Podcasts about washington legislature

Washington lawmakers have ended their legislative session by sending a $78 billion budget to Gov. Bob Ferguson’s desk. It includes nearly $6 billion in cuts and over $9 billion in taxes. Legislators also passed rent cap increases and a new gun permit system. Olympia correspondent Jeanie Lindsay joins us to share what the Washington Legislature accomplished this session. 

The Washington Legislature’s final week in session has brought bills (and debates) to the floor on topics ranging from rent caps to recycling to gun permits. This week Axios Seattle reporter Melissa Santos and Washington Observer publisher Paul Queary join Sound Politics to discuss what the legislature managed to pass this year, and what was left on the cutting-room floor. Oh yeah, and there’s also the little matter of the budget. Thank you to the supporters of KUOW, you help make this show possible! If you want to help out, go to kuow.org/politics. Sound Politics is a production of KUOW in Seattle, a proud member of the NPR Network. Our editor is Gabriel Spitzer. Our producer this week is Sarah Leibovitz. Our hosts are Scott Greenstone and Libby Denkmann. And we want to hear from you! Send us your politics questions by emailing soundpolitics@kuow.org or give us a call at 206-221-0511.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Explore the latest legislative updates impacting multifamily housing investments in Oregon and Washington! In this episode, we cover Oregon's new mandates like air conditioning requirements (SB 54), changes to rent cap exemptions (SB 722), and Washington's push for innovative housing solutions such as commercial conversions and zoning reforms. Learn how these policies affect supply, affordability, and investment opportunities in the region. Stay informed to adapt your strategies in 2025 and beyond!

A bill in the Washington Legislature is sparking intense debate as it proposes changes to the state's parents' rights initiative. Supporters say the bill protects vulnerable students, while critics argue it weakens family authority. Read the full story at https://www.clarkcountytoday.com/news/public-testimony-heats-up-over-bill-that-would-undo-some-of-parents-rights-initiative/ on www.ClarkCountyToday.com #localnews #ClarkCountyWa #parentsrights #studentrights #transgenderrights #educationpolicy #WAbill1296 #Washingtonstate #OSPI #publicschools #legislationdebate

Two bipartisan bills from Rep. Kevin Waters are moving forward in the Washington Legislature. One bill would require all alcohol servers to obtain permits, while the other would allow the Superintendent of Public Instruction to send a designee to Board of Natural Resources meetings. Read more at https://www.clarkcountytoday.com/news/two-more-bipartisan-bills-from-rep-kevin-waters-move-forward-after-receiving-committee-approval/ #Vancouver #WashingtonState #ClarkCountyWa #KevinWaters #HB1698 #HB1609 #AlcoholServerPermit #LiquorLicense #AlcoholLaws #ConsumerProtection #TimberSales #PublicEducationFunding #LegislativeProcess #StatePolicies #Government #localnews

Feliks Banel's guests on this live broadcast of CASCADE OF HISTORY include Chris Moore, executive director of the Washington Trust for Historic Preservation on two bills before the Washington Legislature this week that would radically alter preservation ordinances in the Evergreen State; and Stephanie Johnson-Toliver, president of the Black Heritage Society of Washington on this year's observance of Black History Month, and on the future of Black history in Washington. More information on opportunities for the public to weigh in on the preservation bills online on Monday, February 3 and Wednesday, February 5, 2025: https://preservewa.org/hb1576-sb5554/ This LIVE broadcast of CASCADE OF HISTORY was originally presented at 8pm Pacific Standard Time on Sunday, February 2, 2025 via SPACE 101.1 FM and streaming live via space101fm.org at historic Magnuson Park - formerly Sand Point Naval Air Station - on the shores of Lake Washington in Seattle.

Rep. John Ley begins his first term representing the 18th District in the Washington Legislature. Learn about his committee assignments and priorities. Read the full story at https://www.clarkcountytoday.com/news/rep-john-ley-sworn-in-as-18th-district-state-representative-announces-committee-assignments on www.ClarkCountyToday.com #Vancouver #ClarkCountyWa #JohnLey #WAleg #localnews

About 1,000 new lawmakers were elected in November's election and will be joining their legislatures in the new year. Every legislature is different, of course, but we asked two veteran legislators to offer a little advice on a few issues that likely apply in most legislatures.Sen. Karen Keiser (D) from Washington state and Rep. Walker Thomas (R) from Kentucky shared some of their experiences as new lawmakers and advice on working with the media, responding to constituents and speaking on the floor. Keiser, who is retiring at the end of this term, is the president pro tem of the Washington Senate and is the author of “Getting Elected Is the Easy Part: Working and Winning in the State Legislature.” She started her career in the Washington House in 1995.Thomas has served in the Kentucky House since 2017. He is the chair of Veterans, Military Affairs and Public Protection Committee.ResourcesGetting Elected Is the Easy Part: Working and Winning in the State LegislatureNew Member Virtual Orientation, NCSLNew State Legislators, NCSL

This episode we catch up with Katie Buckley the Pollinator Health Coordinator for Washington State Department of Agriculture. She tells us about two new pollinator bills that passed in the Washington Legislature, as well as the growing Washington Bee Atlas. 

On this topical show, Crystal Fincher and Executive Director of The Urbanist, Rian Watt, dig into how housing policy shapes the future vision for our communities, why the recent legislative session didn't live up to its “Year of Housing 2.0” billing, and how the Seattle Comprehensive plan falls short and can be improved. As always, a full text transcript of the show is available at officialhacksandwonks.com. Follow us on Twitter at @HacksWonks. Find the host, Crystal Fincher, on Twitter at @finchfrii and find Rian Watt at @rianwatt.   Resources  “State Legislators Push for ‘Year of Housing 2.0'” by Ryan Packer from The Urbanist   “Year of Housing 2.0 Mostly Fizzles Out at Washington Legislature” by Ryan Packer from The Urbanist   Find your Washington state legislators   Contact your Washington state legislators   “Seattle Releases Comprehensive Plan Less Ambitious Than Bellevue” by Doug Trumm from The Urbanist   “Housing Leaders Call Out Seattle's Bare Minimum Growth Proposal” by Doug Trumm from The Urbanist   “Land Use Chair Tammy Morales Takes Aim at Proposed Seattle Growth Plan” by Ryan Packer from The Urbanist   “Op-Ed: Harrell's Anemic Growth Plan Is Not ‘Space Needle Thinking'” by Tiffani McCoy, Mike Eliason and Paul Chapman for The Urbanist   “Growth Plan Falls Short of Seattle's Needs, Planning Commission Says” by Ryan Packer from The Urbanist   Complete Communities Coalition   Public participation opportunities for Seattle Comprehensive Plan | City of Seattle Office of Planning and Community Development   Find your Seattle City Councilmembers

Last week we saw the legislature reach Policy Committee Cutoff and the Washington Farm Bureau hosted their Boots on the Hill event! Visit the Washington Legislature website to find your District.  Watch the Boots on the Hill recap video. Check out our conversation with Rep. Kristine Reeves.

This is Garrison Hardie with your CrossPolitic Daily News Brief for Thursday, January 11th, 2024. Pub Membership Plug: Public Houses, or Pubs, are not just places to drink beer, wine, cider or even something a little stronger. It is also a unique social centre, very often the focus of community life in villages, towns and cities throughout the length and breadth of the world. We here at CrossPolitic hope to emulate that for you and yours. That’s why you should grab yourself a pub membership at fightlaughfeast.com… we need you on this ride with us. So pull up a chair, grab a pint, and join us on this ride at fightlaughfeast.com - that’s fightlaughfeast.com. https://thepostmillennial.com/breaking-hunter-biden-shows-up-at-house-while-oversight-considers-contempt-resolution-against-him?utm_campaign=64487 Hunter Biden makes surprise appearance at Oversight contempt proceeding in congress, then storms out After defying a Congressional subpoena in December, Hunter Biden made a surprise appearance at Wednesday’s markup meeting in which lawmakers on the House Oversight Committee are working on a resolution to hold the president’s son in contempt of Congress. House Oversight member Nancy Mace addressed Biden directly. https://twitter.com/i/status/1745105809439150194 - Play Video When Rep Marjorie Taylor Greene began speaking Hunter Biden stormed out, with Greene telling him as he left, "Apparently you’re afraid of my words." https://twitter.com/i/status/1745108562043437517 - Play 0:00-0:39 Then as Hunter Biden was exiting the building, a man asked him on numerous occasions, “are you on crack today?” https://twitter.com/i/status/1745107221992632623 - Play Video Hunter Biden attorney Abbe Lowell addressed reporters in the halls of Congress, saying that "Republicans have sought to use [Hunter Biden} as a surrogate to attack his father." Lowell said that "we have offered to work with House committees to see what and how relevant information to any legitimate inquiry could be provided." "Our first five offers were ignored. And then in November, they issued a subpoena for a behind-closed-doors deposition, a tactic that the Republicans have repeatedly misused in their political crusade to selectively leave and mischaracterize what witnesses have said." Hunter Biden was subpoenaed to appear for a closed-door deposition on December 13, 2023. He refused to attend this deposition, instead speaking from the Capitol lawn. Hunter Biden declared that he would only appear in a public session, but Committee on House Administration rules states that depositions of a witness are to take place only in the presence of the "Committee, Committee staff designed by the Chairman or the ranking minority member, an official reporter, the witness, and the witness’ two designated attorneys." Hunter Biden, however, doesn't think this rule should apply to him. https://www.theblaze.com/news/mexican-president-demands-20-billion-and-work-permits-for-10-million-hispanics-before-offering-immigration-help Mexican president demands $20 billion and work permits for 10 million Hispanics before offering immigration help Mexican President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador recently revealed what that U.S. must do in order for the Mexican government to help slow down the flow of migrants crossing the U.S.-Mexico border, and the price is steep. Fox News Digital reported that Lopez Obrador announced his demands during a press conference on Friday. The development comes just a week after the Mexican president met with Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas and Secretary of State Antony Blinken in Mexico City. In order for Mexico to help the U.S., Lopez Obrador demanded that the U.S. provide $20 billion to Latin American and Caribbean countries; provide work visas to 10 million Hispanics who have been working in the U.S. for at least 10 years; end sanctions against Venezuela; and put an end to the blockade of Cuba. The demands have put pressure on President Joe Biden, who has not polled well on illegal immigration since he took over the presidency in 2021. The report noted that the border experienced a large surge of migrants this fall, with around 240,000 encounters per month toward the end of 2023. However, some of the decisions — if Biden decides to go through with the proposal — would need to get the approval of Congress. Lopez Obrador has not been shy about challenging U.S. politicians on the topic of illegal immigration. He recently challenged Texas Governor Greg Abbott on one of the state's new immigration laws just last month. Blaze News reported last month that Abbott had ratified legislation that would make illegal immigration a state crime. The law, Senate Bill 4, moved forward after the Biden administration seemed unwilling to enforce federal immigration law. The state authorities will now be able to arrest foreign nationals who sneak into the country illegally, and magistrates will be able to order illegal aliens to leave the country. Lopez Obrador said last month: "The Texas governor acts that way because he wants to be the Republican vice presidential candidate and wants to win popularity with these measures." "He’s not going to win anything. On the contrary, he is going to lose support because there are a lot of Mexicans in Texas, a lot of migrants." However, the law recently ratified in Texas will not punish those who enter the country legally — only those who attempt to circumvent U.S. law. https://notthebee.com/article/parents-who-refuse-to-go-along-with-their-childs-gender-transition-can-now-face-7-years-in-jail-in-scotland Scottish parents could face years in jail for preventing kids from "dressing in a way that reflects their sexual orientation or gender identity" Scotland is really making it simple for parents. Let them trans your kids or you go to jail. You may think that's overstatement, but that's actually the plan in Scotland. Parents who do not go along with "affirming" their child's "gender identity" could face jail for SEVEN YEARS! Proposals published on Tuesday state that actions designed to "change or suppress" another individual's gender identity, causing them physical or psychological harm, would become illegal under the radical law. SNP (Scotland National Party) ministers acknowledged that so-called conversion practices often took place in a "family setting", raising the prospect that parents could be criminalised if they refuse to go along with their child's declaration that they are transgender. Just so you know the extent of this proposal and how it could apply to families, one of the examples of "conversion therapy" punishable by jail time is preventing a child from wearing clothing of their preferred gender identity. So if Billy wants to wear a dress and you stop him you would be guilty of "conversion therapy" and be subject to punishment under the law. Even if you don't do anything, the state could preemptively take action against you based solely on your beliefs! If they know you're a conservative Christian in Scotland they could issue civil orders against you, warning you not to cross the line of telling your kids what to do. The Scottish National Party is currently the largest and most represented party in parliament. They hold nearly a majority in the multi-party system. If they're fully on board with this there's not much that can be done to stop them in parliament. It's important to note this is in the "public consultation" phase which, in Scotland and the UK, means they have to lay out the plan for public feedback, in this case until April, before moving forward with the proposal. So my suggestion, between now and April, is for every freedom and faith-loving Scot to channel his inner Braveheart and publicly oppose this radical anti-family, anti-faith, anti-human proposal from the Scottish liberals. Braveheart - FREEDOM- Play 1:36-1:47 https://mynorthwest.com/3945835/rantz-wa-democrats-deem-ammo-privilege-ammunition-tax-way-end-gun-rights/ Wash. Democrats deem ammo a ‘privilege’ as way to end gun rights Washington Democrats opened the 2024 legislative session with another assault on gun rights. This time they hope to reclassify ammunition as a “privilege” — one that should be subject to an onerous tax because the one thing they love more than taking away guns is taking away your money. State Representatives My-Linh Thai and Liz Berry, both Democrats, introduced House Bill 2238. Under the auspices of public safety, claiming access to ammunition is the cause of violence and not their soft-on-crime policies that go easy on criminals (including those who use guns in their crimes), the bill imposes an 11% sales and use tax on ammunition statewide. This would be an additional tax on top of the sales tax and any other tax that may levied when purchasing ammunition. The city of Seattle, for example, imposes a per-round tax. But the bill also reclassified ammunition, claiming you do not have a right to purchase them as a consumer. Instead, it’s labeled a “privilege.” The legislation creates a new section in pre-existing law that reads, “A use tax is levied on every person in this state for the privilege of using ammunition as a consumer at the rate of 11% of the selling price.” Neither Reps. Thai nor Berry responded to inquiries asking the basis for their claim that ammunition is a privilege. But Washington Democrats have set the stage to make this outrageous claim. Washington Democrats have consistently moved to make gun ownership more onerous for non-criminal Washingtonians. The end goal for Democrats is to ban guns so that we cannot protect ourselves against the criminals they embolden. Instead of a flat-out ban against guns, they’ve hoped to reclassify ammunition as a privilege by severely restricting how much of it a gun owner can use at a time. The Washington Legislature approved a bill to prohibit the sale, distribution, and manufacture of firearm magazines holding more than 10 rounds of ammunition. This is meant to set the precedent claiming Washingtonians do not have a constitutional right to ammunition. Like most of their clearly unconstitutional bills, they’re based on a flimsy and purposefully obtuse understanding of the right to bear arms. The Washington State Constitution, Article I, Section 24, clearly states that “the right of the individual citizen to bear arms in defense of himself, or the state, shall not be impaired.” You cannot bear arms if the firearm has no ammunition in it. This provision, like the Second Amendment of the U.S. Constitution, implicitly includes all necessary components of firearms like ammunition as essential to the protected exercise of the right to bear arms. Without access to ammunition, the right to bear arms would be rendered meaningless, as firearms without ammunition are unable to fulfill their intended purpose in defense of oneself or the state. In an ironic twist, Democrats are the best gun salesmen. Their actions are pushing Washingtonians into purchases they might not otherwise make. Washington Democrats’ interest in banning guns does not extend to the criminals they support with legislation that keeps them out of prison before the end of their sentences under the claim the criminal justice system is racist. By passing legislation that is clearly tied to the rise in crime, they give every Washingtonian ample reason to purchase firearms for self-defense. We have a rise in violent crime in Seattle, where homicides have hit historic highs. Democrats pretend they hold no blame in this new reality. State Reps Tarra Simmons and David Hackney pushed a bill in the 2022 legislative session to lessen charges against drive-by shooters. It would even be applied retroactively to release a drive-by shooter serving time. They claimed the change promoted “racial equity in the criminal legal system” because they implied too many black people commit drive-by shootings and it’s unfair for them to be charged more than white people who don’t commit as many drive-by shootings. It was as silly an argument as it was racist. Only after considerable public pushback, did the bill die. But it seems reasonable to want a firearm to protect yourself when you have pro-criminal legislators pushing dangerous bills. State Rep. Roger Goodman, another anti-gun Democrat, is back this year with HB 1268. It would prevent judges from offering additional years of prison to violent criminals who use guns during their crimes (“stacking” on gun enhancement charges). It even offers “good time credits” (or earned release time) to felons serving time on a firearm or deadly weapon enhancement. Any one of these criminals released early is reason enough to own a firearm of your own.

