Thibaudeau

D-Seattle

Students threatened with arrest for trying to enter Capitol

Protesters wanted to discuss tuition increases with their legislators

THE ASSOCIATED PRESS

Originally published Friday, March 15, 2002

OLYMPIA -- College students attempting to enter the state Legislative Building on Thursday night were stopped and threatened with arrest by a State Patrol trooper who claimed the building ceased to be public after 5 p.m.

The students, concerned about tuition increases, wanted to talk to their legislators -- much like hundreds of paid lobbyists and citizen activists do every day and night in the Legislative building, often after 5 p.m. The Legislature worked late into the night Thursday making final decisions about the budget and transportation.

State Trooper Scott Baker told the group of about a half-dozen students that the building was open to the public only from 8 a.m. to 5 p.m. He said the other people milling through the building after hours were "conducting state business."

Asked how the students' attempts to talk to their legislators about the state budget differed from what others were doing, Baker said, "I guess it's how you want to look at it.

"They just wanted to protest, now they want to take it a little bit further," Baker said.

The students were allowed to stay after Sen. Pat Thibaudeau, D-Seattle, heard about the conflict and intervened on their behalf.

"I've never heard of such a thing," said Thibaudeau, a legislator for the past decade.

"It was a pretty blatant display of discrimination based on age and appearance," said Logan Price, a student at Seattle Central Community College.

He and the others were dressed mainly in casual black clothes, wearing caps and baseball hats. They didn't fit the business-suit-clad mold of most people in the building.

"We're not dressed in business clothes; we were probably perceived as protesters," said Katherine Walker, 20, a Seattle Central Community College student. "It's not like we're out here to act like vagabonds."

The students started out by pitching a tent outside the Legislature and holding a vigil to protest tuition increases.

The state budget approved by the Legislature authorizes tuition increases of up to 16 percent at the University of Washington and Washington State University, up to 14 percent at the other four-year colleges, and up to 12 percent at community colleges.

"I'm just barely getting by as it is," Walker said. "I'm just worried about it."

Two years ago, hundreds of state employees and Steelworkers protested and chanted loudly inside the Legislative Building during the session.

They held a sit-in that lasted weeks, with protesters sacked out in sleeping bags on the marble floors.

None was arrested.

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