County lobbyists report on legislative session

Jana Mathia, Gazette Reporter | Mar 22, 20180

The Washington State legislature saddled $15 to $16 million in costs to counties overall following the recent legislative session. While the state wants to “help” the citizens, it is also happy to let the counties be the bad guy and raise taxes to fund the mandates. The budget was not friendly to counties, but could have been worse.

This was part of the report from Zak Kennedy and Jim Potts, lobbyists for counties at the state legislature, to Whitman County Commissioners Monday morning. Kennedy and Potts called in to report during the commissioners’ workshop session with a wrap-up of how things had gone.

Kennedy started with touching on the McCleary fix and Hirst decision fall-out. He noted that teachers are not real happy about the McCleary fix. As for the standing of the Hirst decision, which stalled rural development by practically prohibiting new wells, there is nothing that would preclude further litigation.

Kennedy also commented on the number of legislators retiring or leaving this year, which means himself, Potts and others will have to do some serious education for those who will be elected to take those seats. While they laid some good groundwork this session, there will be a lot more to do for the new legislators.

Although the carbon tax did not make it through the session, the governor is still pushing for some sort of carbon tax.

“We’re definitely going to be watching that in the interim,” Kennedy said.

Potts added one thing about the carbon tax is not a penny of the tax would have gone to roads. Instead, the funds would have gone for other programs the governor wants.

“Just a tax. Period,” said Mark Storey, Whitman County public works director who usually attends workshop sessions. When the carbon tax was still afloat in the legislature, Storey reported it would cost the county $60,000 more just in fuel. That increased burden would mean a reduction in services to compensate for the expense.

Potts did bring up one positive for commissioners: he told them there may be money available for the fairground. A former senator is the new director for rural economic development and he knew there were funds for small rural counties for fairgrounds and courthouses. Funding options included grants for planning and 40-year loans with low interest rates for the projects.

When asked about the public records act exclusion legislators tried to pass, Potts replied, “It was the fastest piece of legislation I’ve ever seen in 22 years.”

While the legislation, which would have made legislators exempt from abiding by the Public Records Acts, passed quickly and without open hearing or public contact, it was vetoed by the governor after he received more than 22,000 requests to do so.

Potts pointed out this shows the impact citizens can have in influencing elected officials.

Other things that passed were the ban on bump stocks―for which the state has instituted a buy-back program for those already in possession of them, Kennedy noted and same-day registration for voting. There was contention over the same-day voting legislation, but it was pushed through quickly. They do not know what the effects of that will be yet, especially in regards to burden on county elections.