This is Garrison Hardie with your CrossPolitic Daily News Brief for Thursday, January 11th, 2024. Pub Membership Plug: Public Houses, or Pubs, are not just places to drink beer, wine, cider or even something a little stronger. It is also a unique social centre, very often the focus of community life in villages, towns and cities throughout the length and breadth of the world. We here at CrossPolitic hope to emulate that for you and yours. That’s why you should grab yourself a pub membership at fightlaughfeast.com… we need you on this ride with us. So pull up a chair, grab a pint, and join us on this ride at fightlaughfeast.com - that’s fightlaughfeast.com. https://thepostmillennial.com/breaking-hunter-biden-shows-up-at-house-while-oversight-considers-contempt-resolution-against-him?utm_campaign=64487 Hunter Biden makes surprise appearance at Oversight contempt proceeding in congress, then storms out After defying a Congressional subpoena in December, Hunter Biden made a surprise appearance at Wednesday’s markup meeting in which lawmakers on the House Oversight Committee are working on a resolution to hold the president’s son in contempt of Congress. House Oversight member Nancy Mace addressed Biden directly. https://twitter.com/i/status/1745105809439150194 - Play Video When Rep Marjorie Taylor Greene began speaking Hunter Biden stormed out, with Greene telling him as he left, "Apparently you’re afraid of my words." https://twitter.com/i/status/1745108562043437517 - Play 0:00-0:39 Then as Hunter Biden was exiting the building, a man asked him on numerous occasions, “are you on crack today?” https://twitter.com/i/status/1745107221992632623 - Play Video Hunter Biden attorney Abbe Lowell addressed reporters in the halls of Congress, saying that "Republicans have sought to use [Hunter Biden} as a surrogate to attack his father." Lowell said that "we have offered to work with House committees to see what and how relevant information to any legitimate inquiry could be provided." "Our first five offers were ignored. And then in November, they issued a subpoena for a behind-closed-doors deposition, a tactic that the Republicans have repeatedly misused in their political crusade to selectively leave and mischaracterize what witnesses have said." Hunter Biden was subpoenaed to appear for a closed-door deposition on December 13, 2023. He refused to attend this deposition, instead speaking from the Capitol lawn. Hunter Biden declared that he would only appear in a public session, but Committee on House Administration rules states that depositions of a witness are to take place only in the presence of the "Committee, Committee staff designed by the Chairman or the ranking minority member, an official reporter, the witness, and the witness’ two designated attorneys." Hunter Biden, however, doesn't think this rule should apply to him. https://www.theblaze.com/news/mexican-president-demands-20-billion-and-work-permits-for-10-million-hispanics-before-offering-immigration-help Mexican president demands $20 billion and work permits for 10 million Hispanics before offering immigration help Mexican President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador recently revealed what that U.S. must do in order for the Mexican government to help slow down the flow of migrants crossing the U.S.-Mexico border, and the price is steep. Fox News Digital reported that Lopez Obrador announced his demands during a press conference on Friday. The development comes just a week after the Mexican president met with Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas and Secretary of State Antony Blinken in Mexico City. In order for Mexico to help the U.S., Lopez Obrador demanded that the U.S. provide $20 billion to Latin American and Caribbean countries; provide work visas to 10 million Hispanics who have been working in the U.S. for at least 10 years; end sanctions against Venezuela; and put an end to the blockade of Cuba. The demands have put pressure on President Joe Biden, who has not polled well on illegal immigration since he took over the presidency in 2021. The report noted that the border experienced a large surge of migrants this fall, with around 240,000 encounters per month toward the end of 2023. However, some of the decisions — if Biden decides to go through with the proposal — would need to get the approval of Congress. Lopez Obrador has not been shy about challenging U.S. politicians on the topic of illegal immigration. He recently challenged Texas Governor Greg Abbott on one of the state's new immigration laws just last month. Blaze News reported last month that Abbott had ratified legislation that would make illegal immigration a state crime. The law, Senate Bill 4, moved forward after the Biden administration seemed unwilling to enforce federal immigration law. The state authorities will now be able to arrest foreign nationals who sneak into the country illegally, and magistrates will be able to order illegal aliens to leave the country. Lopez Obrador said last month: "The Texas governor acts that way because he wants to be the Republican vice presidential candidate and wants to win popularity with these measures." "He’s not going to win anything. On the contrary, he is going to lose support because there are a lot of Mexicans in Texas, a lot of migrants." However, the law recently ratified in Texas will not punish those who enter the country legally — only those who attempt to circumvent U.S. law. https://notthebee.com/article/parents-who-refuse-to-go-along-with-their-childs-gender-transition-can-now-face-7-years-in-jail-in-scotland Scottish parents could face years in jail for preventing kids from "dressing in a way that reflects their sexual orientation or gender identity" Scotland is really making it simple for parents. Let them trans your kids or you go to jail. You may think that's overstatement, but that's actually the plan in Scotland. Parents who do not go along with "affirming" their child's "gender identity" could face jail for SEVEN YEARS! Proposals published on Tuesday state that actions designed to "change or suppress" another individual's gender identity, causing them physical or psychological harm, would become illegal under the radical law. SNP (Scotland National Party) ministers acknowledged that so-called conversion practices often took place in a "family setting", raising the prospect that parents could be criminalised if they refuse to go along with their child's declaration that they are transgender. Just so you know the extent of this proposal and how it could apply to families, one of the examples of "conversion therapy" punishable by jail time is preventing a child from wearing clothing of their preferred gender identity. So if Billy wants to wear a dress and you stop him you would be guilty of "conversion therapy" and be subject to punishment under the law. Even if you don't do anything, the state could preemptively take action against you based solely on your beliefs! If they know you're a conservative Christian in Scotland they could issue civil orders against you, warning you not to cross the line of telling your kids what to do. The Scottish National Party is currently the largest and most represented party in parliament. They hold nearly a majority in the multi-party system. If they're fully on board with this there's not much that can be done to stop them in parliament. It's important to note this is in the "public consultation" phase which, in Scotland and the UK, means they have to lay out the plan for public feedback, in this case until April, before moving forward with the proposal. So my suggestion, between now and April, is for every freedom and faith-loving Scot to channel his inner Braveheart and publicly oppose this radical anti-family, anti-faith, anti-human proposal from the Scottish liberals. Braveheart - FREEDOM- Play 1:36-1:47 https://mynorthwest.com/3945835/rantz-wa-democrats-deem-ammo-privilege-ammunition-tax-way-end-gun-rights/ Wash. Democrats deem ammo a ‘privilege’ as way to end gun rights Washington Democrats opened the 2024 legislative session with another assault on gun rights. This time they hope to reclassify ammunition as a “privilege” — one that should be subject to an onerous tax because the one thing they love more than taking away guns is taking away your money. State Representatives My-Linh Thai and Liz Berry, both Democrats, introduced House Bill 2238. Under the auspices of public safety, claiming access to ammunition is the cause of violence and not their soft-on-crime policies that go easy on criminals (including those who use guns in their crimes), the bill imposes an 11% sales and use tax on ammunition statewide. This would be an additional tax on top of the sales tax and any other tax that may levied when purchasing ammunition. The city of Seattle, for example, imposes a per-round tax. But the bill also reclassified ammunition, claiming you do not have a right to purchase them as a consumer. Instead, it’s labeled a “privilege.” The legislation creates a new section in pre-existing law that reads, “A use tax is levied on every person in this state for the privilege of using ammunition as a consumer at the rate of 11% of the selling price.” Neither Reps. Thai nor Berry responded to inquiries asking the basis for their claim that ammunition is a privilege. But Washington Democrats have set the stage to make this outrageous claim. Washington Democrats have consistently moved to make gun ownership more onerous for non-criminal Washingtonians. The end goal for Democrats is to ban guns so that we cannot protect ourselves against the criminals they embolden. Instead of a flat-out ban against guns, they’ve hoped to reclassify ammunition as a privilege by severely restricting how much of it a gun owner can use at a time. The Washington Legislature approved a bill to prohibit the sale, distribution, and manufacture of firearm magazines holding more than 10 rounds of ammunition. This is meant to set the precedent claiming Washingtonians do not have a constitutional right to ammunition. Like most of their clearly unconstitutional bills, they’re based on a flimsy and purposefully obtuse understanding of the right to bear arms. The Washington State Constitution, Article I, Section 24, clearly states that “the right of the individual citizen to bear arms in defense of himself, or the state, shall not be impaired.” You cannot bear arms if the firearm has no ammunition in it. This provision, like the Second Amendment of the U.S. Constitution, implicitly includes all necessary components of firearms like ammunition as essential to the protected exercise of the right to bear arms. Without access to ammunition, the right to bear arms would be rendered meaningless, as firearms without ammunition are unable to fulfill their intended purpose in defense of oneself or the state. In an ironic twist, Democrats are the best gun salesmen. Their actions are pushing Washingtonians into purchases they might not otherwise make. Washington Democrats’ interest in banning guns does not extend to the criminals they support with legislation that keeps them out of prison before the end of their sentences under the claim the criminal justice system is racist. By passing legislation that is clearly tied to the rise in crime, they give every Washingtonian ample reason to purchase firearms for self-defense. We have a rise in violent crime in Seattle, where homicides have hit historic highs. Democrats pretend they hold no blame in this new reality. State Reps Tarra Simmons and David Hackney pushed a bill in the 2022 legislative session to lessen charges against drive-by shooters. It would even be applied retroactively to release a drive-by shooter serving time. They claimed the change promoted “racial equity in the criminal legal system” because they implied too many black people commit drive-by shootings and it’s unfair for them to be charged more than white people who don’t commit as many drive-by shootings. It was as silly an argument as it was racist. Only after considerable public pushback, did the bill die. But it seems reasonable to want a firearm to protect yourself when you have pro-criminal legislators pushing dangerous bills. State Rep. Roger Goodman, another anti-gun Democrat, is back this year with HB 1268. It would prevent judges from offering additional years of prison to violent criminals who use guns during their crimes (“stacking” on gun enhancement charges). It even offers “good time credits” (or earned release time) to felons serving time on a firearm or deadly weapon enhancement. Any one of these criminals released early is reason enough to own a firearm of your own.

