Immediate Release: June 18, 2007

Over 1,000 mid-management positions cut from state government payroll; Governor also announces drop in state tax ranking to 37th in nation

OLYMPIA � Governor Chris Gregoire today delivered on her promise to cut 1,000 mid-management positions from the state government payroll.

�One of my first promises was to cut 1,000 middle managers so that the state can invest where it is needed most � such as for children struggling in school and expanding health care for kids and families that don�t have access to quality care,� said Governor Gregoire. �I am proud to say that we have fulfilled that promise.�

Governor Gregoire in 2005 ordered the reduction and redistributed $50 million � the two-year cost of the 1,000 mid-management positions. In order to minimize the impact on those losing mid-management positions, she gave state agencies two years to complete the task, with a deadline of June 30, 2007.

�We�ve cut through bureaucracy to place workers where they can help people and make changes for Washington families,� said Governor Gregoire. �These cuts help us to be more accountable to Washingtonians and deliver vital services.�

Of the 1,100 mid-management slots eliminated, about 90 percent were from the Washington Management Service (WMS), a system created for managers and professionals in the 1990s, which, proportionally, had been expanding faster than the rest of the state workforce. Among the WMS positions eliminated, about 70 percent were abolished, another 25 percent were moved to non-management, front-line positions while the rest were changed into part time positions

Since January 2005, the WMS count has fallen by 11 percent and the percentage of the general government workforce in WMS has gone from 9.2 percent to 7.9 percent. A system is now in place to make sure WMS positions are added only when certain criteria are met, such as when a management position is created through legislation, and the proportion of state government managers is maintained.

Washington�s Tax Ranking Drops to 37th in Nation
Governor Gregoire today also noted that Washingtonians pay less state and local tax relative to their incomes than residents of 36 other states, according to figures recently released by the U.S. Census Bureau.

Washington ranked 37th nationally, paying an average of $105.91 in taxes for every $1,000 in personal income in Fiscal Year 2005, compared to a national average of $112.94. Washington ranked 29th in Fiscal Year 2004.

This is the lowest ranking for Washington since it dipped to 39th during a severe recession in 1982. Washington's ranking has declined from a peak of 11th in 1998, in part because personal income has grown faster than taxes.

Washington also dropped in the per-capita rankings, which simply divide tax revenue by the number of people in a state. Washington ranked 21st per capita in Fiscal Year 2005, down from 18th in Fiscal Year 2004. Taxes per capita were $3,651 in Fiscal Year 2005, slightly below the national average of $3,698. This is the first time since 1981 that Washington�s taxes per capita have dipped below the national average. States with higher personal incomes tend to have higher per capita taxes, but Washington�s per capita tax ranking was significantly lower than its 12th-place ranking in per capita personal income.

Washington also fell below national averages in property taxes. Property taxes dropped by $1.08 to $30.60 per $1,000 of personal income in Fiscal Year 2005, although Washington's ranking among the states remained at 28th, the same as in Fiscal Year 2004. Washington ranked 24th in property taxes per capita at $1,055 in Fiscal Year 2005, down from 22nd in the 2004 rankings.

Details on the rankings are available on the Department of Revenue�s web site at http://dor.wa.gov/content/AboutUs/newsroom/default.aspx
and in Comparative Tax Statistics 2005, posted at http://dor.wa.gov/Content/AboutUs/StatisticsAndReports/.

###