Home | About Cyndy | News & Media | Email Updates | The Ledger | Contact
Dear Friends and Neighbors,
We are down to our last two weeks of the 2021 legislative session. It has been challenging to carry on the work of the people remotely, but we have pressed forward and accomplished many things. Before I get into more details, I want to touch on a subject that has been an overriding issue, really since the pandemic began, which is the governor’s emergency powers.
Time is running out for the Legislature to act. If we leave this session with no new emergency power policies in place, then the governor will be able to continue wielding his power without any checks or balances, for as long as he sees fit to keep Washington under a state of emergency. This is not how our state government should be run.
Another prime example came on Monday, when the governor announced three counties would be rolling back to Phase 2 on April 16, due to increased numbers of COVID cases in those counties. Pierce, Cowlitz, and Whitman counties will take a step backward because they are not currently meeting Phase 3 Healthy Washington metrics.
However, according to Pierce County Executive Bruce Dammeier, a slow rollout of the vaccine is partially to blame for the county not meeting Phase 3 metrics. This is another example of the governor making decisions with unchecked power. Our state government should be run by the voice of the people through the Legislature. Republicans will continue to pursue every possible avenue to rein in the governor’s emergency powers.
Click here to read a joint statement from Republican leaders from the House and Senate regarding the three counties moving backward and the governor’s emergency powers.
State Budget Proposals
Among the bills that have now passed both legislative chambers are the state’s three big budget proposals: the two-year operating, transportation, and capital budgets.
Just like any other legislative policy, the state’s spending plans are separate bills that need to be approved by the entire Legislature before they can be signed and take effect.
The majority party controls the legislative agenda, meaning they get to decide who negotiates the budget. That also means House and Senate Democrats, together with the governor will go through each proposal to determine what remains and what gets removed. Republican lawmakers will be left out of the process.
However, we will have one more chance to offer our opinions and vote on these proposals before the final day of session, Sunday, April 25.
Operating budget
Let’s start with the most important one: the operating budget. The majority party proposed and approved a massive $58 billion two-year operating budget, which represents an increase of $6.4 billion over the previous biennium.
This budget funds the day-to-day operations of the state, including K-12 education, child care, health and human services, rental and landlord assistance, criminal justice, natural resources, the expansion of broadband, and many other important items.
Republicans offered their own budget proposal earlier in session, but without majority control, we could not push our proposal through. However, there are many good things in this budget, and Republicans agreed on several key points. Unfortunately, there were two main sticking points that prevented me and my fellow House Republicans from voting in favor of this bill.
First, it relies on a capital gains income tax, which to date has not even been passed. Obviously, we hope it doesn’t come to the House floor, but it has already passed out of Senate. So, we still expect to be voting on it in the coming days. However, this tax is completely unnecessary. It’s also unpopular with voters, an unreliable source of revenue, and it’s likely unconstitutional. We can pay for everything in this budget proposal without implementing a capital gains income tax.
Second, the proposal would raid the state’s rainy-day fund, which is also unnecessary. We should not be taking money out of a fund that exists solely for the survival of our state’s economy during hard times, like the pandemic shutdown. This is not the right move for our state.
So many individuals, families, and small businesses are still hurting from the COVID-related shutdown. It’s irresponsible and inconsiderate to raise taxes right now, especially when state revenues are back to pre-pandemic levels. State government has more than enough money to operate, but thousands of Washingtonians are still struggling just to survive. This is bad policy and new taxes should not be part of the state’s plan. Because of these issues, as well as the massive increase in spending, I could not support this budget.
You can see the entire budget debate by clicking here. You can also watch some of the highlights, including my speech, by clicking on the image below.
Capital budget
The capital budget, which is typically a very bipartisan effort, allocates funds for land acquisitions, parks, construction and repair of public buildings, and other long-term investments. I’m happy to report the $5.7 billion House capital budget passed with unanimous support. Some of highlights include funding for low-income housing, schools, mental health expansion efforts, and state park improvements.
Additionally, $23.7 million in local projects for the 25th District have been included in the House capital budget. For a list of our local projects, click on this link and select the 25th Legislative District in the drop down window and then hit the “view report” button.
Transportation budget
Lastly, we passed a $10.9 billion biennial transportation budget, which works as both an operating and capital budget for our state’s transportation system. It funds infrastructure projects across the state including the Washington State Department of Transportation, maintenance and preservation of current transportation systems, the Washington State Patrol, the Washington State Ferry system, and other state transportation agencies.
Unfortunately, we were not able to amend the budget to implement the $30 car tabs the people of Washington have made clear they want. The amendment was defeated on party lines.
While this budget is not perfect, it will do several positive things, including keeping transportation projects across our state and in our district moving forward. Additionally, the proposal itself does not raise any taxes. We passed this proposal with bipartisan support.
Concurrence Process
We reached the last policy cutoff for bills to be passed out of the opposite house on Sunday. We will still be voting on bills these last two weeks, but much of our time will be spent on concurrence, dispute, and conference committees. Here’s how that works.
If the bill has been amended by the second house, the first house must decide whether it will concur in the amendments or not. Leadership decides which bills returned from the second house will be discussed and places those bills on the concurrence calendar (House) or concurring calendar (Senate). If the first house concurs in the amendments, the bill has passed the Legislature.
If the first house disagrees with the second house, it can ask the second house to recede from the amendments. If the second house recedes, the bill has passed the Legislature.
However, if the two houses cannot resolve their differences, one of them can ask for a conference committee. Members from each house meet to discuss the differences. If they agree on what is to be done, the conference committee makes a report. Both houses must adopt the conference committee report for the bill to pass the Legislature. If one house does not adopt the conference committee report (whether by vote or inaction), the bill has not passed.
Update on My College Text Books and Course Materials Bill
House Bill 1119 is now one step closer to becoming law after it unanimously passed out of the Senate Friday. However, it had to take a slight detour before heading to the governor’s desk. Because the bill was amended in the Senate it went back to the House for approval. The House did concur with the Senate’s changes, Tuesday, so it will now head to the governor and wait to be signed into law.
As a reminder, this legislation would help ease some expenses for college students in Washington state. The bill would encourage the use of open source course materials at four-year colleges, as well as inform students of the prices of textbooks before they register for courses. I’m very hopeful it makes it to the governor.
Medicaid Reimbursement Rate
Thank you for continuing to contact me about the Medicaid reimbursement rate for nursing homes. I agree that we must increase the rate for nursing homes to address the significant gap in funding and to prevent more closures. We have already seen way too many close, so we need to keep the remaining homes we have operational.
As a member of the Appropriations Committee, I wrote a letter to the budget writers urging them to address this matter. I believe we must take the following actions to prevent more closures:
- Provide an inflator to ensure system sustainability based on the Bureau of Labor Statistics Consumer Price Index for Urban Skilled Nursing Facilities.
- Adopt annual rebasing to ensure rates keep up with actual cost of care.
- Provide a one-time, early rebase of rates to stop imminent facility closures.
You can see the entire letter by clicking here. This issue is personal for me and I support and voted for amendments in the budget that would solve this. I will continue to fight for this in the final budget. It is vital that our loved ones are taken care of.
Thank You and Please Stay in Touch
Thank you so much for your continued support and allowing me to serve you in the state Legislature. It’s truly an honor to represent the 25th and stand for sensible government. Please continue to reach out to me by using the contact info listed below.
In service,
Sincerely,
Cyndy Jacobsen