This is Garrison Hardie with your CrossPolitic Daily News Brief for Thursday, January 11th, 2024. Pub Membership Plug: Public Houses, or Pubs, are not just places to drink beer, wine, cider or even something a little stronger. It is also a unique social centre, very often the focus of community life in villages, towns and cities throughout the length and breadth of the world. We here at CrossPolitic hope to emulate that for you and yours. That’s why you should grab yourself a pub membership at fightlaughfeast.com… we need you on this ride with us. So pull up a chair, grab a pint, and join us on this ride at fightlaughfeast.com - that’s fightlaughfeast.com. https://thepostmillennial.com/breaking-hunter-biden-shows-up-at-house-while-oversight-considers-contempt-resolution-against-him?utm_campaign=64487 Hunter Biden makes surprise appearance at Oversight contempt proceeding in congress, then storms out After defying a Congressional subpoena in December, Hunter Biden made a surprise appearance at Wednesday’s markup meeting in which lawmakers on the House Oversight Committee are working on a resolution to hold the president’s son in contempt of Congress. House Oversight member Nancy Mace addressed Biden directly. https://twitter.com/i/status/1745105809439150194 - Play Video When Rep Marjorie Taylor Greene began speaking Hunter Biden stormed out, with Greene telling him as he left, "Apparently you’re afraid of my words." https://twitter.com/i/status/1745108562043437517 - Play 0:00-0:39 Then as Hunter Biden was exiting the building, a man asked him on numerous occasions, “are you on crack today?” https://twitter.com/i/status/1745107221992632623 - Play Video Hunter Biden attorney Abbe Lowell addressed reporters in the halls of Congress, saying that "Republicans have sought to use [Hunter Biden} as a surrogate to attack his father." Lowell said that "we have offered to work with House committees to see what and how relevant information to any legitimate inquiry could be provided." "Our first five offers were ignored. And then in November, they issued a subpoena for a behind-closed-doors deposition, a tactic that the Republicans have repeatedly misused in their political crusade to selectively leave and mischaracterize what witnesses have said." Hunter Biden was subpoenaed to appear for a closed-door deposition on December 13, 2023. He refused to attend this deposition, instead speaking from the Capitol lawn. Hunter Biden declared that he would only appear in a public session, but Committee on House Administration rules states that depositions of a witness are to take place only in the presence of the "Committee, Committee staff designed by the Chairman or the ranking minority member, an official reporter, the witness, and the witness’ two designated attorneys." Hunter Biden, however, doesn't think this rule should apply to him. https://www.theblaze.com/news/mexican-president-demands-20-billion-and-work-permits-for-10-million-hispanics-before-offering-immigration-help Mexican president demands $20 billion and work permits for 10 million Hispanics before offering immigration help Mexican President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador recently revealed what that U.S. must do in order for the Mexican government to help slow down the flow of migrants crossing the U.S.-Mexico border, and the price is steep. Fox News Digital reported that Lopez Obrador announced his demands during a press conference on Friday. The development comes just a week after the Mexican president met with Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas and Secretary of State Antony Blinken in Mexico City. In order for Mexico to help the U.S., Lopez Obrador demanded that the U.S. provide $20 billion to Latin American and Caribbean countries; provide work visas to 10 million Hispanics who have been working in the U.S. for at least 10 years; end sanctions against Venezuela; and put an end to the blockade of Cuba. The demands have put pressure on President Joe Biden, who has not polled well on illegal immigration since he took over the presidency in 2021. The report noted that the border experienced a large surge of migrants this fall, with around 240,000 encounters per month toward the end of 2023. However, some of the decisions — if Biden decides to go through with the proposal — would need to get the approval of Congress. Lopez Obrador has not been shy about challenging U.S. politicians on the topic of illegal immigration. He recently challenged Texas Governor Greg Abbott on one of the state's new immigration laws just last month. Blaze News reported last month that Abbott had ratified legislation that would make illegal immigration a state crime. The law, Senate Bill 4, moved forward after the Biden administration seemed unwilling to enforce federal immigration law. The state authorities will now be able to arrest foreign nationals who sneak into the country illegally, and magistrates will be able to order illegal aliens to leave the country. Lopez Obrador said last month: "The Texas governor acts that way because he wants to be the Republican vice presidential candidate and wants to win popularity with these measures." "He’s not going to win anything. On the contrary, he is going to lose support because there are a lot of Mexicans in Texas, a lot of migrants." However, the law recently ratified in Texas will not punish those who enter the country legally — only those who attempt to circumvent U.S. law. https://notthebee.com/article/parents-who-refuse-to-go-along-with-their-childs-gender-transition-can-now-face-7-years-in-jail-in-scotland Scottish parents could face years in jail for preventing kids from "dressing in a way that reflects their sexual orientation or gender identity" Scotland is really making it simple for parents. Let them trans your kids or you go to jail. You may think that's overstatement, but that's actually the plan in Scotland. Parents who do not go along with "affirming" their child's "gender identity" could face jail for SEVEN YEARS! Proposals published on Tuesday state that actions designed to "change or suppress" another individual's gender identity, causing them physical or psychological harm, would become illegal under the radical law. SNP (Scotland National Party) ministers acknowledged that so-called conversion practices often took place in a "family setting", raising the prospect that parents could be criminalised if they refuse to go along with their child's declaration that they are transgender. Just so you know the extent of this proposal and how it could apply to families, one of the examples of "conversion therapy" punishable by jail time is preventing a child from wearing clothing of their preferred gender identity. So if Billy wants to wear a dress and you stop him you would be guilty of "conversion therapy" and be subject to punishment under the law. Even if you don't do anything, the state could preemptively take action against you based solely on your beliefs! If they know you're a conservative Christian in Scotland they could issue civil orders against you, warning you not to cross the line of telling your kids what to do. The Scottish National Party is currently the largest and most represented party in parliament. They hold nearly a majority in the multi-party system. If they're fully on board with this there's not much that can be done to stop them in parliament. It's important to note this is in the "public consultation" phase which, in Scotland and the UK, means they have to lay out the plan for public feedback, in this case until April, before moving forward with the proposal. So my suggestion, between now and April, is for every freedom and faith-loving Scot to channel his inner Braveheart and publicly oppose this radical anti-family, anti-faith, anti-human proposal from the Scottish liberals. Braveheart - FREEDOM- Play 1:36-1:47 https://mynorthwest.com/3945835/rantz-wa-democrats-deem-ammo-privilege-ammunition-tax-way-end-gun-rights/ Wash. Democrats deem ammo a ‘privilege’ as way to end gun rights Washington Democrats opened the 2024 legislative session with another assault on gun rights. This time they hope to reclassify ammunition as a “privilege” — one that should be subject to an onerous tax because the one thing they love more than taking away guns is taking away your money. State Representatives My-Linh Thai and Liz Berry, both Democrats, introduced House Bill 2238. Under the auspices of public safety, claiming access to ammunition is the cause of violence and not their soft-on-crime policies that go easy on criminals (including those who use guns in their crimes), the bill imposes an 11% sales and use tax on ammunition statewide. This would be an additional tax on top of the sales tax and any other tax that may levied when purchasing ammunition. The city of Seattle, for example, imposes a per-round tax. But the bill also reclassified ammunition, claiming you do not have a right to purchase them as a consumer. Instead, it’s labeled a “privilege.” The legislation creates a new section in pre-existing law that reads, “A use tax is levied on every person in this state for the privilege of using ammunition as a consumer at the rate of 11% of the selling price.” Neither Reps. Thai nor Berry responded to inquiries asking the basis for their claim that ammunition is a privilege. But Washington Democrats have set the stage to make this outrageous claim. Washington Democrats have consistently moved to make gun ownership more onerous for non-criminal Washingtonians. The end goal for Democrats is to ban guns so that we cannot protect ourselves against the criminals they embolden. Instead of a flat-out ban against guns, they’ve hoped to reclassify ammunition as a privilege by severely restricting how much of it a gun owner can use at a time. The Washington Legislature approved a bill to prohibit the sale, distribution, and manufacture of firearm magazines holding more than 10 rounds of ammunition. This is meant to set the precedent claiming Washingtonians do not have a constitutional right to ammunition. Like most of their clearly unconstitutional bills, they’re based on a flimsy and purposefully obtuse understanding of the right to bear arms. The Washington State Constitution, Article I, Section 24, clearly states that “the right of the individual citizen to bear arms in defense of himself, or the state, shall not be impaired.” You cannot bear arms if the firearm has no ammunition in it. This provision, like the Second Amendment of the U.S. Constitution, implicitly includes all necessary components of firearms like ammunition as essential to the protected exercise of the right to bear arms. Without access to ammunition, the right to bear arms would be rendered meaningless, as firearms without ammunition are unable to fulfill their intended purpose in defense of oneself or the state. In an ironic twist, Democrats are the best gun salesmen. Their actions are pushing Washingtonians into purchases they might not otherwise make. Washington Democrats’ interest in banning guns does not extend to the criminals they support with legislation that keeps them out of prison before the end of their sentences under the claim the criminal justice system is racist. By passing legislation that is clearly tied to the rise in crime, they give every Washingtonian ample reason to purchase firearms for self-defense. We have a rise in violent crime in Seattle, where homicides have hit historic highs. Democrats pretend they hold no blame in this new reality. State Reps Tarra Simmons and David Hackney pushed a bill in the 2022 legislative session to lessen charges against drive-by shooters. It would even be applied retroactively to release a drive-by shooter serving time. They claimed the change promoted “racial equity in the criminal legal system” because they implied too many black people commit drive-by shootings and it’s unfair for them to be charged more than white people who don’t commit as many drive-by shootings. It was as silly an argument as it was racist. Only after considerable public pushback, did the bill die. But it seems reasonable to want a firearm to protect yourself when you have pro-criminal legislators pushing dangerous bills. State Rep. Roger Goodman, another anti-gun Democrat, is back this year with HB 1268. It would prevent judges from offering additional years of prison to violent criminals who use guns during their crimes (“stacking” on gun enhancement charges). It even offers “good time credits” (or earned release time) to felons serving time on a firearm or deadly weapon enhancement. Any one of these criminals released early is reason enough to own a firearm of your own.

With funding commitments secured from both Washington and Oregon for the new Interstate 5 Bridge between Vancouver and Portland, the Joint Legislative Action Committee is now looking at potential designs for the replacement bridge that differ in their aesthetic style and functionality. Although Oregon Gov. Tina Kotek has yet to sign it, a bill passed this session by the State Legislature committed a total of $1 billion in the form of $250 million in bonds during this biennium and another three rounds of bond sales for each subsequent biennia. The Washington Legislature allocated $1 billion for the new bridge as part of the Move Ahead Washington transportation package. --- Support this podcast: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/washington-in-focus/support

