New reports filed with the Public Disclosure Commission last week indicate that Tim Eyman is still searching for a new benefactor to prop up his sputtering initiative factory, two months after the Mukilteo profiteer revealed he didn’t have the money lined up to buy his way onto the ballot this year.

Excluding a large money transfer from Help Us Help Taxpayers (another one of his PACs), Eyman’s reincarnated Voters Want More Choices committee has brought in just $15,200 so far this year. This sum, along with the aforementioned transfer, is being applied towards the loan Eyman took out against his house last year, leaving Voters Want More Choices with a deficit of $196,101.06.

Years ago, such a debt would have been insignificant, because Eyman’s wealthy benefactor would have taken care of it with a check or two. But so far in 2011, nobody with deep pockets has come to Eyman’s rescue.

If Eyman can’t find a benefactor, he will likely end the year still in debt. At present, Voters Want More Choices is taking in an average of only $7,600 a month. Even if Eyman managed to double his monthly average starting this month, he’d still finish 2011 with only $152,000 raised – not enough to cancel the debt.

Eyman won’t be able to use all of what he raises to pay off his loan, either, because he’ll presumably need to pay himself and his associates.

Eyman no doubt recognizes the predicament he’s in, which explains why he sounds so desperate in his recent letters and emails. Without money – lots of money – the gears of his initiative factory cannot turn.

That was quite evident two months ago when Eyman revealed that, for the first time since the new millennium began, he wouldn’t be doing a signature drive this spring. Instead, he used his annual press conference in the Secretary of State’s office to announce his plans for 2012. It was a telling moment.

Without his initiative factory, Eyman has no real power. He needs it to be in operation so he can enjoy the occasional success and remain relevant.

If history is any indication, Eyman will find a new wealthy benefactor. That’s why it’s important that we spend 2011 in infrastructure-building mode. We have to assume that an I-1053 clone will be on the ballot in 2012, and we have to be prepared to respond forcefully. Voters need to understand what measures like I-1053 are really designed to do: take away majority rule and sabotage representative democracy.

Since announcing to his followers that he was “hitting the big panic button” a few weeks ago, Tim Eyman has managed to shave $38,000 plus off the total amount of his outstanding debt from last year. Or so he claims in a fundraising appeal recently sent out via snail mail and forwarded to NPI’s Permanent Defense.

The letter doesn’t say how Eyman managed to “whittle” his I-1053 down to “under $200k”; nor does it disclose exactly how much of Eyman’s debt is still outstanding.

Given how anemic Eyman’s fundraising has been, we’re inclined to think at least a chunk of that money is from either wealthy conservatives (like Bellevue Square owner Kemper Freeman Jr., an Eyman fan) or from corporations (Association of Washington Business chieftain Don Brunell urged lobbyists last fall to help Eyman cover his debt).

Reports for contributions received in February are due March 10th, so at that time, we should be able to see just who has been funneling money into Eyman’s presently idle initiative factory… if Eyman’s treasurer files the reports on time.

Apparently unable to convince either corporate lobbyists or Michael Dunmire to pony up the cash needed to pay off the $250,000 loan he took out against his house to help finance I-1053, Tim Eyman is shaking his electronic tin cup harder than ever, pleading with his supporters to help pay off the debt so he can move forward with his next scheme. In a message sent out this morning, Eyman says:

I haven’t been showing it, but I’m seriously concerned. We are raising funds for the next 2/3’s initiative and to pay off my 2nd mortgage loan (when donations weren’t coming in fast enough to pay the bills for last year’s I-1053 signature drive, I loaned the campaign $250,000 that got I-1053 over the finish line). I said to myself “it’s either this or we fail” and decided that I-1053 was just too important to fall short. So I jumped off that steep cliff hoping and praying that our supporters — all of you — would catch me this year. We have spent the last month highlighting some bad anti-1053 bills, asking you to email legislators, and helping with some local initiatives. But thus far, we’ve not hit the big panic button on this top priority.

I’m doing so now: THIS IS ME HITTING THE BIG PANIC BUTTON.

Eyman claims he has only managed to pay off $12,000 of the $250,000 loan, leaving him with $238,000 in debt. “[I]magine how scary that is for the Eyman family,” he says later in the message.

Wait a second… Tim Eyman is asking for sympathy? Now that’s rich!

