LEAGUE OF WOMEN VOTERS OF WASHINGTON: Legislative Newsletter (Feb. 6, 2022)
Editor’s Note: The League of Women Voters (LWV) of Washington sent this legislative newsletter on Feb. 6, 2022. Our mission at the Voter Interests Project is to monitor elected officials and ballot measures; we generally do not report on the activities of non-profit organizations. However, the LWV Whidbey Island chapter conducts candidate forums during most election cycles, and are therefore of particular interest to voters. The LWV of Washington’s website states, “The League is a Nonpartisan Source You Can Trust”; however, the LWV does take positions on public policy. Our observation is that their policy positions inform their management of voter forums. Therefore, we believe it to be of interest to our readers to know the positions for which the LWV advocates.
Action Alerts
There are no specific action alerts this week, see below for more information.
Moving Into the Home Stretch on Bills
This year’s short session has put constraints of time on everything that our Washington state legislature does – and on how and whether the League can exercise its influence. Because of the legislative schedule this week it will be impracticable for your Lobby Team to propose legislative action alerts in some reasonable way. Here’s why.
The deadline for action in chamber of origin policy committees occurred on Thursday of last week. The two fiscal committees (House Appropriations Committee and Senate Ways and Means Committee) and the two transportation committees will be holding hearings on Saturday. Since we won’t know the results of those hearings in time for our Legislative Newsletter deadline, there really isn’t a way for us to pass meaningful recommendations about them on to our readers.
What is more, next week and until the 15th (cutoff date for action in the chamber of origin) there will be almost no committee meetings (which are usually scheduled with some degree of advance notice.) Most of the work will be taking place on the floor of the two chambers. Decisions about which bills to pull for floor debate are among the least transparent that the legislature makes. Once a bill is pulled, the interval between then and when debate starts and voting occurs is likely to be extremely short. There would be no opportunity to communicate about possible actions in a timely fashion.
Under these circumstances, we urge you to consider this course of action. If there is a bill that you are particularly concerned with, go to the general bill page (leg.wa.gov,) search on the bill number, and then click the button labeled “comment on this bill.” That will enable you to inform your three legislators whether you favor passage of the bill in question (Pro, Con, or Other) and to write a short comment.
Our Current Actions page may help you pick out which bills are particularly important to you.
LWVWA Legislative Issues From the 2022 Washington State Legislative Session
Click on an issue to learn more about session results on bills the League supported and “This Week’s Updates” to read the issue chair’s report on this past week.
Democracy
Elections | This week’s updates
Money in Politics | No update this week
Education | This week’s updates
Redistricting | This week’s updates
Natural Resources and Climate Change
Climate and Energy | This week’s updates
Forests | No update this week
Growth Management | This week’s updates
Transportation | This week’s updates
Social and Economic Policy
Housing and Homelessness | No updates this week
Health and Behavioral Health | This week’s updates
Calendar
- No events this week.
Other Ways to Follow the State Legislature
- Washington State Legislature website, leg.wa.gov.
- Washington State’s public affairs TV network, TVW.org.