On this Tuesday topical show, Crystal welcomes Bryce Yadon and Marcella Buser from Futurewise to talk about the For Our Future campaign's success in passing middle housing and climate planning bills during the 2023 legislative session. Bryce and Marcella share how organizing a broad statewide coalition and sustained efforts by key legislators finally pushed middle housing across the finish line, then delve into the details of implementation, rulemaking, and why the policy appeals to so many.  The conversation continues with diagnosing why a transit-oriented development bill had trouble moving forward and describing what impacts the climate planning bill will have in our communities. Finally, Marcella and Bryce encourage interested folks to get involved and help Futurewise tackle continued action and future legislation around land use in Washington state. As always, a full text transcript of the show is available below and at officialhacksandwonks.com. Follow us on Twitter at @HacksWonks. Find the host, Crystal Fincher, on Twitter at @finchfrii, find Futurewise at @FuturewiseWA, find Bryce Yadon at @BAYadon, and find Marcella Buser at @marcymarce98.   Bryce Yadon Bryce started working with Futurewise and as a lobbyist in December of 2014. He has a BA from Seattle University in Political Science and a Masters from Middlesex University in Environmental Sustainable Management. He is a contract lobbyist who works on issues related to land use, housing, and transportation representing and working with a broad range of organizations, advocates, and businesses. Marcella Buser Marcella Buser is Futurewise's State Organizer and has been organizing for the past 5 years in Oregon and Washington. She's organized thousands of volunteers around efforts to pass missing middle housing and climate planning in the GMA in Washington, and other environmental and public health policies in the Northwest. She grew up in rural Oregon on her parents' apple farm and in her free time you can find her gardening, cooking, and enjoying live music.   Resources “2023 Legislative Wrap-Up!” from Futurewise   Missing Middle Housing One-Pager | Futurewise   Climate-Resilient Growth One-Pager | Futurewise   Transit-Oriented Development One-Pager | Futurewise   “Four Vital Housing and Climate Bills Survive the Washington Legislature” by Ray Dubicki from The Urbanist   Transcript [00:00:00] Crystal Fincher: Welcome to Hacks & Wonks. I'm Crystal Fincher, and I'm a political consultant and your host. On this show, we talk with policy wonks and political hacks to gather insight into local politics and policy in Washington state through the lens of those doing the work with behind-the-scenes perspectives on what's happening, why it's happening, and what you can do about it. Be sure to subscribe to the podcast to get the full versions of our Friday almost-live shows and our midweek show delivered to your podcast feed. If you like us, the most helpful thing you can do is leave a review wherever you listen to Hacks & Wonks. Full transcripts and resources referenced in the show are always available at officialhacksandwonks.com and in our episode notes. I am excited to be welcoming two folks from Futurewise - Bryce Yadon and Marcella Buser - here to talk about the work that Futurewise and others did on land use and policy bills during the legislature and in general - trying to help our community serve the people who live in it better. So just starting out - starting with Marcella - what brought you to this work and why is it so important? [00:01:18] Marcella Buser: Thanks for having me on, Crystal. I think what brought me to organizing and what brought me to Futurewise are two different things. I got involved in organizing back in college. I grew up on a farm, so I had never been canvassed before. I really didn't know that activism and organizing were a thing, but I grew up caring a lot about the environment, and sustainable agriculture, and everything related to growing up on a farm. So it wasn't until I was in college that I had my first experiences with organizing and learned that protests don't just happen out of serendipity, but there's a lot of planning and organizing that goes behind it. So I really fell in love with organizing and I thought it was so cool that I could be a part of making my voice heard and passing bills. I was still a teenager at the time - you didn't have to be an expert on the issue and I thought that was awesome. So I absolutely fell in love with organizing, took it on as my career and I've been doing that for the past five years, working on a variety of issues. And really the thing that keeps me so engaged in organizing is knowing that there are still thousands of people out there that, like me, really cared about these issues but have no idea that they can be a part of the solution. And then with Futurewise - I'm relatively new to the team - I just joined last fall, but I absolutely love it. Growing up, again, on a farm - I always saw cities as these expensive, polluted, scary places. Density was a bad word to me. And it wasn't until I moved to Seattle and started working with Futurewise that I learned - really, if we want to be protecting our farms and our forests and our green spaces, having these dense cities is the solution. This is the way to protect our world. And when you're building cities well, they can be equitable and affordable and environmentally friendly. So I absolutely love still learning more about urban planning and land use - and organizing on these issues. [00:03:27] Crystal Fincher: Excellent. And what about you, Bryce? [00:03:29] Bryce Yadon: Thanks for having us on and letting us join. I got my start in Olympia in 2006 - I believe, was my first legislative session, if I'm remembering correctly - it feels like a really long time ago now. And worked my way up to becoming a contract lobbyist in 2009 and 2010. And I represented a few groups and organizations that I didn't always see eye to eye on, and it was a little more difficult to work. So I took a break from politics for a few years, got my master's and came back - in environmental sustainable management - figuring out that really the environment and land use is where my passion lies, just generally. And I got lucky enough to have some friends who worked in and around Futurewise and helped connect me to, at the time, Hilary Franz, who hired me on as the State Policy Director in 2015 - early 2015, late 2014. And really, I have been working on land use, transportation, housing issues since then. And it all really, like I said, stems from 10 years of searching about what I cared about before I fell into the lap of Futurewise. And it's been really exciting to see the organization continue to grow and being able to continue to work on a host of issues that kind of change every year on the land use realm, because there's a lot to do in that space. So yeah, just a long time of slowly working my way into the land use and transportation realm. And now I'm lucky enough to continue to do it. [00:04:54] Crystal Fincher: Excellent. So like you said, there's so much to do. But there have been some headline issues over the past couple years, culminating with this last session - middle housing, transit oriented development, the GMA climate bill. Starting with middle housing and the coalition - getting that together - the multi-session effort that it took to pass it, but resulting in passage. What was that process like? And why is this so important? [00:05:21] Bryce Yadon: Yeah, I'll start off with that. It was a multi-year thing, and I do want to mention that there was a couple of different priorities moving in tandem throughout the last few sessions. Representative Bateman, Representative Macri, and others had been working on middle housing for a number of years before Futurewise got involved. We always knew we would eventually be able to really help. But a few years ago, what we started off with was what was called House Bill 1220, which was an update to the housing element of the Growth Management Act. And the reason why that is important is it set the stage for us to take on these larger issues, such as middle housing and TOD. And what that update did was required local jurisdictions to plan differently for housing types. It also required the state to start addressing and issuing housing targets that are a little more specific than they used to be. They used to just be general - you should be allowing this many units. Now we're more in the detailed units. And so from a Futurewise perspective, it started back in 2020 with the introduction of that bill and worked forward. And we had built a small coalition on updating the housing requirements under that - knowing that in 2024, the vast majority of local jurisdictions are going to be updating their comprehensive plan required by law - where all these planning documents come together to facilitate access to housing, hopefully. So that was - from a Futurewise perspective - that was our first kind of go at trying to figure out what was the preliminary step to take. And then what it allowed us to do then is look at how do local jurisdictions implement this new law? What are the opportunities that Futurewise and the state need to give them to really fully embrace income levels, housing at all income levels, affordable housing, and those important things. And so when we were able to team up with Representative Bateman, she had already built a small coalition that was pretty strong. But over the course of about six months, myself, Futurewise, Marcella teamed up with a very large coalition that cut across areas that normally don't - we had business, we had realtors, we had environmental organizations, we had labor all teamed up, because there's one thing that everybody needs, which is housing. And I think that was a big deal to kind of restructure what the coalition looked like going into the 2023 session. And I think that one of the best and interesting parts about that, when we look at the breadth of knowledge within that coalition - like I said, we had folks - we had realtors who understand what people are looking for in housing these days and what they want to market to folks. We have builders that are seeing where they're getting hangups in where and how they can build. You have environmental organizations like Futurewise that understood that a lot of the density and outcomes we're looking for to protect the environment are around types of new housing, and it's like middle housing - that take up less space, that provide community and those things. And I think that was one of the key aspects at the end of the day was just the coalition having such knowledge in different aspects that really helped push it over the line. And again, Representative Bateman and others had worked on it for, I think, three or four years prior to Futurewise stepping in and really helping out. So I want to give a lot of credit to the previous work they did. And then the one other thing that I think is extremely important to realize that our coalition and all the work Marcella and everybody else did - one of the things that we can't substitute is hard work from a member. And there was Representative Bateman who was consistently meeting with her colleagues one-on-one, folks like Representative Macri, Representative Fitzgibbon and others meeting with members one-on-one just about this specific bill to make sure that we were addressing policy concerns throughout the whole thing. So I think that was the key culmination for us is - it was a four-year period, there was two different tracks we were taking, and then they lined up at the right time. And again, we think this is one of the policy implementation bills for House Bill 1220 that we passed a number of years ago. [00:09:27] Crystal Fincher: Got it. Marcella, Bryce covered a little bit about the coalition with this - and it was a broad and varied coalition, but a coalition that even within the housing space didn't agree on all issues - and were working together on some bills this past session, were working in opposition on other bills this session. What did it take, and what was the process of pulling this coalition together and keeping it together throughout this session, throughout the changes in the bill? Can you walk us through what that was like? [00:09:55] Marcella Buser: Yeah, so I can walk you through the grassroots side of the coalition - because how Bryce and I work together - Bryce is on the inside, working to create a policy that most people can get behind. And then I'm working on the outside with the rest of the state, making sure that we have the people power needed to get these bills over the finish line. So like I said, I started last fall - my very first day on staff was joining one of these coalition meetings and seeing all the different players in the room. My priority was coordinating the grassroots side of the coalition, so bringing together local groups that really cared about these issues, environmental groups, racial justice groups, everyone that had different types of reach and diversity in their interests. I would say how much we cared about missing middle and seeing this bill over the finish line united us way more than any of our differences could have separated us. Honestly, one of the larger challenges, rather than working on these other issues, was just balancing everyone's strengths. Like a local group might have expertise in a certain area but might not know about the rest of the state, whereas a comms team might have really great publications but not a large membership base to reach out to. So I think that was more - the bigger challenge is balancing that and through having really open and honest conversations every week in the meeting that I coordinated, we were able to figure out - okay, where can everyone make an impact? What makes sense for everyone? And how can we keep this bill moving? [00:11:33] Crystal Fincher: So what comes next? What does implementation look like for this? And what can people in their communities expect to see as a result? [00:11:42] Bryce Yadon: That's a really good question. Funny enough, we've been having both internal conversations as well as a few conversations with people in the governor's office and the Department of Commerce. So the immediate next step is going to be that the Department of Commerce is going to start a rulemaking process for implementation at the local level. We have a phased approach to this piece of legislation, so the four central Puget Sound counties - so King, Kitsap, Pierce, and Snohomish - have to update their development regulations and implement this piece of legislation by June of 2025, because it's due six months after the comprehensive plan. This gives us a two-year time window to assist local jurisdictions in implementation. So the first thing that we're going to probably start seeing is the Department of Commerce both from a small group area - small groups - calling people in to get feedback and ideas on how this should be implemented, what should the regulations and sideboards should be for implementation of this bill. We're also going to see - because the rulemaking process is public - we're also going to be seeing opportunities for the general public to provide feedback to the Department of Commerce through hearings and other things over the next six months to a year. [00:13:01] Crystal Fincher: And pausing right here, what does it mean - what kinds of things are being taken up and handled in rulemaking? What is going to be determined there? [00:13:08] Bryce Yadon: Yeah, that's a good question. So things such as what does the definition of substantially similar to development regulations that apply to single-family homes. So things that we didn't define very well that are going to be required. So again, one of them was you can't have any more restrictive requirements than you have on a single-family zone. So those will be things like matching up your setbacks and making sure that it's clear that we have a - you're either following the law, or not. So I think some of those rules will be very clear - that we think they're clear in the law, but we need to make sure they're there. I also think we'll also see things that will be able to be just adopted out of the rules to a local city's ordinance. And so things, like I said, what do setbacks look like for middle housing comparatively to other types? Or what does open space look like between courtyard apartments - how much is open space needed to create a courtyard apartment situation? What should the average heights, or what could be heights, that would facilitate different unit sizes for each development? What does substantially similar for affordable housing look like? 'cause we do have affordable housing incentives built into the bill. So those are some of the things. But I think it's going to be imperative of us all to think about how broad and how flexible can we make sure that this is, that the rulemaking is so local jurisdictions can really facilitate the development of these housing types. And I think that's one of the things that we want to make sure is going to occur at the end of the day. So those are some of the things - obviously, I'm probably missing a whole host of them because it's such a big piece of legislation and we haven't done this much extensive rulemaking on a bill in a while - like this, I should say, let alone on housing at the state level in a long time. And then - how's it going to impact the local area after we get through that? Second, you're going to see local jurisdictions taking up public hearings, opportunities to engage. There's multiple pathways for local jurisdictions to comply with the law. There's one that says - you have to upzone 75% of your single-family homes and you can protect 25%. But there's a lot of stipulations within that, so making sure we have folks on the ground that are paying attention to high risk of displacement areas, other areas that might have been formerly redlined. So we obviously need people at the local level to be engaged at the planning process. It also provides folks an opportunity to give feedback on development regulations. Again, another kind of rehash of setbacks, heights, other requirements that might go along with this. And then in reality, what do I think is going to look like on the ground in four or five years when we start seeing more of these develop is - more community and more homes for people. I live in a townhome - there's 11 units that is on two formerly single-family homes. And I've got a great community - I know my neighbors, I talk to them, we garden together out front - which is really exciting. So what I think we're going to see is just - is more housing options, maybe not always affordable for 80% and below, but more affordable than the single-family home that it replaced, which is really providing housing opportunity. So fits within the character of the neighborhood - the houses next to me look like they belong there and my house looks like it belongs here. And I'm right next to two-story apartment building that's next door to me as well, so it's a really diverse community and it's really exciting to see. So that's what we expect to see on the ground - is more people getting housing, more community being built, and facilitating a walkable environment that really creates and thrives in that community-based planning process. [00:16:54] Crystal Fincher: Yeah, thank you for going into detail on what rulemaking means. I think that's a part of the process that is not known to as many people as the legislative process. And so much is determined about the implementation with those - whether it's this legislation or any piece of legislation - it's so important to continue engaging and following through rulemaking. I've explained it before - it's like the difference - the law that was passed is like a script on paper and the rulemaking is what fills in all of those details to actually make it a movie. There's so much more than the words on the paper in the ways that they're interpreted, in the ways that they can manifest in reality. And so making all of those decisions about - What exactly does that definition mean? What does that look like in real life? - makes a big difference. So whether it's this or any piece of legislation, really - if you've been engaged in the fight to get it passed, please continue to stay involved. Or if you want to get involved for the first time, do it within this rulemaking period because it does impact how this will turn out in real life. Marcella, what was it about this that brought so many people to the coalition? What were some of the concerns that you had to overcome to continue to build this coalition? And what are you most excited to see as a result of this passing? [00:18:09] Marcella Buser: Yeah, I think so many people were brought to this coalition because regardless of what you care about, there is a reason why missing middle affects you in a positive way. So talking with folks that care about climate change and care about having more walkable communities - great, missing middle is a solution for you. Folks that care about dismantling systemic racism - great, missing middle is for you. I think the biggest barrier that we faced with this bill on the ground was less with the coalition and more with local opposition. So I'm thinking in particular about Edmonds. At the start of session, we saw a lot of letters to the editor against missing middle coming out of Edmonds, and eventually started seeing lawn signs and flyers - all of this work against missing middle. And we learned that this was coming from a group called ACE, or Alliance for Citizens of Edmonds, and they are an organized group that's been around since 2004. And part of their mission is, and I quote "preserving the character of Edmonds." So we knew that if we were going to get this bill passed, but - not just passed, get this implemented - we needed to have a very local and strategic approach to this. So we started working with our partners in Edmonds. We got connected with CARE, Coalition for Accessible and Resilient Edmonds, and started hosting regional meetings working to get more folks in the area involved. And we saw our engagement double - partially because we were there doing the work we needed to turn these folks out, but also because folks were seeing these lawn signs and thinking - You know, I don't really agree with that. I think I'm on the other side of this. And it ended up being successful. We got all of the representatives and the senators in that district to vote Yes on missing middle. But this was a big lesson learned - that if we want to keep passing zoning reform in the future and if we want to be implementing missing middle, we need to make sure that we're building these massive, stronger bases in these local, typically wealthier, smaller communities and making sure that we have the support needed to keep this work up. So I think that was one of the biggest struggles. And so making sure that our coalition wasn't just the folks that work on the statewide level, but we were working with individual smaller groups that work in these local communities - like Edmonds, Bellevue, Mercer Island, Bainbridge - and making sure that they were a part of this larger movement. [00:20:45] Crystal Fincher: Absolutely. And what - looking forward into another bill that you were working on - the transit oriented development bill, where does that stand? And where is it going? [00:20:57] Bryce Yadon: That's a good question. So just in terms of actual process real quick, it will go back to - I believe it goes back to the Senate. So it'll still be introduced next year, goes back to the last place that it passed, which would be - we have different steps, so it'll go back to the Senate. [00:21:12] Crystal Fincher: And what would it do? What would that bill accomplish? [00:21:15] Bryce Yadon: So the bill - it is a complement to the middle housing bill. So the middle housing bill obviously dealt with areas - just your entire city, generally speaking. What TOD, Transit Oriented Development Bill, did was really increase housing availability around our transit investments. So things like light rail, frequent transit service, or bus rapid transit, thinking about - again, King County has the Rapid Ride line, so it would increase development capacity at all the stops along the Rapid Ride line. They have Swift up in Snohomish County. Spokane is getting a number of bus rapid transit-type lines. So really what it would have done is taken areas - many of the bus lines go through a whole host of different zoning types - they go through commercial, they go through multifamily, and they also go through single-family. And what this was saying is the Legislature invested around $3.7 billion into bus transit in 2022 - let's leverage that to create housing opportunity around those things so people don't have to drive - thinking about how we implement our climate plans and meeting our goals for vehicle miles traveled that we have in state law. So it would have allowed, within a quarter mile of bus rapid transit, a substantial increase in what they call floor area ratio or FAR. FAR is a wonky term to look at your lot size and how much building capacity you can have on top of it. I think most of us would defer to like heights - so we normally see 40-foot heights or 60-foot heights. This does it based off of - how many square feet can you build per lot, depending on the size and location. But I'm going to defer back to like heights and density just because I think it's easier to understand, and I think that's the direction we'll probably inevitably see the bill go because people can envision it better. So functionally it would have allowed something - instead of two stories, it would have allowed something like five stories or six stories and that typically is wood frame construction over concrete that's the cheapest to build when you start talking about multifamily. And then around light rail, it would have done the steel and concrete type of construction, which can be upwards of 70, 80 to 150 feet or any skyscraper in Seattle, Bellevue, Tacoma, Everett - those types of buildings - around light rail. So it would have really increased the development capacity - and instead of thinking of it as a station area, you would think of it more as a transit line. So you would have whole sections following a bus that could be upzoned that might be currently single-family or low-rise development and really increase the capacity. So I think that was fundamentally what the bill did at the end of the day. And I think there was a lot of confusion, even among members and the lobbying team, as I mentioned - FAR and other requirements. So I think there has to be some peel back and look at how can we best talk about it and represent and show what the bill will do. I think that was one of the positives of missing middle - we were able to provide photos and built environment that showed what middle housing is. I think we were having a hard time providing that for transit oriented development because it was a different way to look at how we develop. I think there's three or four cities that use FAR and the rest use height, and we got to probably move back towards that way to get people to see it better. [00:24:44] Crystal Fincher: And Marcella - when it comes to the GMA climate bill, why was that so important to pass and what impact will it have moving forward? [00:24:54] Marcella Buser: Yeah, I can't speak on the exact policy, but this bill is huge. Futurewise has been working on this for the past three years and this is going to change the way that we are looking at how we develop our cities. Before this bill, cities didn't need to plan around climate change, but now we are taking that into consideration - and we know that this is one of the top issues that people in our state care about and are looking to see action on. It's great being in Washington - we are one of the climate change leaders in the country, if not the leader, in climate change action - but there's always more that needs to be done. [00:25:34] Crystal Fincher: Looking at the specifics and through the eyes of a layperson, through the eyes of someone just in the public - what would they expect to see differently and what would it do? [00:25:45] Bryce Yadon: I'll say a couple of things, and I know that Marcella heard a lot of on the ground conversations - because again, I think one thing that we did well this year was take the stories of people on the ground and turn them into our key talking points and other things. One of the things that we're probably going to see is a better thought process on what does climate resiliency look like for flooding. We know that we're going to see increased storms, we're going to see sea level rise - and sea level rise will impact, obviously, the whole Puget Sound and the coastal areas. So we're going to see better and more thoughtful development regulations and development patterns within those flood zones. We've had a law for a long time that says - You really shouldn't be building in them. But we're also seeing a larger flood zone - they're increasing as time goes on because these are more severe. So I think the first thing we'll probably see is not immediate, but more thoughtful development regulations, exit patterns, access away from areas that are eventually going to be hit with floods and other things. I think another thing that we're going to see - thinking of, say, eastern Washington right away - is the planning and understanding of where development patterns occur and likelihood of wildfires. We've all seen the devastation in California and in some of the small towns in Oregon over the last few years with devastating impacts to people's homes and properties and livelihoods lost. And I think Washington has typically done a good job at trying to create this buffer between development areas and areas that are susceptible to wildfires, but we're going to see more action in that area. And then we're also going to see better plans to prevent wildfires from expanding into these communities. So it might not be immediate on the ground impacts, but it's one of those things. And I think the second thing I want to mention, within the context of this, is with the GMA climate bill, we added - we made a change to how local jurisdictions plan for travel and transportation - requires vehicle miles traveled to be reduced over time. But in addition to that, it said - when you're doing your transportation plan, you have to plan for a multimodal environment. That means not only are you planning for vehicle traffic on roadways, but you should be planning for - What does transit look like within corridors? What does bike facilities look like in corridors? And what does pedestrian facilities look like in corridors? We know cities have a lack of pedestrian access - there's whole sections of all of our major cities that don't have access to sidewalks. And this is going to put those front and centered and say - You can't only invest in moving vehicles quickly. What you have to do is you have to invest in - safety is the number one priority for all users on the roadway. And you have to figure out how you're going to be investing in all modes of transportation instead of one. So I think what we're probably going to see immediately is a reworking of our transportation system, hopefully - and I think that'll be the most impactful. Hopefully we'll see speeds come down, vehicle crashes reduced, we'll see safety increase, we'll see access to crosswalks and pedestrian facilities that - again, a lot of jurisdictions just haven't invested in because their number one priority has been the speed of a vehicle to get through one singular intersection. So I think in the short term, that's probably going to be one of the major things we're going to see right away, within the context of what the immediate impacts are going to be, which is really exciting - something that we've been working on with partners for years. [00:29:12] Crystal Fincher: It is really exciting. And so necessary, especially through our - basically a mobility safety crisis that we are in the middle of - and hopefully people will be taking action to address that soon. So now that we're post-session doing this kind of evaluation of everything that happened and looking forward - Marcella, what is necessary in the next year, leading up to this next session, locally and in conjunction with state legislators to pass these bills and continued action as needed? What's needed to bring the coalition together around the continued action to make sure that we can continue moving forward? [00:29:51] Marcella Buser: Yeah, there's a lot that's needed. I think working through session - some of the best organizing that will set a campaign up for success happens before legislators are even back in Olympia. So really our campaign for next year is already starting now. It takes a lot of effort working in local communities and statewide, finding the volunteers that care about these issues that - again, maybe don't know how to get involved. Or maybe they really care about climate change and housing, but don't even know what land use is - they've never even heard the phrase zoning before. So making sure that we are reaching as many of those folks as possible, getting them involved, teaching them that they can be a part of the solution, and making their voice heard. And then - yeah, working with the coalition - took some time off, recovered from session, but now getting back to working with these groups, finding that common ground of - Okay, maybe we aren't working on missing middle or something else, but where do our interests coincide? And not only working with our past partners, but making sure that we are identifying new groups that want to get involved, making sure that our coalition is very diverse - that we are representing local groups and not just the Seattle area, but we are getting statewide. So there's a lot of work to do if we want to be building up the support that we need to be a really robust campaign, starting in January when bills are getting introduced. [00:31:19] Crystal Fincher: And if people are interested in joining this effort and getting involved, who can they contact and how can they find out more information? [00:31:27] Marcella Buser: Definitely get in touch with us. If you go to our website, we have ways - you can fill out a volunteer form and I'll get in touch with you to tell you more. There is a variety of ways for people to get involved. So even if you're hearing this and you're like - I don't have a ton of time for that, but I'm interested - during session, we send out weekly action alerts that take five minutes to email your legislators to vote Yes, or to sign-in Pro for hearings for bills. That's huge - that goes a long way. But we also have great opportunities for folks to get involved if you do have more time - if you want to volunteer, take on leadership, help run things like in-person lobby days. But also even if you don't have any time at all, you can always donate - and that always goes a long way with our campaigns - making sure that we have the resources needed to stay in this fight for as long as it takes to win. [00:32:20] Crystal Fincher: Thank you so much, Bryce and Marcella, for joining us today and helping to inform. Any parting words that you have, Bryce? [00:32:27] Bryce Yadon: Just thank you for your time and thanks for everybody's engagement in the last legislative session. And I just want to echo what Marcella said, which is - if you're interested, there's millions of ways, both from your local city all up to the state, and happy to help anybody who's excited to do that. [00:32:44] Crystal Fincher: All right. Thank you so much for joining us. [00:32:46] Bryce Yadon: Thank you. [00:32:47] Marcella Buser: Thanks. [00:32:47] Crystal Fincher: Thank you for listening to Hacks & Wonks, which is co-produced by Shannon Cheng and Bryce Cannatelli. You can follow Hacks & Wonks on Twitter @HacksWonks. You can catch Hacks & Wonks on iTunes, Spotify, or wherever you get your podcasts - just type "Hacks and Wonks" into the search bar. Be sure to subscribe to the podcast to get the full versions of our Friday almost-live shows and our midweek show delivered to your podcast feed. If you like us, leave a review wherever you listen. You can also get a full transcript of this episode and links to the resources referenced in the show at officialhacksandwonks.com and in the episode notes. Thanks for tuning in - talk to you next time.

