43rd District lawmakers give 2016 Legislature update

Washington’s 43rd Legislative District lawmakers shared an update on the status of this year’s short session during a town hall meeting on Feb. 20, addressing everything from education funding to affordable housing.

Sen. Jamie Pedersen started off the town hall at Seattle Central College’s Erickson Theater, telling attendees not to get their hopes up about seeing any big changes to the state budget coming out of the 60-day session, which ends March 11.

He added his disappointment over the Legislature’s decision to address education funding in 2017, when the state Supreme Court last year held the state in contempt for not meeting requirements of the McCleary decision.

“I would not expect to see anything dramatic out of Olympia,” Pedersen said.

Education

House Speaker Frank Chopp said despite this not being a capital budget year, the supplemental budget released Feb. 22 does add funding for teacher salaries and addressing an educator shortage in Washington.

Pedersen said the Senate has spent 40 minutes discussing education this session, while spending three hours on transgender bathroom legislation or “where people can pee.”

Meanwhile, student enrollment in Seattle has gone up by 7,500 over the last six years, with class sizes remaining too big and 30 percent of teacher pay being supplemented through a city levy, Pedersen said.

He is pushing for $25 million in capital funding to reopen Magnolia and E.C. Hughes elementary schools, as well as making fixes to other facilities.

Homelessness, housing affordability

Last year’s fire season was the worst in state history, and funding is still needed to address those losses and whatever this year brings, Chopp said, adding the homeless crisis in Washington state is another emergency that needs adequate state funding.

The House speaker said $10 million in additional funding is included in the supplemental budget to address housing for homeless youths, while Senate Democrats propose putting $37 million in a housing trust fund for permanent and transitional housing.

Pedersen said he’s troubled by the recently released statistic showing about 3,000 students in Seattle Public Schools are without housing.

“It’s a real problem,” he said. “Hungry, un-housed kids can’t learn.”

Of the $10 million in the budget for homeless youths, $1.5 million is being allocated for the purchase of a building on Madison Street for nonprofit Peace for the Streets by Kids from the Streets to use to care for its youth clients.

While Seattle is lacking in public land it can use to provide some semblance of shelter and relief, the state has a lot of it, Chopp said, which could be used to find housing solutions for homeless populations. He said work groups will conduct audits soon to determine what real estate is available and how it could best be used for things like student and transitional housing. Chopp said a number of potential workforce housing sites are being identified around King County, and being publicly owned means no acquisition costs.

“We’re talking about thousands of units, thousands of units at different sites,” he said.

Pedersen said there is also an affordable housing discussion surrounding surplus property Sound Transit is releasing back to the state with the conclusion of light rail staging for University Link. Affordable housing is already one component of transit-oriented development planned around the Capitol Hill Station on Broadway. 

Minimum wage

House Democrats passed a $12-an-hour minimum wage with paid sick leave last year with no Republican support, Chopp said. With a ballot measure filed last month that would raise the rate to $13.50 over the next four years and also provide paid sick leave, the Chopp said last year’s legislation now seems preferable to conservative lawmakers, and the business community is already working on compromises for the Legislature to consider.

Chopp said he’s worried whether the measure will receive support.

“We want to make sure we have a solid victory for working people,” he said, with Pedersen adding he suspects the initiative will pass. “I’m just paid to worry more, I guess.”

Gun control

A House bill that would have banned assault weapons and large-capacity magazines died in committee. The Senate didn’t do any better at addressing increased gun control in Washington, Pedersen said.

Pedersen said the Senate did have time to address legislation regarding short-barrel rifles, renewing concealed pistol licenses and exceptions for background checks.

Chopp said he is happy HB 2793 passed through the House. The legislation would create a safe-homes task force to raise public awareness and increase suicide prevention education. Part of this bill would require the health department to find ways to incentivize firearm dealers to participate in a program for suicide prevention and awareness. Chopp said 80 percent of gun deaths in the state are suicides.

Pedersen said he was hopeful the legislation would be given a favorable review by the Senate Law and Justice Committee.

Chopp said he’s also looking forward to seeing an initiative make it to the November ballot that would let police and family members get temporary orders to keep guns away from people who are believed to be a risk to themselves or others. A campaign for the Extreme-Risk Protection Order initiative was just recently announced.

I-732

Initiative 732 is being touted by the group Carbon Washington as a revenue-neutral tax swap that would reduce the state sales tax 1 percent, phase in a $25-per-metric ton carbon tax, eliminate the B&O tax for manufacturers and provide $1,500 rebates for 400,000 low-income households.

Chopp said fiscal staff for both the Legislature and the governor’s office argue this swap not only wouldn’t be revenue-neutral but would lower state revenue by about $700 million over four years, according to Chopp.

He isn’t opposed to a carbon tax but said a different plan that won’t negatively affect revenue is needed. He added he’s certain this initiative will make the November ballot, adding he would like a tax or surcharge on carbon.

DOC early release

Pedersen addressed an audience question regarding the ongoing controversy over thousands of Department of Corrections (DOC) prisoners being granted early releases for more than a decade due to a software glitch.

“I’m sorry that I have to talk about this,” he said.

The DOC implemented a software change back then to calculate and apply credit for good time to prisoners’ base sentence and enhancement sentences, Pedersen said, but did so incorrectly, resulting in many prisoners being released early by an average of 60 days from 2002 to 2015, when the governor’s office became aware of the error.

By then, more than 3,000 inmates had been released, and two murders and seven additional felonies had been committed by people who should have been incarcerated, Pedersen said.

Gov. Jay Inslee hired two former federal prosecutors to investigate what went wrong within the DOC, but then Senate Republicans decided to launch their own investigation, Pedersen said.

While the investigation Inslee commissioned is providing its report, Pedersen said the Senate’s parallel investigation has already gone beyond its $50,000 cap but may be only 50-percent complete. The Seattle senator said he was disappointed by the GOP’s action, calling it wasteful, duplicative and unlikely to reveal any new information.

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