- Sign up for advocacy days (Wednesdays at 10 am)
- Action alert: We need community housing, not institutions
- Petition from the Shut Them Down Coalition
Legislators are on the floor all week (or in caucus) deciding which bills will pass out of their chamber of origin by the March 9 cutoff. If a bill you like is still in Rules, now is the time to contact your legislators and ask for their support in getting it to a vote.
Here is our big list of bills. We include disability-specific ones as well as ones we think people with developmental disabilities might be interested in.
How the legislative process works:
1. Bills must pass out of their policy and fiscal committees.
2. Bills that do, then go to Rules for consideration for a floor vote.
3. If the Rules committee "pulls" the bill, then it is placed on "2nd reading" for a floor vote.
4. If it passes off the floor, it goes to the other chamber, and the process repeats
5. Many bills get changed (or amended) when they go to the other chamber; so after passing out of the second chamber they go BACK to the original chamber to make sure a majority agrees with the new version. This is called reconciliation. Sometimes the chambers do not agree, and the bill dies.
Did you know?
Lots of bills never make it out of Rules; and sometimes the chambers run out of time and can't get to all of bills pulled for a floor vote.
Zombie bills
Sometimes bills that did not make cutoff stay in play; this is because the legislators decide they are necessary to pass the budget. For this reason, a lot of bills about taxes or bills with large fiscal notes are left to the very end.
Budget bills
Now is also a GREAT time to talk to your legislators about budget priorities. Legislators are making their requests now, and the House and Senate budget proposals are expected in mid-March.
The Arc of Washington State has an alert out for the capital budget - that is the budget for building things.
The Arc is concerned about the governor's proposal to build a $120 million nursing facility on the grounds of Fircrest, an old institution in Shoreline for people with developmental disabilities, while at the same time failing to designate any funds for the developmental disability set aside in the Housing Trust Fund. Typically, funds are designated to ensure projects are created to expand housing stock for supportive housing options for people with DD. As for the nursing facility, advocates agree new state-run nursing facilities are needed but have proposed an alternate, lower-cost proposal for small community-based nursing homes across the state. This would keep people in their communities, near family, friends and other natural supports while freeing up tens of millions to invest in accessible housing for people with disabilities.
We do not know yet about cuts to long-term supports. While the budget outlook is improving, the governor's no-cuts proposal relied on passing a capital gains tax. One capital gains proposal passed the Senate Ways and Means committee and is in Rules, but there is no word on whether the chamber will vote on it.
A key bill we are tracking, SB 5268 - Transforming services for individuals with intellectual and developmental disabilities by increasing the capabilities of community residential settings and redesigning the long-term nature of intermediate care facilities - is also still in Rules.