A bill passed this session by the Washington Legislature and signed into law by Gov. Jay Inslee will allow people starting in 2024 to register online to vote in the state by providing the last four digits of a Social Security Number and an electronic signature. It's a process proponents say will make it easier for people to register or pre-register if they're not yet 18, while detractors argue it makes the election system open to fraud or compromise people's private information to cyberattacks. --- Support this podcast: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/washington-in-focus/support

A quick finish to a special session of the Washington Legislature; the head of a controversial King County agency calls it quits; and a closer look at jobs in the tech sector in our state. It all happened this week. Let's get you caught up...

The Port of Vancouver USA will receive $3.5 million in funding from the Washington State Legislature to remove its 100-year-old Terminal 1 dock and replace it with a fish-friendly structure that will house a public market. https://bit.ly/3pJIp4U #PortOfVancouverUSA #WashingtonStateLegislature #Terminal1Dock #EcologicalImprovementPhase #2023CapitalBudget #Terminal1ReplacementProject #VancouverWa #ClarkCountyWa #ClarkCountyNews #ClarkCountyToday

The Washington Legislature is getting back to work Tuesday in an effort to finalize the state's drug possession and addiction treatment law.

Hacks & Wonks will return next Friday with a regular week-in-review! In the meantime, please enjoy this re-air where Crystal is joined by Mike McGinn of America Walks and Coté Soerens of Reconnect South Park to learn about their work with the Freeway Fighters Network. Mike shares a broad overview of the movement's efforts to remove crumbling highway infrastructure while addressing the climate, health, and equity issues these concrete structures have caused. As a resident of Seattle's South Park, Coté reflects on the throughline of Highway 99 running through the middle of her community – connecting a history of red-lining, displacement, and racism to the present-day impacts on the neighborhood's livability, pollution exposure, and life expectancy. Mike and Coté call out the lack of imagination exhibited by the country's attachment to highways and paint a compelling vision that replaces underutilized thoroughfares with vibrant, connected communities. As always, a full text transcript of the show is available below and at officialhacksandwonks.com. Follow us on Twitter at @HacksWonks. Find the host, Crystal Fincher, on Twitter at @finchfrii and find Mike McGinn at @mayormcginn and Coté Soerens at @cotesoerens.   Mike McGinn Mike is the Executive Director of national nonprofit America Walks.  He got his start in local politics as a neighborhood activist pushing for walkability. From there he founded a non-profit focused on sustainable and equitable growth, and then became mayor of Seattle. Just before joining America Walks, Mike worked to help Feet First, Washington State's walking advocacy organization, expand their sphere of influence across Washington state. He has worked on numerous public education, legislative, ballot measure and election campaigns – which has given him an abiding faith in the power of organizing and volunteers to create change.  Coté Soerens Coté Soerens calls herself a midwife to a thriving local coffee shop that has become a hub for community organization and activism. Living in the South Park neighborhood of Seattle, Washington, a community filled with immigrants and people of color where opportunities are limited, Soerens felt called to create spaces of belonging. In 2017, while hosting a dinner for neighborhood friends, Soerens realized that, even without secured funding, she had all she needed to create a local coffee shop, where local youth could find employment and where neighbors could meet to discuss local issues and organize. Soerens, along with the neighborhood, has even bigger dreams. Reconnect South Park initiative's dream is to ultimately decommission the highway which cuts the neighborhood in half and to reclaim those 44 acres for equitable development.   Resources Freeway Fighters Network   Reconnecting Communities Campaign | America Walks   Reconnect South Park   “South Park Joins Growing Movement to Dismantle Freeways” by Agueda Pacheco from The Urbanist    “Seattle residents drive movement to tear out Highway 99 in South Park” by David Kroman from The Seattle Times   “Feds award money to study removing Highway 99 in one Seattle neighborhood” by David Kroman in The Seattle Times   Transcript [00:00:00] Crystal Fincher: Welcome to Hacks & Wonks. I'm Crystal Fincher, and I'm a political consultant and your host. On this show, we talk with policy wonks and political hacks to gather insight into local politics and policy in Washington state through the lens of those doing the work with behind-the-scenes perspectives on what's happening, why it's happening, and what you can do about it. Be sure to subscribe to the podcast to get the full versions of our Friday almost-live shows and our midweek show delivered to your podcast feed. If you like us, the most helpful thing you can do is leave a review wherever you listen to Hacks & Wonks. Full transcripts and resources referenced in the show are always available at officialhacksandwonks.com and in our episode notes. Well, today I'm thrilled to welcome two guests to the podcast. The first, Mike McGinn - you're used to hearing him on Fridays, as we do weeks-in-review. But today we are talking about what's in his wheelhouse, really, in America Walks, the organization that's helping to build a nationwide movement to reconnect communities divided by wide roads and overbuilt arterials - that hosts the Freeway Fighters Network, which calls for increased investment in walkable, equitable, connected, and accessible places by divesting from polluting highways. And Coté Soerens with the Freeway Fighters Network - representing a broad coalition of public and private sector leaders, community activists, and multidisciplinary professionals - dedicating ourselves to championing design, equity, and policy principles that center people before highways. Welcome to you both. As we get started, I just wanted to start with you, Mike, and what got you involved with this work? [00:01:53] Mike McGinn: Oh my God, it just depends where you want to start. Probably a big starting point for me was the realization, as a climate advocate, of the role of transportation in climate emissions, which - when I was working in the mid-2000s on Seattle's Climate Action Plan, transportation was 40% of all emissions because we had hydropower. We'd already gotten off of coal. What's fascinating now is that as the nation is getting off of coal, which is great and renewables are the way to go - it's just the cheapest, best way to go - that's now what's happening nationwide. Transportation is now the largest source of emissions. But then once you start getting into it, even the littlest bit, you also see tremendous equity issues, like who has access to the transportation system. Right now it requires a car mainly - and if you have to walk, bike, and use transit, you're denied of a lot of opportunities because we've built a system that's very hostile to getting around that way. And oftentimes it's hostile because it's wide, fast roads, it's freeways that have divided communities, lack of sidewalks, not having bus lanes, they're not prioritizing transit, all of that. So huge equity issues, huge health issues as well. Apartment buildings tend to be, and residences tend to be near those wide roads - and all the pollutants you breathe in has tremendous negative effects on the health of everyone living nearby. And again, that's an equity issue as well. We intentionally do this. You'll hear people argue for this - the apartment buildings belong next to the arterials to protect the single-family neighborhoods. So in other words, the people of lower incomes need to breathe more pollution so that we, in the leafy green neighborhoods, who are better off can breathe less pollution. It's - yeah, the whole thing is just an extreme failure of public policy, and planning, and building for the future. And of course, it's not even a good transportation system. Obviously when you're excluding a huge portion of the population that doesn't drive because of age, because of ability, or because of income - already it's bad. That's not a way you raise all boats, so to speak. That's not a rising tide that lifts all boats. It's something that divides us, but it's also extraordinarily wasteful and expensive. Which kind of brings us back to the freeway work as well. We're at the stage now - and the Alaska Way viaduct on our waterfront was an example of that - where after you've had that concrete structure around for 50 or 60 years, it's ready to be replaced. It's gonna fall down. It's gonna take a big expenditure to replace it. And what more and more places are realizing is - Let's not replace it with another highway. Let's replace it with a surface street, or maybe no street at all. And let's put the dollars we would have spent into rebuilding this inequitable, polluting, climate-changing monstrosity of infrastructure - let's put the money into walking, biking, transit, or geez, how about affordable housing? How about letting people live back in communities again - live near jobs and services? And those are all the arguments. We've had no shortage of arguments - good, really good ones - why we should do this. We're starting to see them take hold, but the US still has not let go of its highway-building mania with all its negative effects, but we are starting to see some cracks, so to speak, in the unity that's been around highway building for decades. And we're actually seeing the beginning of a freeway removal moment, and at the very least, we should be stopping highway expansion, and I get to do that work now at America Walks, too. [00:05:26] Crystal Fincher: And Coté, how did you get involved in this work and why is it important to remove freeways? [00:05:31] Coté Soerens: Well, I got involved in this work by living in a neighborhood that was cut in two by a highway that was never actually very popular. For residents in South Park, this portion - it's a portion of Highway 99 State Route - was fought very proactively by the residents of South Park back in the '50s, but Washington State Department of Transportation at the time decided to go with it anyway. What I do love about this movement of highway removal and walkability is basically the emergence of a new imagination, nationally, around how life should be lived. It seems that if you look at the time that this highway in my neighborhood was built back in the '50s, the imagination then was - Let's expand car availability - and there were different values that were being worked at the time. And now, 70 years later, we want different things as a society, we need different things. We tried the car designs, urbanism, and we have found that it's not equitable, it's also horrible, and also - it's funny - you have to pay a premium for a walking score of 90. Now it's like a privilege to live in a walkable neighborhood. So back to the question how I got involved in this. I've lived in South Park for 10 years. I've raised three boys in this neighborhood and South Park, actually, it's a pretty interesting place in Seattle. It's been a red-lined neighborhood back in - if we get a little wonky with history - back at the turn of the century. And then I feel that I find this history of South Park fascinating because it seems to be a history of government consistently missing out on what residents of our community are saying. It seems like - We hear what you're saying, and yet we don't care. We're gonna move forward anyway. So this story has been replicating itself around this highway. Back in the 1900s, South Park was a farming community - it was its own little town in Seattle. And it was a thriving neighborhood of farmers that actually started the Pike Place Market, which is very famous nationally. And it's always been a community after - the Duwamish were here originally in the ancestral lands - then it's been a community of immigrants, and it's been a community of Italian immigrants back at a time where Italians were not considered white. And in the planning map of the town, of the time, South Park is seen as "hazardous," which is a word that has been used in planning before to say it's non-white. And now that it's environmentally challenged, we see the word "hazardous" and would say - Oh wow, yes, of course, there is a Superfund in it - there is the Duwamish River. But if you go back to the time - no, it was a farming community, which changes the meaning of "hazardous." So at the time, Seattle wanted to annex this little town of South Park into the city with very different expectations than the residents had. So at the time, Seattle City Council thought - Well, there is a river in the park that is really good for industry. So we're going to annex this neighborhood to make it industrial and push out all the residents. The residents, on the other hand, were thinking - Whoa, if we get annexed to Seattle, we can get better permits for our sewer system and other amenities. So they both entered into this "agreement" and with very different expectations. Now, the City of Seattle - wanting to make this place industrial - what got accomplished out of that was the Duwamish River became a Superfund site and then industry was started popping around. And by the time the plans for the highway to cross this residential core were conceived, it was thought of as a very convenient way to discourage the residential - so that we could continue with the work of making this area industrial. So all the protests of the time, in the '50s, of residents were sorely ignored. That highway didn't make any sense and it still doesn't make any sense. It's a very redundant grid. Many people don't know this, but when we talk about removing the portion of Highway 99, people think that we're talking about this other one - this 509 - which is what people use to get to the airport. And it's not that one. You can still get to the airport. It's a portion that connects I-5 and 509 and it goes right connected to it. So I'm totally not answering your question, Crystal, about how I got involved. So the way I got involved was Cayce James and the City at the time, put together a group of people - stakeholders in the neighborhood - to walk around the neighborhood. And we were making different tours of different places around the neighborhood - the community center, the library. And on every stop, people will be talking about problems caused by this portion of the highway. So I remember looking around to my tour partners and saying - Hey guys, you all realize that all these problems go away if you just shut the dang highway, right? And the reaction was a reaction that I often get, which was to look at me and say - Cute, moving on. They really didn't think of this as a viable solution - to just cut an underutilized highway in order to resolve issues such as pollution, safety, lack of walkability, lack of access for kids to their school, and other problems this highway creates. And what that did for me was to see firsthand the problems with the illusion of permanence. People do see a highway and they think it's been there forever and it will be there forever. They don't think about it like - No, this was actually an expression of certain values that we hold as a society, and when our values change, we can also change our built environment. We can change the highway. At some point, I remember Cayce James, who hosted this tour around the neighborhood, reached out and we started talking and she said - Hey, you know what? I've been thinking about this too. I think it's possible to remove this highway. So we started talking and then we got connected with the folks from PlacemakingUS, who I just mentioned this idea - Hey, Madeleine Spencer and Ryan Smolar. Hey, how about - I've been thinking about removing this highway. What do you think? They said - Hey, there is a whole movement across the country on highway removal. And we were connected with Freeway Fighters, and then we started learning that across the country, so many communities were having this idea of reconnecting communities, thinking about land differently, really considering the opportunity cost of having a highway crossing the neighborhood. For us in Seattle, we have had problems with affordability for a long time. The City has not been effective at creating policy that will stabilize the real estate market and actually preserve cultural space, preserve housing, affordable housing - particularly for communities of color. When thinking about this portion of the highway crossing South Park, you can see 44 acres of land that could be utilized in a different way. That, to me, creates a once-in-a-generation opportunity to actually make more land for equitable development. So for all these reasons, I am particularly excited about getting this highway out of our neighborhood. And another thing that I need to mention is that this highway - it's so interesting how it was designed - it goes through every single place where kids play. It goes right next to the community center, the skate park, the library, and the elementary school. It seems to have been designed to cut children's life expectancy by 13 years, which it does. There are studies about this. So I can talk to you for three hours about reasons why this highway needs to be removed. [00:12:35] Crystal Fincher: Yeah, it's really important. It makes a difference. And both of you touched on the racialized history of highways and just the impact that this has on communities, on families, and particularly on health. Transportation is the number one polluter in our state, in our area. And what you just talked about - I feel like sometimes people hear statistics and they don't really apply it to people's lives. But when you talk about a life expectancy that is that much shorter - in Seattle - it feels neglectful. It feels criminal almost. It feels wrong that we know that these types of harms are being forced upon our children. And we aren't taking that into account so often when we have these repeated conversations every single year about what highways we're gonna build, expand, put in. And these are conversations that aren't just - they certainly absolutely started in the '50s and we started that whole domino effect rolling. But now we have the chance to review what we're doing to make modifications, whether it's Highway 99 in South Park, whether it's the Interstate Bridge Replacement between Washington and Oregon. We had this out - and Mike McGinn is notorious and has been pretty much vindicated, it looks like - for fighting against the Highway 99 tunnel in Seattle. But we seem to so easily dismiss the negative harms that this has on neighborhoods, on affordability, on health, on just our quality of life. How do you view just the importance of really taking all of these factors into account as we make these policies, Mike? [00:14:19] Mike McGinn: Well, first of all, I just have to say that as a mayor, you're not supposed to have any favorite neighborhoods. But if I had a favorite neighborhood, South Park would be pretty darn close. I spent a lot of time down there as mayor, but I also spent time there before mayor - my kids played basketball in the rec leagues and I played ultimate frisbee in the schools. And I'd be down there in those playing fields at South Park Community Center. And yeah, you're right next to the highway. And that highway doesn't carry that many cars either. The reason people confuse it with 509 is because it's not really that useful a section of highway, but it certainly carries enough cars for the noise and pollution to be meaningful. And it's also not at all surprising, tragically, that it's a community like South Park that gets a highway like this. What you see is - when you look at where freeways were built across the country, they almost always went through Black or Brown or poor neighborhoods - because that was where there would be the least political resistance to building it. And they oftentimes would get a little more convoluted in the route to avoid wealthy neighborhoods. So it's worth thinking about that - would you - and take a look at where the, take a look at the property values near big bustling highways and the ones further away. I'm not talking about downtown, which has its own economic thing - but even there, the properties right next to the highway were the last to develop. And the ones that are a few blocks away developed faster. And if you look at Seattle, the wealthiest neighborhoods are the furthest from the highway. So we built a system that was designed to speed people in and out of the city at the expense of other people. And the equity issues are really tremendous. And South Park - it's a textbook case, really, of that - when you see all the highways going through South Park. And then of course they're under the airport and everything else - under the airport flight routes. So you'd like to think that decisions about how to build a transportation system and how to route highways and all the rest were based on rigorous analysis of the data - what's the most public good we can generate from this. And certainly we dress it up that way - that there's a plan and it was done for a certain way. But anytime you dig into it, you found that it's really a reflection of who did have power in the political system at the time and who did not. So we speed the commute of people from wealthier places and we subsidize that with the lungs and health of poor people where those highways go through. And if it were your neighborhood, you wouldn't stand for it. So of course South Park would like to see it removed. And we're talking about SR 99 here, right - which is kind of a weird route - it's not 509, but they intend to extend 509 to connect with I-5 right now. This is underway. And when that connection is complete - they've been working on this for years - they call it now the Puget Sound Gateway Project, used to be called the SR 509 extension. It's been labeled nationwide as a highway boondoggle - it's a nationally known highway boondoggle - the 509 extension. That's gonna siphon off tens of thousands of cars a day from I-5 to send them to a back way into Seattle, which is not gonna be that fast 'cause that back way is gonna run right into the First Avenue South Bridge, which is always backed up. And so where will that traffic jam be - at the First Avenue South Bridge? It's gonna be in South Park again. I mean, honestly - WSDOT should rip out 99 just as an apology for building the 509 extension 'cause they're actually making it worse right now. [00:17:55] Coté Soerens: So you do have, yes - the equity issues are so blatant when you look at the highway grid in Seattle. Even if you have wealthy neighborhoods next to the I-5, you have sound barriers and other appropriate ways to mitigate the effects of it. But there are things in the history of this particular portion of the highway that are really painful. For example, the land upon which it was built - it was conveniently left vacant by the Japanese internment. Much of that land was built on homes that belonged to Japanese farmers. There is a house actually that was transported from South Park to the Hiroshima Museum of the Japanese-American Experience. So there are these undertones to this highway that, in a way, make it a monument to racism. And as we are removing monuments across the country, this one might be one of the ones that we can remove. But also what I find very concerning is the lack of imagination - 'cause that's also part of it. I don't see anybody at Department of Transportation being - Hey, let's be as racist as we can. I think it might be, it is often an issue of - We know to do highways, so we're going to just do highways. And when it came to the decision of building this portion of 99 across South Park, the history of it tells us the story of residents making their case that it shouldn't be built. And Washington State Department of Transportation said - Yeah, we know, but we already started. We have the plans, we're about to start, so we're gonna do it anyway. And it was supposed to be a federal highway, but it was so underutilized - as it is today - that nearly six years later, six years after its completion, it was demoted from a federal highway to a state route, which to us is a smoking gun right there. Yes, it's a very irrelevant piece of highway in the grid. The need for a new imagination, the need for people to think of a better way to live life that does not rely on highways and to be able to invite departments of transportations across the nation to think differently about transportation - I think that's a really great opportunity that this movement has. And I think that Pete Buttigieg has really, really done the movement a favor in the sense of making this idea more mainstream in ways. There is a lot of room to grow, of course, with the Reconnecting Communities Initiative, but I'm actually hopeful about the ability of people in communities to think of new ways about how to build their communities. I'm really hoping that this is a good means for neighborhoods and cities to think differently. [00:20:34] Crystal Fincher: Now, I want to talk about the how of this really - 'cause there's still a lot of people, and a lot of the general conversation for people who don't follow this for their job is - Hey, you know what? You just said that this highway will take some pressure off of I-5 and man, I'm sick of sitting in traffic on I-5. So isn't that a positive thing? And wow - this is supposed to connect people and help people get from A to B faster? What does it mean to remove a highway? Does nothing go in its place? Where do those cars go? Is it going to be a burden for everyone? How do you answer that, Mike? [00:21:12] Mike McGinn: Well, the first thing you have to realize is that we've created - if the idea was that by building a freeway system through populated places, we would make transportation work really smoothly - I think we got about 50 or 60 years of evidence that it's a failure. Any economically successful place cannot possibly accommodate all of the mobility needs of its residents through limited access freeways and through single occupancy vehicles. And it's not a question of ideology or even climate or health or anything else - it's really just a question of geometry. A car that holds 1-1.5 people per trip on average - there's not enough room for all the cars, which is why we also saw so many downtowns kind of get the parking crater around their downtown office buildings, where you got - parking lots had to be built to accommodate all the vehicles. And it's not something that can be met. The other thing you do when you do a system like that is you really encourage everybody to sprawl out over the landscape. Whereas before you needed to be within a closer proximity for transit to work, or maybe walking to work, or streetcars to work - now you can live in more distant places. So those freeways then fill up again, 'cause what you've done is you've filled up the landscape with people that have to drive, right? They have to spread all over the place. So now once you do that for 50 or 60 years, as we've done, it's kind of reasonable for people to go - Well, how could you do something differently? We're now at a point where people, for most of them in their lifetimes, have not lived in an environment in which that wasn't true. But we can look at other places around the globe, or we can look at smaller units of our country, and see where many more people are moved by a combination of walking, biking, and transit - particularly if you put the housing closer to the destinations. So that's what we haven't done. Now, what we've seen, now let's just - now that may sound all pie in the sky. Well, that'll take forever to build all that transit and do all that housing. But let's take a look at SR 99 on the waterfront. How many times did we talk about the Carmageddon that would come when the viaduct closed, as it did for lengthy periods of time for construction reasons, and it never materialized. And it didn't materialize because actually a lot of those auto trips are by choice. People could choose a different time of day. They could choose a different place to go. They could combine trips, or they could choose an alternative like transit. So what you saw every time the viaduct was closed was that in fact, everything worked a little more smoothly, believe it or not, because people - it turns out people have brains and they will not mindlessly drive into traffic and they will adapt their behavior. And that's what we see happen again and again - not just on the Seattle waterfront, but every place this is predicted. And those cities that have removed highways, what they find is that the Carmageddons don't materialize, but they regain this land just as Coté was talking about. They regain this land for, really, all these other great purposes. One of the best purposes would be housing - what we know is so many people - our young people, our immigrant and refugee communities, our Black and Brown communities that have been lower income communities, service workers pushed out of the city by higher housing prices. What if we started investing those dollars in making it easier for people to drive from further and further away? We say easier, but you got to own a car for that. You got to pay all the expenses of that. What if instead we put people closer where they could actually use transit and could be taxpayers in the city? What a crazy concept, right? Okay, so for all you fiscal conservatives out there, WSDOT isn't paying taxes to the City of Seattle for all that land. So if you're a fiscal conservative, you should love this idea because you bring a bunch of new housing in there - you got sales taxes, you got property taxes, you've got all the other taxes that people who live in a city pay as taxpayers - and you have all the economic activity that goes along with that. And you've reduced household expenses because people can live in a place without a car. This is - the fiscal prudence of this alone - if you are not convinced by health or climate or anything else, if all you do, if all you care about is hard line, bottom line, dollars and cents considerations, the last thing you want to do is invest in a freeway through a populated part of your town. [00:25:52] Coté Soerens: That's why this is such a great idea because you have arguments on every side. So yes, we do need - there are more progressive causes that are pushed by these initiatives such as affordable housing and environment. But also fiscally - I really - I'm worried about seeing the City of Seattle consistently spend hundreds of thousands of dollars on mitigation strategies to deal with this highway - that is underutilized. One of the reasons we decided to move forward with this Hail Mary initiative - let's see if we can pull it off - was when we saw the traffic counts. Hey, this is not something that is necessary to anyone we are aware of. Again, there is a feasibility study underway, but so far with the data we have, we calculated that it would maybe add 7 minutes to a commute, which again - compare 7 minutes to 13 years of life expectancy of children. This is the youngest neighborhood in Seattle, but nothing in the built environment will tell you that. Most children live per square foot in South Park than anywhere else in the city. Also there is - particularly in South Park, because of the disinvestment that the City has practiced over South Park - because they want it to be industrial, so we have like 100 years of disinvestment on affordable housing and other amenities - and we pay the same taxes. There are people - the residents in South Park have consistently had to organize to make things happen in this neighborhood. So you have generations of immigrant families who have really put sweat equity in the development and livability of South Park that now are being pushed out. That to me was a tragedy and something I felt we needed to do something about. So making more land available in this neighborhood for families who have invested their lives here to be able to remain and thrive in place - that, to me, is a big win that this project could bring, among other things. But I love what you said, Mike, about the fiscal aspect of this - the amount of revenue that we will bring as far as property taxes, businesses. Somebody at the Legislature, Washington Legislature, mentioned this opportunity cost that I thought it was a really important point when we think about land being used for cars. [00:28:06] Crystal Fincher: Yeah, really for cars versus the community. And you're right, it absolutely makes a humongous difference. It is absolutely fiscally responsible and it has a stimulative effect to the local economy. There's just a - gosh, I'm trying to remember this study - I'll find it, I'll try and put it in the show notes resource section. But there was a study done for local business owners, who we all - who employ most people in cities, small businesses employ most people in the area - and they asked them to estimate how many people arrive to their stores and shops via car, versus via foot, on bike. And they all overestimated how many people arrived by car to the tune of 4-5x as much. They estimated 60, 70, 80%, and it was uniformly under 20%. I think people underestimate how much a community connection makes a difference to the local and regional economy. And that's absolutely something that makes a difference. I live in an area close to a freeway that really cuts us off from a significant portion of the city, or just makes it really, really inconvenient. And is a 5 minute detour by car, is a 20 minute detour to 30 minute detour to walk around - and just walk across the street, walk three blocks one way, if there was not a freeway there. What does it mean to South Park? And you talk about the opportunity with the additional land - South Park is, as you said, the youngest neighborhood in Seattle with almost a third of the residents being under 18. What will it mean to kids and families, and really the future of this area and region, to be able to reclaim that space? [00:29:54] Coté Soerens: Well, we'll see because - so something that is really important to mention is that the process that we're engaged in right now is a community envisioning process - to provide the opportunity to South Park residents to say what ought to happen in these 44 acres. So we have - because we're part of this neighborhood and we've heard people speak for years - we have a hunch that it will be about affordable housing, first and foremost, but also places for children to play. Infrastructure for kids is not great, and it's actually - compared to other places in Seattle - it's upsetting to see the quality of the community center and the playgrounds. Again, I have three school-aged children and I have stories about the places they have access to play, or the places we have access to bike. It's very dangerous to bike, to connect from South Park and other places. So the opportunity of these 44 acres - to actually let the neighborhood have a say on what the built environment should look like - I think it's incredibly powerful. And it's one of the benefits of engaging a whole neighborhood into a community envisioning process, which now we have just started the contract with the City to begin this process. There will be three or four big meetings and we have partnered with very skilled community organizers and - that do understand the importance of clear communications across the neighborhood and the ability of people to say their opinion in an equal playing field with others about what ought to happen in this 44 acres. In the Reconnect organizing team, we have shied away from saying what needs to happen because we are basically quarterbacking the project. We are kind of bringing the resources together and bringing the platform together, but the conversation needs to occur within South Park by South Park people. So I have opinions about what I would like to see on this 44 acres, but I think the most powerful work will happen when everyone in the neighborhood is given the chance to say - I would like this to happen, or I'm concerned about that. There's some people who are concerned about - Hey, if we shut that portion, then will the traffic be diverted to 14th Avenue South? How are we going to deal with that? Those are all incredibly important questions. So what is important right now - the way we see it at Reconnect South Park - is the dialogue. How are we able to host a democratic dialogue within the neighborhood is the most important. And then at the end, the story of government completely ignoring the voice of the residents and not being accountable to it, does the story want to change? And also we, as residents, also can use a dose of imagination as well. 'Cause for many of us, it's been like - Oh, there is a highway there, whatever. No, hey - you deserve better. So engaging people in that conversation - that I think it's - I'm a retired therapist, so I see things as therapeutically speaking. So I think that's a nice therapeutic process for this neighborhood's healing. [00:32:56] Crystal Fincher: Excellent. That makes complete sense. So as we get close to drawing this conversation to a conclusion - Mike, for people who are looking to get involved, who understand the importance, or just want to make their voice heard here - how can they get involved? And also as importantly, as we consider the several city council candidates - including in District 1 in Seattle, which includes South Park - what should we be looking to hear from those candidates, and how can we hold them accountable to listening and serving this community? [00:33:33] Mike McGinn: Well, the question answers itself, doesn't it? But let's just first start by saying - to celebrating the fact that there is now a grant from the federal government to study this, the Reconnecting Communities grant. But a study is a long way from success. And there will be powerful interests locally that will fight to maintain the highway. We're already hearing from the Port that somehow or another this is essential to them, but I'm sure they're not prepared to pay the costs of all of those shortened lives. It's not worth that much to them. So I think you do have to understand that there will be a fight here. And you'll never be able to push this through the State Legislature in that fight without strong local champions. So first of all, support Coté and everybody down there in South Park in the effort. It's gonna take public demand. Second, let's get people on the record. Do we need a highway in South - do we need that SR 99 in South Park? Get them on the record. And I really think it's not just the city council candidates, but the mayor as well. 'Cause if you can get the City united around that, there'll be a fighting chance with WSDOT. But that's gonna be extremely difficult - because let's be really clear that it is not just the Port businesses. It's a lot of labor unions down there at the Port too that believe in this stuff. They've still got 1950s and 60s outdated notions of what should happen and that highways are good. So against that combined political might, it's really gonna take a significant public demand to move elected officials. And now's the best time to make those demands as elections are occurring. [00:35:11] Crystal Fincher: Thank you for listening to Hacks & Wonks, which is co-produced by Shannon Cheng and Bryce Cannatelli. You can follow Hacks & Wonks on Twitter @HacksWonks. You can catch Hacks & Wonks on iTunes, Spotify, or wherever you get your podcasts - just type "Hacks and Wonks" into the search bar. Be sure to subscribe to the podcast to get the full versions of our Friday almost-live shows and our midweek show delivered to your podcast feed. If you like us, leave a review wherever you listen. You can also get a full transcript of this episode and links to the resources referenced in the show at officialhacksandwonks.com and in the episode notes. Thanks for tuning in - talk to you next time.