Considering the way he treats others (belittling elected leaders, demonizing public servants, and attempting to undermine the public’s trust in government), he’s the last person in the state who is deserving of anyone’s sympathy.

Eyman created his own financial crisis by using his house as collateral to secure funds for his 2010 initiative. He took a risk and now he’s going to have to deal with the consequences. Given how little money he raised independently last year (more than 80% of the money for I-1053 came from corporations) we’re guessing the loan won’t be paid off until Eyman hooks up with a new sugar daddy… or an old one.

In an email sent out today to supporters and copied to the media, Tim Eyman is once again hypocritically criticizing opponents of his latest destructive initiative for contributing large amounts of money to stop it from passing. Eyman singled out several unions and their international affiliates, sneering, “Washington DC’s most powerful government unions are seeking to buy this year’s election on I-1033 — $2.6 million+ reported so far and much more expected.”

Eyman may enjoy pretending to be a populist, but he knows perfectly well we are only voting on Initiative 1033 because its placement on the ballot was bought and paid for by an angry investment banker who despises government.

Eyman acknowledges in his email that his initiative factory received a $300,000 donation from “super supporter” Michael Dunmire back in the spring. What he doesn’t admit was that Initiative 1033 could not have qualified for the ballot without Dunmire.

For the last four years, Dunmire has kept Eyman’s operation going by repeatedly dumping enormous sums of money into Eyman’s bank account, allowing Eyman to continually buy his way onto the ballot: in 2005 with Initiative 900, in 2007 with Initiative 960, in 2008 with Initiative 985, and almost in 2006 with Initiative 917, which looked like it would initially be on the ballot but ultimately self-imploded because it lacked enough valid signatures.

In 2008, Eyman used a combination of Dunmire’s money and a loan taken out against his home to come up with enough cash to buy I-985 onto the ballot, a formula he relied upon again this year. Last year’s loans, however, were fully covered by Dunmire, who wrote two checks on February 6th, 2009, for a total of $280,000. Eyman used this money to repay the $175,000 loan he had taken out for I-985, and three days later, he and the Fagans used the rest to compensate themselves. (See the C4 report and Amended Schedules A and L for ReduceCongestion.org, 3/10/2009 reporting date.)

If history is any indication, Dunmire will be paying off Eyman’s $250,000 loan for Initiative 1033 this winter, which woud then put his financial backing of I-1033 at a total of at least $550,000. Out of a total of $670,169 raised by Eyman this year for I-1033, that would be about 82%. Eighty two percent.

Without Dunmire, Eyman simply could not afford to hire signature gatherers to set up shop outside of stores and at events to pester citizens to autograph his initiative petitions. And without the signatures he purchases, Eyman couldn’t qualify for the ballot.

Dunmire’s cash makes it possible. That’s all it takes. But that’s not grassroots.

Eyman’s small dollar donations and the number of signatures collected by volunteers are insignificant compared to Dunmire’s checks and the number of signatures collected by mercenary petitioners.

Unlike SEIU, NEA, AFSCME, or any of the unions Eyman is condemning, his backer represents only one person: Michael Dunmire. Unions opposed to Initiative 1033, in contrast, represent thousands or tens of thousands of working families whose livelihood is directly threatened by Eyman’s jobs-killing wealth transfer scheme.

It should come as no surprise to anyone who follows politics that organized labor would donate heavily to defeat a ballot measure which not only puts its own members’ jobs in jeopardy, but punishes small businesses and destroys any hope of economic recovery for our state. This battle will decide Washington’s future. Unions are doing their part to ensure the opposition campaign has ample resources to explain to voters the devastating consequences I-1033 would have on our quality of life.

Eyman has no ground to stand upon when he criticizes opponents for relying on big bucks to build a war chest to educate voters. He qualifies initiatives by getting one rich guy to write him a couple checks.

If Tim Eyman doesn’t like big money in politics, he should stop relying on big money – one man’s money – to bankroll his initiatives and his “compensation fund”. Otherwise, he has no right to complain.

Does Eyman’s multimillionaire backer, Michael Dunmire, know that Eyman wasted thousands and thousands of dollars of Dunmire’s contributions printing up invalid petitions that the state won’t accept? Learn more about Eyman’s costly mistake in this Special Report from Permanent Defense.