Divisive rent control bill heads to negotiations after House refuses to approve amendments
A bill that would cap annual rent increases has split Democratic lawmakers in Olympia.
The House passed a version putting a seven percent limit on rent increases for any given twelve-month period of a lease.
Then the Senate changed the cap to 10 percent plus inflation.
But this week, the House rejected that change, which means lawmakers from each side of the legislature will need to try to negotiate a final bill.
One of the bill’s sponsors says the talks will include the final number for a rent increase limit and exemptions for single family homes.
Still, with the end of the session approaching this weekend, the stakes are high for the bill’s survival.
And if either chamber rejects the final deal, that’s the end for the measure — at least for this legislative session.
WA to sell I-5 bridge replacement bonds
The Washington Senate has agreed to let the state to sell bonds to pay for a replacement Interstate 5 bridge to cross the Columbia River at Vancouver.
Planners estimate the project will cost between $5 and $7.5 billion.
The two states and the federal government will all bear part of that.
The bill approved Wednesday by the Senate and last week by the House authorizes Washington to sell up to $2.5 billion in state bonds.
The new bridge would replace two aging one-way spans, one built in 1917, the other in 1958.
Bill co-sponsor Sen. Marko Liias (D-Edmonds) said the work needs to be done soon.
"So much valuable commodities come across I-5 at that point that this is critical to all of us, accessing medicine and food and other critical services and supplies," he said on the Senate floor. "For the communities most directly impacted, the folks that live in Clark County and in Portland, this is a vital link for commerce, for jobs, for opportunity."
Money to pay back the bonds would come, in part, from tolls drivers pay now to cross the bridges.
Oregon’s legislature has already authorized its state to sell bonds to pay for part of the project.
Federal transit money is also earmarked to pay some of the cost.
WA GOP says Dems are moving too fast with new taxes
Washington legislative Republican leaders say they’re having a hard time keeping up with the budget writing developments going on in Olympia.
The Democrats overseeing the process are crafting an operating budget that cuts billions in spending, while also raising billions through a variety of new and increased taxes.
House Republican Leader Drew Stokesbary told reporters Wednesday he thinks Democratic leaders are having a hard time making up their minds.
"We spent all session talking about certain taxes, and then, in the last week, Democrats said, 'Forget about those ones. Here’s a brand new set of taxes nobody has looked at.' They are being changed on the fly," Stokesbary said.
The legislative session is scheduled to end on Sunday.
It’s not yet clear whether lawmakers will pass operating, transportation and capital budgets that the governor will sign before then.
If not, they will have to come back in a special session.
Columbia River Gorge Commission may get funding from the WA legislature after all
With just days before the end of Washington state’s legislative session, officials with the Columbia River Gorge Commission are feeling optimistic that lawmakers will walk back proposed budget cuts to the agency.
In late March, Washington representatives voted to zero out the state’s entire $2 million contribution to the Columbia River Gorge Commission.
Oregon and Washington split the cost of funding the commission that oversees land use permits. The goal is to make sure the national scenic area act is applied in both states.
"It’s important to have a regional body that can have oversight over a whole region that can’t be just carved up administratively by county or by state," Krystyna Wolniakowski, the agency's executive director, said.
Since the Washington House proposed cutting its half of the commission’s budget, Wolniakowski said Governor Bob Ferguson has been supportive of restoring the funding. Right now, she’s expecting the senate to approve a much smaller 3% budget cut.
Murray blasts Trump decision to gut WHI
Washington senior U.S. Senator Patty Murray is calling President Donald Trump’s decision to terminate contracts with the Women’s Health Initiative a “devastating loss” and “short-sighted.”
WHI is the largest effort by the National Institutes of Health to study the health needs of women. And the WHI Clinical Coordinating Center is based at a cancer research facility in Seattle.
The contracts will be ended at the end of September. The Clinical Coordinating Center will continue its operations until January, but after that time, WHI says its funding isn’t certain.
In a statement Wednesday, Murray blasted the Trump administration for the decision, pointing to the major advancements made by the initiative in the field of women’s health, which advocates say has long been overlooked and underfunded.
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Reporting by Doug Nadvornick, Owen Henderson and Erik Neumann.