In this episode: A final wrap-up of housing industry legislation of interest to multifamily owners and developers in Washington State A roundup of development and transaction news from around the state A new tenant rights group has formed in Whatcom County, threatening lawsuits and legislative initiatives

On this week-in-review, Crystal is joined by political consultant and urban farmer, Heather Weiner. They talk about the newly uncovered messages that reveal former Seattle mayor Jenny Durkan allegedly ordered the abandonment of SPD's East Precinct, where the “Blake fix” stands after its failed vote in the legislature, the remaining need to address renter protections after the legislature passed major legislation to address the housing supply and affordability crisis, the success of the King County Crisis Care Centers levy, and the failure of the Kent School District bond underscoring the need for bond reform and for putting school measures on primary and general election ballots. As always, a full text transcript of the show is available below and at officialhacksandwonks.com. Find the host, Crystal Fincher, on Twitter at @finchfrii and find today's co-host, Heather Weiner at @hlweiner.   Heather Weiner Heather Weiner (she/her) is a political consultant with 30 years of experience on labor, environmental, LGBTQ, racial justice, and reproductive rights issues. She focuses on ballot initiatives, independent expenditures, legislative, union organizing and contract campaigns. She's a recovering lawyer.   Resources Teresa Mosqueda, Candidate for King County Council District 8 from Hacks & Wonks   ““Please Stop on the Teams Chat”: New Records Expose Mayor Durkan's Role and Others in Abandonment of East Precinct” by Glen Stellmacher from The Urbanist   “WA Legislature fails to pass new drug law; special session likely” by Joseph O'Sullivan from Crosscut   “No Clear Path Toward Criminalizing Drugs in Washington” by Ashley Nerbovig from The Stranger   “5 big things Washington's Legislature passed in 2023” by Melissa Santos from Axios   “Final state transportation budget boosts funding for highways, ferries, traffic safety and the Climate Commitment Act” from Washington State House Democrats   “Washington Legislature increases support for free school meals” by Griffin Reilly from The Columbian   “Washington State Rakes In Revenue From Capital Gains Tax” by Laura Mahoney from Bloomberg Tax   “Voters approve King County's crisis center levy” by Michelle Baruchman from The Seattle Times   “Voters turn down Kent School District bond measure” by Steve Hunter from The Kent Reporter   Find more stories that Crystal is reading here   Transcript [00:00:00] Crystal Fincher: Welcome to Hacks & Wonks. I'm Crystal Fincher, and I am a political consultant and your host. On this show, we talk with policy wonks and political hacks to gather insight into local politics and policy in Washington state through the lens of those doing the work with behind-the-scenes perspectives on what's happening, why it's happening, and what you can do about it. Be sure to subscribe to the podcast to get the full versions of our Tuesday topical show and our Friday week-in-review delivered to your podcast feed. If you like us, the most helpful thing you can do is to leave a review wherever you listen to Hacks & Wonks. Full transcripts and resources referenced in the show are always available at officialhacksandwonks.com and in our episode notes. If you missed our Tuesday topical show, I chat with Teresa Mosqueda about her campaign for King County Council District 8 - why she decided to run, the experience and lessons she wants to bring to the County from serving on the Seattle City Council, and her thoughts on the major issues facing residents of the County. Today, we are continuing our Friday shows where we review the news of the week with a co-host. Welcome back to the program, friend of the show, today's co-host: political consultant and urban farmer - who now even has chicks - Heather Weiner. [00:01:26] Heather Weiner: Hi, Crystal - so nice to talk with you again. [00:01:29] Crystal Fincher: Nice to talk with you again. I guess I should clarify - chicks as in mini-chickens. [00:01:32] Heather Weiner: Well, I have had many chicks, but now I'm married. Yeah, I have four baby chicks in my office right now under a heat lamp - getting them settled and we'll move them out to the henhouse probably in about five or six weeks. So you may hear a little bit of baby chirping in the background here. [00:01:48] Crystal Fincher: A little bit of baby chirping. I did hear the chirps - they are adorable. I actually got a sneak peek and now I want some chicks. [00:01:57] Heather Weiner: Everybody does - you can't go back. [00:01:59] Crystal Fincher: Yes, yes, yes. Okay, I guess we'll start out talking with the news that broke yesterday on a long-standing story - stemming from the abandonment of Seattle PD's East Precinct, which happened in the middle of the 2020 protests amid a lot of controversy - sustained abuses and excess physical abuse by police against protesters and residents of the City. And in the middle of that, the abandonment of the East Precinct - which was at first almost tried to, spun as protesters forced them out - lots of hyperbole on Fox News and conservative media, all that kind of stuff. But for quite a long time, they said they had no idea who made the call to abandon the precinct. [00:02:48] Heather Weiner: But you know that Spiderman meme - where the Spiderman is, all the three Spidermans are standing in that triangle pointing at each other? This was a live-action Spiderman meme where we just had all of these high-ranking officials, high-paid officials within Seattle City government and the department pointing at each other and saying - It's your fault. No, it's your fault. No, it's your fault. But look at this news from internal chats that are coming within the Seattle IT department - who know better than to delete their text messages and their chats - saying the order came directly from Durkan, at exactly the same moment that Chief Best, then-Chief Best, was telling reporters there's no order to evacuate the East Precinct building. So liars are lying. [00:03:31] Crystal Fincher: Yeah, so it turns out Jenny Durkan ordered the Code Red and wow, there's been a lot of obfuscation about this. And even in these - in this records request and what was released - it is clear they are bending over backwards to avoid discussing this in a disclosable way, to avoid discussing this in a way that would be illuminated by issues like this. But they didn't get everyone in on the conspiracy in time. However, they did catch someone being like - Hey, hey, hey, hey, don't discuss this on the Teams chat. [00:04:01] Heather Weiner: Right. It literally says - Do not discuss this on the Teams chat - which was revealed in the public disclosure request. [00:04:07] Crystal Fincher: Absolutely, and - [00:04:08] Heather Weiner: I wonder why all those text messages between Best and Durkan were lost forever. [00:04:13] Crystal Fincher: Lost forever. [00:04:14] Heather Weiner: Oops, I dropped my phone in saltwater. [00:04:17] Crystal Fincher: And there's still an ongoing investigation into that. As a reminder, public employees can't delete records, not disclosable records. And this may be something for - we've talked about this before in the program - but for people outside of government, outside of politics, outside of that world may be like - Texts, they're deleted. I delete texts all the time. Everyone in the public sector knows that you don't do this. There are people in positions who handle these. You're constantly getting - Hey, this request came, do you have this document? Or where was this? We're responding to this. This is a regular course of business, and they clearly were trying to hide what was happening. Big controversy - texts from Carmen Best, from Mayor Durkan were deleted. Mayor Durkan is a former federal prosecutor who has been living in this world forever, who had to be retrained even on prior issues when she was with the City. And then those mysteriously deleted texts, which looks more and more like they were intentionally deleted in order to hide this information. [00:05:19] Heather Weiner: And now former Chief Best is now directing security at Microsoft, right? She got a nice hefty landing pad there for when she left. And so despite the fact that her veracity and her transparency are now deeply in question, she is getting paid - I'm going to say a lot of money - [00:05:38] Crystal Fincher: Oh, a ton of money. [00:05:39] Heather Weiner: -working across the water for Microsoft. I saw former Mayor Durkan at LAX a couple of weeks ago walking by and I have to say - [00:05:48] Crystal Fincher: I was about to be like - in Seattle? I could just see her - [00:05:50] Heather Weiner: No, at LAX - she was walking at LAX. [00:05:51] Crystal Fincher: Yeah, that doesn't surprise me at all. [00:05:53] Heather Weiner: I just kind of stopped and looked at her. Of course, she didn't recognize me - who would? But I just - [00:05:57] Crystal Fincher: I would, Heather Weiner. [00:05:58] Heather Weiner: Ah, thank you - how many five foot tall - anyway, I'm not going to put myself down. So anyway, I did see her walking by and I did almost want to walk up to her and be like - What were you thinking, lady? But I didn't - nobody's happy transferring planes at LAX - even somebody who did that, I don't need to heckle them. It's also super interesting because there are so many lower-level employees, whether they're employees of the Seattle Police Department or Parks Department or wherever, who know that they will lose their jobs if they delete emails, text messages, anything that is subject to public disclosure requests. And so to have your highest ranking people doing that - you know who has not been mentioned in any of this is the current Chief of Police, who was an Assistant Chief at that time. How is, how, I'm always curious about why Diaz somehow was either not included in this chain, or hasn't ever been implicated in what's going on here. Was he just really - just not involved at all? That's crazy to me. [00:06:56] Crystal Fincher: I have no idea. Also haven't seen his name mentioned in this, but - [00:07:00] Heather Weiner: No, I know. I've asked reporters - Is Diaz literally nowhere here, or did he just do a spectacular job of cleaning out his records? [00:07:08] Crystal Fincher: Yeah. [00:07:09] Heather Weiner: Don't know. [00:07:09] Crystal Fincher: Don't know, but this is the saga that won't end. And to your point, this is really about accountability. This is about - do rules apply to everybody, and do people - do public servants have an obligation to the people? [00:07:22] Heather Weiner: You're starting to make a case now about what's happening in the State Legislature with transparency there, and where reporters and open government folks are really putting a lot of pressure on the State Legislature to open up their records. And legislators say - Look, I can't make decisions, I can't go through drafts, I can't do any of this - if I feel like all of it's going to be subject to public scrutiny when it's not final yet. It's legal - involving lawmaking, so therefore it is protected under legal exemptions. What do you think about that? [00:07:52] Crystal Fincher: I wonder why that's different than any of the other legislative bodies, like city councils across the state or county councils, who have more generous and open transparency policies. And again, this is happening on the public dime. There is a measure of accountability here, especially when so consistently through these records requests, we find out such egregious information. Just as a reminder - it wasn't any external investigation, it was a public records request that - in the City of Kent - uncovered that there was a Nazi assistant police chief. And that is a literal statement - literal Nazi, with Nazi symbols, and a Hitler mustache, and literally all of that - that only came to light because of public disclosure requests. And in this time where we have so many fewer reporters covering what's happening across the state and they only make it to the biggest things because they're stretched that thin, transparency becomes even more important. Because there may not be someone there to answer the questions, to cover how something came to be - this is our only record of how it came to be. And people should see who is influencing policy. [00:08:58] Heather Weiner: Right, and how the sausage was made. Listeners, you will be shocked to hear that good and bad politicians out there get around this by using their personal phones. Now, they're not supposed to use their personal phones for official taxpayer funded business, but they do. And so even if we did get a lot of those text message records about what was happening around the East Precinct, one can imagine that probably there was a lot of conversations going on - unrecorded conversations on the phone, in person, undocumented conversations, but also conversations on personal cell phones. Now again, I just want to point out - if any other lower-level employees were caught doing this, they would be fired, right? Cops would be sent to OPA. All kinds of things would happen. But when you're a higher-level political appointee, apparently, you get off scot-free. [00:09:41] Crystal Fincher: You do. [00:09:42] Heather Weiner: Speaking of cops - you want to talk about the Blake - what's happening with Blake, and what's happening there? [00:09:49] Crystal Fincher: Yeah, let's talk about what's happening with the Blake decision. So we just had the end of the legislative session - a lot of bills were passed before then, but some of the most contentious bills took 'til the very last day or two to get decided. [00:10:04] Heather Weiner: Last hour. Oh my - as usual - I just feel for everybody working three in the morning, four in the morning. It must be just absolutely exhausting. [00:10:12] Crystal Fincher: Yeah, when the Legislature does that - just the amount of work that support staff have to do to support the entire operation, to keep information moving under these incredibly tight deadlines. They're working so hard and so long. I think - so the Blake fix, in year's time? Time is an interesting thing for me these days. A few years back - yeah, our State - [00:10:35] Heather Weiner: Not yesterday, but also not 10 years ago. [00:10:37] Crystal Fincher: Yes. More than a year ago, less than 10 years ago - which anything in that zone consistently gets confused for me now. Yes. Our State Supreme Court invalidated - basically said the law about personal possession of substances, of drugs, was invalidated - took the law away. And so it instantly made possession of drugs legal. There was nothing illegal to do with the possession that didn't do with anything with paraphernalia, with selling or distribution, all those other peripheral things still remained in place. But for possession - [00:11:14] Heather Weiner: Personal use possession. [00:11:16] Crystal Fincher: Yes. And so under a certain threshold, or thresholds that come into play sometimes in policy with this. So in year before last, our Legislature - this happened during the legislative session, actually. And so they said - Oh my goodness, we can't let this stand. Even though best practices, sound public policy says that our really expensive and damaging War on Drugs has failed and treating substance abuse issues like a public health crisis and problem is the way to make progress in actually dealing with addiction, actually getting people off of drugs and getting people healthier, and reducing all the impacts surrounding that by crime and different things. But our Legislature basically said - We are not comfortable with that, and so we're going to re-institute a penalty - a misdemeanor - add some diversion in there, fund some kind of diversion-root-cause-drug-court-type things across the state. But they put a sunset clause in that law and said basically - Summer 2023, this is going to sunset, basically expire and terminate on its own. And in the meantime, that'll give us time to figure out something else that we want to do, or stay on the course. But the concern about invalidating that law at the state level was that municipalities, localities, counties, and cities, and towns can make their own laws if they want to in the absence of a state law on that issue. So some have said - Well, it's going to be more confusing to have a patchwork of different drug possession laws across the state, which is not ideal. It's not ideal. But the question is - is that more harmful than what this proposed fix was, which wound up being a gross misdemeanor - which is different than a simple misdemeanor and can come with sometimes financial penalties and jail time that exceeds that of the lowest level felonies. And so from a - we have talked about on this show - but jail, carceral solutions, do not reduce recidivism any more than non-carceral solutions. Throwing someone in jail doesn't reduce their likelihood of committing a crime in the future. And certainly in the case of substance use disorder, it does not address any of the issues about that. And all it does is destabilize and usually throw people further into addiction, further away from being able to rebuild their lives and get healthy again. So this debate is taking place, while evidence and data and lots of people are saying that. But you also have people who really advocate for punitive punishment measures. And even though we have spent decades and billions, if not trillions, of dollars on this War on Drugs, domestically and internationally, it's as bad as it's ever been. [00:14:06] Heather Weiner: Yeah, and it's a war on people who have an illness. It is a disease. And it's a public health issue, not a crime issue. And so to put people in jail who have alcoholism - we've already been shown that does not work. It's the same thing with addictions to other substances. It just doesn't work. And in fact, you're right - it makes it worse. So now we see local folks - Reagan Dunn, three of our City Councilmembers here in Seattle - who are proposing instituting their own gross misdemeanor rules in their jurisdictions. And it's going to cost more in taxpayer dollars to house people in jail - who are going through withdrawal, who are going to have massive health problems, and then are going to get out and not have money and not have support - than it would to put them in housing. [00:14:54] Crystal Fincher: Yeah. And to - [00:14:56] Heather Weiner: And if the real problem here is that we, as the public, don't want to see people suffering on the street - how is it that paying more for them to go into jail than to put them into supportive housing is going to solve the problem? It doesn't make any sense to me. It's not a solution. It is painting over the parts of your house that are disintegrating, that are moldy and disintegrating, and they're trying to paint it over instead of dealing with the leak in the first place. Wow. That was a really stretched out analogy. Not sure that anybody should use that. All right, anyway. So it doesn't make any sense to me - you're right. It's political posturing, coming into election time and municipal election time. Yeah, it's going to be super interesting to see how this is used. And the local news media has been doing this, not just here in Washington state but around the country, has been using this fear around people who have a disease - and they are using that as a fear to other people, but also to cause political dissension in our country. And