  We present initial results from the M33 Metallicity Project. Out of the
thousands of cataloged HII regions in M33, only ~30 have electron-temperature
based abundances in the literature. We have obtained Keck spectroscopy of a
sample of ~200 HII regions in M33, with 61 detections of the [O III] 4363 A
line that can be used for determining electron temperatures, including
measurements at small galactocentric radii where auroral lines are generally
difficult to detect. We find an oxygen abundance gradient of -0.027 +/- 0.012
dex/kpc, in agreement with infrared measurements of the neon abundance gradient
but much shallower than most previous oxygen gradient measurements. There is
substantial intrinsic scatter of 0.11 dex in the metallicity at any given
radius in M33, which imposes a fundamental limit on the accuracy of gradient
measurements that rely on small samples of objects. Finally, we present a
two-dimensional map of oxygen abundances across the southern half of M33 and
discuss the evidence for deviations from axisymmetry.
