Leading WA lawmakers give media a rundown on their 2024 legislative priorities
Leading lawmakers in Washington discussed some of their legislative priorities for the upcoming 2024 session Thursday during the annual legislative preview leading up to the start of the session on Monday, Jan. 8.
Legislators will have a short 60-day window this year to pass a supplemental budget as well as policy bills.
They also will have to decide whether or not they will address six ballot initiatives that have been turned into the Secretary of State. Those initiatives, if passed by the legislature or voters, could impact funding from key areas such as the Climate Commitment Act, which lawmakers passed in 2021.
Lawmakers are constitutionally required to pass a supplemental budget during the upcoming session. Constitutionally, the ballot measures also have to be at the top of the list for lawmakers to address.
Separate panels of lawmakers — including budget writers, transportation leaders, and House and Senate leadership — sat before news media and the public to answer questions Thursday, Jan. 4. Gov. Jay Inslee made an appearance to discuss some of his priorities for the session as well.
Here are some of the issues lawmakers said they want to tackle.
Behavioral health
One of the biggest priorities mentioned by lawmakers Jan. 4 was increasing access to behavioral health, including substance abuse treatment, in the state.
Sen. June Robinson, D-Everett, serves as the chair for the Senate Ways and Means Committee. Robinson told reporters that she believes the state has been focused on institutional care, but a more balanced approach should be taken to address the issue moving forward. She said the state should be investing in behavioral health long before people need care in a hospital setting. The state’s failure to properly fund behavioral health in the past has resulted in having to make up for the shortfalls now, she said.
“We have a long way to go to make up for under-investment, but I’m proud that we’re making progress,” Robinson said.
Rep. Timm Ormsby, D-Spokane, who serves as chair of the House Appropriations Committee, said the Legislature can’t fully address behavioral health without looking at other factors such as the labor force that provides such care.
Sen. Lynda Wilson, R-Vancouver, the ranking Republican on the Senate Ways and Means Committee, said that addressing the fentanyl crisis is also an important part of behavioral health, and that holding individuals accountable is part of that issue.
“We need to get these people into treatment,” she said.
Housing
Speaker of the House Laurie Jinkins, D-Tacoma, said that housing will continue to be a priority this session, following last year’s investments in building more housing and moving the homeless out of freeway encampments. She especially noted renters in the state, who make up more than 30% of the state’s population, and the issues they face as rents climb.
While mortgage holders know what their payments will be for years to come, renters have no “predictability or stability,” she said, and lawmakers need to look at how to help that. Jinkins mentioned several policies that could help that the House Democratic Caucus is already looking at such as a lot-splitting bill, and a bill introduced last year that would make transit-oriented development easier in certain areas.
Senate Majority Leader Andy Billig, D-Spokane, said that building new housing will take a few years, and he believes lawmakers need to find ways to split that timeline. This year, he said, lawmakers will likely take smaller but “more meaningful” steps on housing.
House Minority Leader Drew Stokesbary, R-Auburn, said the only meaningful thing lawmakers can do to ease homelessness is to build more housing supply. Increasing housing supply will lower the cost of housing, he said, but proposals such as rent control will end up as a “failed policy” and will in the end be “counter-productive.”
Leaders were questioned about whether they support Gov. Inslee’s $100 million proposal to expand his rights-of-way initiative to move individuals living in encampments into housing with services.
While Democrats said the rights-of-way initiative is one of the successful strategies to deal with homelessness, Republican lawmakers pushed back on the project’s cost per person helped.
Wilson told media that although a price tag can’t be put on “fixing someone,” the state can certainly do better. Wilson argued that the program does not address root causes, and that the goal should be to get people to be “productive members of society” but she doesn’t believe that is happening.
Transportation
The skyrocketing costs of transportation projects and the struggling ferry system are among the biggest issues lawmakers are facing this upcoming session.
Sen. Marko Liias, D-Mukilteo, chair of the Senate Transportation Committee, told media that the first step for lawmakers and the public is to set “realistic expectations.” He noted that while it’s true that the Legislature has already made significant investments in the ferry fleet, it’s also true that lawmakers haven’t been able to get enough done.
“The likelihood of getting new boats faster is not high,” Liias said.
He noted that the state’s Climate Commitment Act is a “critical” component to funding the fleet, and that its estimated the soonest the ferries can be completed is in 2027.
But lawmakers also acknowledged that staffing the ferries has been a struggle, and that state is launching a program to help current ferry system employees climb the ladder to better jobs within the system as a way to attract and retain workers.
Rep. Jake Fey, D-Tacoma, noted that the CCA cannot be used for highway projects, and that any additional funding for the ferry projects on top of the money that has already been allocated will also come from the CCA. Fey said his observation is that for a long time ferries were a “delinquent stepchild” and not funded appropriately, and lawmakers now are trying to rectify that.
Sen. Curtis King, R-Yakima, the ranking minority member on the Senate Transportation Committee, said lawmakers need to be cautious about spending money from the CCA and that he thinks the state will even struggle to have new ferries by 2027.
King said lawmakers should look at funding from the automobile sales tax to keep important transportation projects in the pipeline.
None of the four transportation leaders supported delaying or canceling projects currently in the works.
This story was originally published January 4, 2024 at 6:52 PM with the headline "Leading WA lawmakers give media a rundown on their 2024 legislative priorities."