it is not as bad in Seattle as everybody is saying. Yes, we do have a problem, but it is not as bad as what the news is portraying. It is part of the fear mongering. [00:16:10] Crystal Fincher: Yeah, and I don't think there's anyone who really, who doesn't want to do more to address this problem or doesn't acknowledge that substance use disorder is a problem - that we don't want to be seeing this, that it can lead to other things. We all know and understand that. We just want to do something that actually fixes it instead of landing us in the same place we've been for the last 30, 40 years under this War on Drugs, where we just punitively punish people for that. And - [00:16:38] Heather Weiner: For a disease. [00:16:39] Crystal Fincher: For a disease and I - or, there are also people who just use substances who are not addicted and based on what we classify as an illegal drug or not - there are people who drink alcohol socially. [00:16:53] Heather Weiner: I'm one. [00:16:53] Crystal Fincher: Yeah, that's a drug. [00:16:54] Heather Weiner: I'm one. I have been seen with - the fact that the mayor is now proposing open container rules in certain neighborhoods, where people can walk around with open containers - but they're not allowed to be seen with a different substance? Yeah, just the irony, the inconsistency - call Alanis Morissette. [00:17:10] Crystal Fincher: The irony and inconsistency and - look, drug laws, very punitive drug laws have been a major contributor to mass incarceration, to an incredibly disproportionate impact on Black and Brown people. And what we're seeing now. Yeah, I have some thoughts. So one - [00:17:32] Heather Weiner: Do you? [00:17:33] Crystal Fincher: I do. [00:17:33] Heather Weiner: Maybe you should start a podcast. [00:17:35] Crystal Fincher: This should not be a surprise to a lot of people. But this posturing and grandstanding, just - number one, there is talk of a special session. And they're trying to figure out if they can get to a place on this, where they can agree and do something that's actively being talked about. There may be a special session. This has been reported on. So because they're working on this and because people at the county level are talking about dealing with this - all this talk from mayors and city council members is just premature. It's putting the cart before the horse. And it's grandstanding. And it's so plain to see. Allow the people who are working on this to continue working on this. Notice they didn't have any issue with doing that over the past few years. They just recognize that - Ooh, maybe this is an issue we can capitalize on. But I would caution them that it didn't turn out too well for them last year when they tried to bombard, to flood the zone with all of the voter, direct voter contact, media talking about crime and drugs. And they're gonna try and crack down and make drugs illegal again, all that kind of stuff. [00:18:48] Heather Weiner: Look, let's go ahead and let's blame people who are actually symptoms of the larger problem. And the problem is number one, we don't have enough affordable housing. Number two, we have a ton of people who are suffering from trauma and for all different kinds of way - whether it's in the military, in their own households, in their own family. And one of the ways that the body responds to trauma is to try to find a way to not feel the trauma. And that's a lot of what substance use disorder is. Three, we - the Republicans and some Democrats 12 years ago - cut massive funding from mental health and addiction services. And now we don't have enough places for people to go, as we see where the hospitals are overloaded with people who are suffering from mental health disorders. And now the chickens have come to roost. Look, I brought it back to chickens. [00:19:33] Crystal Fincher: There you go. You have brought it back, we're full circle. [00:19:36] Heather Weiner: Brought it back to chickens, to the chickens. [00:19:39] Crystal Fincher: To the chickens. [00:19:40] Heather Weiner: So these are all symptoms of this massive problem. Inslee tried to do something where he wanted to float a massive bond to raise money for housing - that didn't pay out. Some Democrats at least tried to raise some money from a REET on luxury housing and massive buildings that would fund affordable housing - a tax on real estate sales. The real estate lobby killed, the realtor lobby killed that. We tried to get rental caps this year to make sure that landlords, corporate landlords are not egregiously raising rents and causing economic evictions and destabilizing communities - that didn't pass. So let's just crack down on people and put them in jail. Are the jails empty? Is that what's going on? Is there a massive demand? [00:20:20] Crystal Fincher: Oh, totally empty. We're totally not experiencing issues of overcrowding, suicides, deaths from illness, injuries, understaffing - none of that is a problem that they're actively having to spend millions of dollars to deal with and facing lawsuits. No, not a problem at all. But yes, that whole situation is there. So we'll see how this unfolds. But I also want to - some people have tried to characterize this as a Democrat versus Republican issue - on the drug - it is not. This is an issue where there are a variety of stances on the Democratic and Republican side, really. And Democrats control the Legislature and they came forward with a bill, after all the talk and compromise, that landed at gross misdemeanor. The sky-is-falling argument was - Well, we have to do this because otherwise they're going to really criminalize it locally. So this is good enough. I have noticed that no proposal from conservative or Republican mayors or city councils have gone further than the Democratic legislature did. So were they negotiating themselves down? Again? [00:21:21] Heather Weiner: Fair. [00:21:22] Crystal Fincher: And is what we're actually going to wind up with worse than having that statewide? Would we rather have a significant recriminalization statewide, or have lower penalties and more treatment access across the board, or in more places in the state? That's something that they're going to have to deal with, but - [00:21:41] Heather Weiner: When do we think this special session might be called? It feels like there is a hard deadline, right? Of June. [00:21:47] Crystal Fincher: It feels like it, but I don't know. I have no inside information on those conversations or anything. [00:21:53] Heather Weiner: And when they have a special session, they can only address the issue that the special session has been called for. So there's no sneaking other things in there at the same time, which is good. Although there's a lot of things that were left unfinished. [00:22:04] Crystal Fincher: There is. And also legislators don't like special sessions often because it takes them away from campaigning - because they can't raise money while they're in session. [00:22:14] Heather Weiner: That's another reason why we need a full-time legislature and not a legislature where people have other jobs that they have to go do. They're paid so little, they have to have other jobs. And as a result, they just don't have time to do all the things that need to get done. And they don't have time to do it in a really thoughtful way, unfortunately - that things do get rushed. [00:22:30] Crystal Fincher: And that's why we have a disproportionate amount of wealthy and out-of-touch people in our legislators. [00:22:36] Heather Weiner: And white. Yes. And why we keep losing our legislators of color. [00:22:40] Crystal Fincher: Talking about some of the other things you touched on that we were able to see at the conclusion of the Legislature, of this legislative session - certainly, as we talked about last week, some significant movement on some housing bills. But as you mentioned, no relief for renters, which is a major component of keeping people in housing, preventing displacement, and keeping housing more affordable. [00:23:03] Heather Weiner: Yeah. 40% of Washingtonians are renters - 40%. That's a significant portion. And our rents are skyrocketing. There's articles in Crosscut about Walla Walla - retirees who are getting pushed out, they're having to do all kinds of crazy things in order to keep their housing. And a lot of this is because corporate landlords are using algorithms - kind of like what Airbnb does - to jack up prices in response to how the other corporate landlords are doing things. And so I wouldn't really call it collusion, but they are using these formulas to maximize the amount of profit that they make. And as a result, what we're seeing is massive community destabilization. Single parents with children have to move their kids from school district to school district. Retirees, our elders are leaving their neighbors - they don't know anybody around them, they don't know how to ask for help. Our veterans, who may already be facing a lot of challenges, are also being moved and destabilized. It's not good for communities. It's not good for Washington state. And when I see things like in today's news where they say - Half of people are thinking about moving out of Washington state - they don't really say why, but the reason is the rent is too high. It's time for the State Legislature to do something to provide relief for 40% of the state's residents. And I myself am a landlord - I have a small house that I rent out and I 100%, like many landlords, support rent caps and rent stabilization. [00:24:35] Crystal Fincher: Yeah. I didn't even know you were a landlord. [00:24:36] Heather Weiner: Well, landlady. I don't know. It's kind of gendered. [00:24:40] Crystal Fincher: And yeah - I could talk a lot about that. But there are, we are suffering certainly at the hands of big corporate landlords. And they love nothing more than to try and paint all of the landlords - it's we're just little ma and pa, just we just had an extra house, and we're just out of the kindness of our hearts, just being housing providers. Some lobbyists are calling them housing providers. They're not housing providers. They're housing dealers. [00:25:05] Heather Weiner: I know - it's like job creators, right? [00:25:07] Crystal Fincher: Which is fine, but let's call it what it is. [00:25:10] Heather Weiner: Look, the way that the law was drafted, that was supported by the Washington Low Income Housing Alliance, the way that the law was drafted is for the first 10 years of a building's - that a building is, or a unit, is being rented out - there's no rental cap on there as it adjusts to the market rate, figures out what's going on. And then you could always increase the rent once somebody moves out. But if somebody is living in that unit, you can't raise the rent - according to this law, you couldn't raise the rent more than 7% based on inflation and essentially economically evict them. And there is nothing wrong with that. There were lots of landlords who came out - family, mom and pop landlords, like me - who came out and said - Yeah, that sounds completely reasonable. That's what I would like to do. But it's the big corporate real estate lobby that once again came in and killed it. [00:25:56] Crystal Fincher: Yeah - once again. And so I guess what I would say is - there was a big, broad coalition that was put together by the legislators who sponsored this legislation - by organizations, activists, Futurewise certainly was huge in helping to get this passed. I hope that coalition stands up as strongly over the next year - through the next session - for mitigations, for rent relief, for helping people stay in their homes. Because that is as critical to getting costs in line, to keeping people in the communities where they are and their houses where they are, and reducing homelessness. It is as critical - this isn't an either-or - this is we absolutely need both. And so I hope this coalition continues to show up for the communities that have showed up for them and work to get this passed. Also, just want to talk about a couple other things they were highlighting. The budget was worked on until the very end. Democrats are touting investments in ferries, some modest investments in traffic safety. We had the first allocation of funds from the Climate Commitment Act that came in - still need to dig more into that to see where it's going and if they are living up to their promises to make sure that they are centering communities that are most impacted by climate change and pollution. And also workforce investments, workforce equity investments across the board. They did increase the cap for special education, which does increase funding, but not nearly at the level that is needed. There was a bill that didn't make it through that started off as free lunch for everyone, which we've talked about a few times before on this show, which - was a huge supporter of and thinking that - Of course, that totally makes sense. How is this controversial? Unfortunately it was - there was a trimmed down bill that increased access, that increased the number of people that could get school lunch programs. Basically, I think it's in schools or districts that met a certain threshold - if a kid asked for a free lunch, then it could be given to them in those districts. I want to say that it was 50 - I'm just throwing out numbers, but I'll figure that out and put it in the resources and show notes. But it was a trimmed down bill. A lot of good things happened - like many sessions - a lot of good things happened. A lot of disappointing things happen, and we just move forward and we continue to work and we continue to push and we hopefully continue to hold our legislators accountable for the decisions that they're making. [00:28:29] Heather Weiner: Let's have - let's end on a good note, on a positive note. Here's some good news. So article just came out in Bloomberg Tax - I know you read that every morning, Crystal, I know you do - and the new capital gains tax that was passed about two years ago is now finally being collected. The Washington Supreme Court ruled that it was legal and it's now being collected for the first time. There were estimates by policy experts that it would be, probably in the first year, somewhere around $450, maybe $500 million raised from taxes on the sales of huge stock market gains. Doesn't apply to 99.8% of us. And they thought it would raise maybe $500 million. According to the Department of Revenue, $833 million raised for schools, childcare, preschool, and other education. Amazing amount of money. But here's what you got to think about is how rich are people that they are having stock market gains where a 7% tax on their stock market gains over a quarter of a million dollars is raising nearly a billion. That's a lot of money being moved between stocks over there in rich people land. I couldn't believe it. It blows my mind. [00:29:37] Crystal Fincher: It is - absolutely, and more there. So I also hope that the work of the wealth tax picks up next session because it's absolutely needed and we can see how much of an impact that it does make. Also, we had a special election this week. In King County, there were - depending on where you were at - everyone voted on the Crisis Care Centers Levy, which passed. And so we are going to be having five new regional crisis care centers in the County. There are also provisions for helping to boost the workforce, increase the staffing levels in an area that's already really stressed and really hurting for staff. And what was your take on this? [00:30:18] Heather Weiner: I think it's great, but also people are going to come into these crisis centers and where are they going to send them? There's not any housing. So I think it's a great idea. It's a good first step to get people through. But I'm concerned that you're still in crisis at the end of the day. [00:30:32] Crystal Fincher: Yeah, I feel similarly - a lot is going to be about the implementation. We absolutely need more resources. And if this is done well, and if this is done right, it'll be helpful. We have also heard a ton of stories about challenging care, especially when that care is involuntary - when someone is in a major crisis. And so I think it's going to be really paying attention to the implementation of this and making sure that they are following best practices, and that people are treated with dignity and respect, and really the focus is on their healing over everything else. We'll see how it turns out, but I deem it to be a helpful - these are absolutely resources that we need. And we can do this better than we have done it before. And we should - we owe it to everyone to do that, so we'll see. Also, Kent School District had a bond vote, also on this same ballot, that failed. School bonds raise for buildings, for capital expenditures - those races, elections carry a higher threshold to pass a bond. It's 60% as opposed to 50% - which is a big, big difference between 60% and 50%, when you just look at elections across the board. This one actually didn't even make 50%. And I, once again, am begging school boards, people in school districts to stop putting these ballot measures on special election ballots. Put it on the general election ballot. If you must, put it on the primary ballot. But stick to those, especially in a district like King County, when turnout is everything. When it comes to these school levies, school bonds - having them in higher turnout elections obviously is going to increase the support. In the same way that we know in Seattle - if it's a very high turnout election, that's going to be a more progressive election than a really low turnout election. So let's just stop doing this, please. Do you have any thoughts about special elections and school levies? [00:32:25] Heather Weiner: Look, the big thing is we keep going back to the people over and over again to pass what are essentially regressive taxes, whether it's for the school levies or for the crisis center. I want to point out that one of the major funders of the crisis center levy - which I supported - one of the major funders was John Stanton, who is on the wall of shame for his work to kill the capital gains tax, to hit up the taxpayers to pay for his stadium to the tunes of hundreds of millions of dollars. And yet he wants to put a regressive tax on the rest of us. The solution here is not to keep passing, or trying to pass, these little regressive taxes to patch the leaky roof. See, I'm back to that analogy. It is to pass wealth tax and other taxes on the incredibly super rich billionaires and ultra millionaires that we have in this state. [00:33:13] Crystal Fincher: Absolutely. Thank you for listening to Hacks & Wonks on this Friday, April 28th, 2023. The producer of Hacks & Wonks is Shannon Cheng. Our insightful co-host today is political consultant and urban farmer, Heather Weiner. You can find Heather on Twitter @hlweiner, that's W-E-I-N-E-R. You can follow me on Twitter at Hacks & Wonks - that's @HacksWonks. Or you can follow me on Twitter @finchfrii, or on Blue Sky, or basically any platform at finchfrii - that's F-I-N-C-H-F-R-I-I. You can catch Hacks & Wonks on iTunes, Spotify, or wherever you get your podcasts - just type "Hacks and Wonks" into the search bar. Be sure to subscribe to get the full versions of our Tuesday topical and Friday week-in-review shows to your podcast feed. If you like us, leave a review wherever you listen. You can also get a full transcript of this episode and links to the resources referenced in the show at official hacksandwonks.com and in the podcast episode notes. Thanks for tuning in - talk to you next time.

