Mike Salsbury/The Olympian
State Auditor Brian Sonntag displays some of the dollar bills his office has received as a result of a talk show host's call for citizens to help fund performance audits.

Taxpayers send a message with bills

PATRICK CONDON, THE OLYMPIAN

OLYMPIA -- Feel like you don't pay enough in taxes? Well, you could join 435 Washington residents who mailed cash directly to government agencies.

Under the premise that money talks, concerned citizens from Anacortes to Yakima have mailed anywhere from $1 to $100 to the office of state Auditor Brian Sonntag.

Egged on by a Seattle radio talk show host, they want to make state government more responsible for the tax dollars that flow through it.

Last week, KIRO morning host Dave Ross got behind performance audits that would allow the state auditor to investigate whether agencies and programs are achieving their goals. Such measures have been a priority for Sonntag since he took office in 1993.

"We already do financial audits," Sonntag said Monday. "Why not measure the other side of government services? Not just what's going into government, but what's coming out the other side."

Bills to require performance audits have been a regular feature in recent legislative sessions, and a performance audit component did pass as part of last year's budget, only to get Gov. Gary Locke's veto.

Ross told his listeners last week that the audits would be a handy way to restore taxpayer faith in government -- and perhaps eliminate the desire for anti-tax initiatives that have caught fire with voters the past few years.

Ross urged listeners to mail $1 to Sonntag's office so that lack of money can't be used as an excuse to not perform the audits. And send dollars they did. By Monday, the 435 pieces of mail had yielded a thick stack of $1 bills, a couple of larger bills and some checks -- for a total of $738.

"We get almost no mail," said Mindy Chambers, communications director in Sonntag's office. "This has been pretty exciting."

Some of the people who sent money included notes.

"Please take my $1.00 very seriously and push with great energy and determination a state performance audit," wrote Patricia Harvey of Olympia.

The money can't go directly into a performance audits fund. By law, all unsolicited cash must go into the general fund.

"I think what's important is the message from average citizens," Sonntag said. "They want government to do something different, and do something better."

The Olympian Copyright 2002

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