End of Session Update and a Telephone Town Hall

April 28, 2023

Dear friends and neighbors,

Earlier this week we wrapped up the 2023 legislative session. I’m proud of what we were able to accomplish in 105 days, and I’ve got a high-level overview below. We did a lot more than I can cover in just one newsletter, so I’ll be reaching out with more information in the coming days and weeks.

If you want a preview on some of that, we’re also hosting a telephone town hall on Thursday, May 11th at 6:00 PM, there’s more information about that below.

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I’ve mentioned a couple of times this year how our work in Olympia is largely bipartisan, and this year was no exception. We passed 474 bills, 286 of those bills received unanimous support in their last vote on the floor. 379 of those 474 bills passed with over 80% of legislators in support. I’ve said it before: at the end of the day, we’re all here to work on behalf of the people of this state.

With that, here are some highlights:

Housing

Our Operating and Capital Construction Budgets together make over $1 billion in housing-related investments to address housing affordability and the homelessness crisis. That includes:

  • $141 million for emergency housing and rental assistance
  • $60 million for encampment response and outreach
  • $30 million in additional funding for children and youth homelessness

These investments are a big deal and will go a long way towards helping keep people housed and get people into housing. But we know that alone isn’t enough, which is why we also passed bills to expand middle housing options (HB 1110), make it easier to build accessory dwelling units, or ADUs (HB 1337), and protect renters from unfair damage deposit claims (HB 1074).

Workforce

At the beginning of session, I talked about how every sector in Washington has been impacted by workforce challenges, from behavioral health to childcare, long-term care to K-12 education, public safety, and more. That’s why we’re investing $382 million in college and workforce development, helping to ensure we’re building the workforce of the future.

We know that it will take time for some of those investments to come to fruition, which is why we also passed a number of bills targeted at growing our workforce now. That includes bills to enter interstate compacts for dental hygienists, audiologists, mental health counselors, making it easier for people like military spouses to get to work in Washington state. We also passed legislation to address our homecare worker shortage (HB 1694), grow our behavioral health workforce (HB 1724), and remove barriers in hiring paraeducators (HB 1015).

Reproductive Rights

This session, we focused on what we can do in Washington to protect access to reproductive health and freedom and the right to make medical decisions without government interference. We invested $24 million in reproductive health services in our operating budget this year, in addition to passing legislation like:

  • The My Health, My Data Act (HB 1155), which protects the right to reproductive care by blocking websites and apps from collecting and sharing sensitive health data.
  • The Shield Law (HB 1469), which protects patients and providers of reproductive and gender-affirming care in Washington from retribution by other states, ensuring that care remains available to those who require it in Washington state.
  • A bill to protect Washington’s health care providers (HB 1340), ensuring they cannot be disciplined for providing reproductive or gender-affirming care in accordance with Washington state law, regardless of where their patients reside.
  • A bill ensuring that Washingtonians will have access to a safe abortion pill, Mifepristone, regardless of pending federal lawsuits. (SB 5678)

I know that many of you were also tracking our response to the Blake decision this year, and while we weren’t able to pass a bill this session our work is ongoing, and I’ll keep you updated.

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Join us for a Telephone Town Hall!

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Now that session is over, we’ll be hosting a telephone town hall to give an update and answer your questions. We’ll be calling households in the district at 6PM on Thursday, May 11.

There are a couple ways you can join:

  1. Sign up here by selecting the “Let’s Talk” button on the May 11 event

Or

  1. Dial in at 6PM on Thursday, May 11 by calling 877-229-8493, PIN #: 116282

I hope you’ll join us May 11th, and I look forward to answering your questions.