Dear Friends and Neighbors,  

The Legislative Session is off to a busy start—and it’s been so wonderful operating in-person and interacting with so many of you face-to-face. Thank you to those of you who have already reached out to share your input—I really appreciate it. One of the most important parts of my job is informing you about what we’re working on in Olympia—and hearing from you about what’s important to you. Here are some of the things we’ve been working on, and an invitation to an upcoming Town Hall where I can hear more from you:  

Across the country, puppy-breeding farms practice high-volume dog breeding to churn out puppies for profit in cruel, abusive, inhumane environments. Puppies from mills are often sick, unsocialized, and have physical problems, and their mothers often spend their lives in cages. The puppies are then shipped all over the country to be sold in stores, offering predatory financing practices leaving many thousands of dollars in debt.   

This is obviously inhumane to the puppy and exploitative to the consumer—and so many of you have reached out to say something.  

I’m proud to have sponsored HB 1424 to end the puppy mill to pet store pipeline and restrict pet stores from offering predatory financing. 30 of my colleagues have already signed on as sponsors to this bill. According to this Seattle Times article about my bill “at the most basic level, good public policy aims at helping communities thrive. By definition, that means working towards less suffering, less misery.” Thank you so much to everyone who has reached out to advocate for this issue—your feedback is so important. “Enacting HB 1424 would surely prevent a lot of unnecessary misery — for humans and our furry friends.” 

Watch my testimony in the House Consumer Protection & Business Committee: 

In 2021, we successfully passed legislation by Rep. Thai to better support families in Washington. The Working Families Tax Credit is a new program that will provide payments of up to $1,200 to low-to-moderate income individuals and families. The amounts are based on income level and the number of qualifying children (if any). This credit is projected to reach more than 400,000 Washington households, and will benefit one in three kids in our state.  

This new program goes live this February, and will help us stimulate local economies, promote racial equity, and provide the financial stability Washington families need right now. To find more information in several available languages, and to see if you qualify, visit WorkingFamililesCredit.wa.gov. 

Sunday, January 22nd would have been the 50th anniversary of Roe v. Wade, protecting a woman’s constitutional right to choose. This case affirmed the basic principles of equality, the fundamental right to privacy, and solidified the right people have to their own destinies. Following the U.S. Supreme Court’s decision to upend decades of constitutional protections for reproductive care and abortion rights, many state legislatures have banned or restricted access to abortion and gender-affirming care.  

This legislative session, it’s one of our top priorities to expand access to reproductive freedom and ensure that Washington remains a safe haven — for both in- and out-of-state access. We’re keeping abortion available, accessible, and affordable with a package of bills that will stand up against extremists and states looking to take away your rights.  

HB 1155 – The My Health, My Data Act would protect the right to reproductive care by blocking websites and apps from collecting and sharing health data. The bill would also prohibit the sale of Washingtonian’s health data, the use of “geofences” to send unsolicited messages to persons at health facilities and would require companies that collect personal health data to create, maintain, and publish a privacy policy for consumer health data.   

HB 1340 – Health care providers are under attack in other states. This bill ensures that Washington’s providers cannot be disciplined in our state because they provide reproductive or gender affirming care in accordance with Washington state law, regardless of where their patients reside.  

HB 1469 – The Shield Law protects patients and providers of reproductive and gender-affirming care in Washington from retribution by other states.  

HB 1286 – Extremists want to punish employers and scare them away from providing support for reproductive health care services. When another state’s laws allow a judgment against an employer for providing support for reproductive care allowed in Washington state, this bill allows the employer to recover damages here in Washington from the people who brought the action or sought to enforce the judgment.  

HB 1263 – The Keep Our Care Act prohibits hospitals from merging if the consolidation diminishes patients’ access to services, including reproductive, end-of-life and gender-affirming care.  

HB 1115 – Patients seeking an abortion may find the cost prohibitive, and no one should be unable to get the reproductive care they need because of an inability to pay. Under this bill, anyone seeking an abortion cannot be required to pay a co-payment or meet their deductible to have their services covered. 

Mark your calendar for my Virtual Town Hall on Wednesday, March 15thth, at 6:30 PM. Stay tuned here and on my Facebook for details about how to register.  

If you’d like to get in touch but can’t participate in the Town Hall, please feel free to email me at April.Berg@leg.wa.gov, or email my legislative assistant at Katharine.Gillen@leg.wa.gov to find a time to stop by my office in Olympia. I hope to hear from you soon!