WASHINGTON STATE

Washington State House Democrats

HOUSE DEMOCRATS

Legislative Update from Rep. Eileen Cody

In my last e-memo, I reported back on some bills we passed during the House of Origin cutoff week. I am proud of these legislative accomplishments and I look forward to seeing them advance through the Senate. However, there were also some disappointments this session and we still have more work to do to keep our communities safe.

Preventing gun violence

Over the last few months, many of you have reached out to me with emails, letters, phone calls and even visits to Olympia to express your concern about the escalating level of gun violence in our communities. After last December’s tragedy in Connecticut—and the thousands of lives our nation has lost due to mass shootings, suicide and domestic violence—the general sentiment coming from my constituents is that something needs to be done to protect our communities from the kinds of violent tragedies we’ve seen all too frequently in recent months.

According to the Center for Disease Control, 87 Americans die every day from gun violence—that’s one every 17 minutes. These are moms who miss soccer practices and wedding days; these are dads who miss homework help and graduation. Every day in our nation, someone’s family member never returns home because of gun violence.

I was one of 38 co-sponsors of House Bill 1588, which would have required background checks for all firearms purchases. Currently, Washington law doesn’t require background checks for firearms purchases made over the internet or at a gun show. Licensed dealers, who are required to conduct a background check, reject about 80,000 people a year because they have a criminal history or a mental health problem. But the 40 percent of gun sales that don’t take place at licensed dealers are slipping through the cracks with no background checks at all. It shouldn’t be this easy for a criminal or mentally ill individual to obtain a deadly weapon.

In one of the more disappointing defeats I can remember, we failed to get the number of votes we needed to pass House Bill 1588 out of the House. The bill won’t be signed into law this legislative session. Make no mistake—universal background checks wouldn’t have prevented every tragedy. But it would have gone a long way towards keeping firearms out of the hands of dangerous people. If we could have saved even one life by passing this bill, it would have been a job well done.

Many of you have expressed your disappointment that we were unable to pass this legislation this session. Even though we didn’t get the bill to Governor Inslee’s desk this year, I will continue to fight for responsible, common sense gun laws.

Focusing on mental health

If there’s a bright spot in this debate, it’s the renewed focus on adequate treatment for individuals with mental health issues. We need to take a hard look at how we’ve been forced to slash our social safety net in recent years and how that contributes to violence in our communities. This legislative session I am committed to maintaining funding for Washington’s mental health services.

The House passed several bills that will prevent gun violence by identifying individuals with mental health problems and giving them the support they need before they turn to violence.

  • House Bill 1777 will speed up the implementation of previously passed involuntary treatment laws. Often after a tragedy, we hear from family members or close friends who admit that they could see an individual’s capacity for violence, but didn’t have the avenues to prevent it. Back in 2010, the legislature approved a new approach that would take input from an individual’s family and friends into account when making the decision to commit an individual with a mental health problem. Budget constraints prevented these changes from being funded until 2015, but House Bill 1777 will fund these reforms two years ahead of schedule.
  • We also passed House Bill 1522, which builds a bridge for the mentally ill as they transition between hospitals and the community. It is important to make sure that individuals who have completed treatment for a mental illness have the support they need to transition back into day-to-day life. This isn’t just the right thing to do—it’s the cost-effective approach. The bill will free up beds in our mental health hospitals, which are becoming more in demand every day.

These bills aren’t consolation prizes; they are good policy that will save lives. For the remainder of this legislative session, one of my priorities will be to get these bills to Governor Inslee’s desk fully funded.

We all know that there is still so much work to do to make our communities safer. Please continue to share your concerns and ideas with me. In future sessions my colleagues and I will be working hard to pass stricter gun policies and to promote mental health. We need your support to make that a reality. If you have friends and family in other legislative districts who share your concerns, encourage them to reach out to their representatives. They can find their legislator here.