The possibility of a special session for the Washington State Legislature to address the decriminalization of possession of controlled substances has increased following the failure to pass Senate Bill 5536, with Gov. Jay Inslee and some Republican lawmakers in support of the move. https://bit.ly/3NjgC5d #TheCenterSquareWashington #WashingtonStateLegislature #SpecialSession #DrugPossessionLaw #GovJayInslee #RepublicanLawmakers #StateSupremeCourtDecision #DecriminalizedPossessionOfControlledSubstances #WashingtonState #ClarkCountyWa #ClarkCountyToday

The Washington Legislature passed a bill allowing tolling on the Interstate 5 Bridge spanning the Columbia River, despite opposition from Republicans who raised concerns about toll revenue and its impact on southwest Washingtonians. https://bit.ly/43XxBzX #TheCenterSquareWashington #DoubleTaxation #WashingtonStateLegislature #2023LegislativeSession #I5BridgeTollBill #Tolling #Intersate5Bridge #ColumbiaRiver #VancouverWa #PortlandWa #RepublicanOpposition #TollRevenue #ClarkCountyWa #ClarkCountyNews #ClarkCountyToday

On this week-in-review, Crystal is joined by former Pierce County Council Chair Derek Young! They discuss the official end of the death penalty in Washington state, the abortion pill decision from the U.S. Supreme Court, Pierce County & rural students struggling emotionally and socially after covid, how Seattle's failure to act on housing is hurting other cities, and some interesting political races shaping up in Pierce County. As always, a full text transcript of the show is available below and at officialhacksandwonks.com. Find the host, Crystal Fincher, on Twitter at @finchfrii and find today's co-host, Derek Young at @DerekMYoung.   Resources Climate Justice Work with 350 Seattle's Shemona Moreno from Hacks & Wonks   “Washington Legislature votes to repeal death penalty” by Melissa Santos from Axios   “Washington state officially abolishes death penalty” by Lisa Baumann from The Associated Press   “Budget committee weighs Inslee's plan to stockpile abortion medicine” by Jim Camden from The Spokesman Review   “Gov. Inslee buys 3-year supply of abortion pills in case of ban” by Joseph O'Sullivan from Crosscut   “Pierce County students ‘absolutely in crisis' after COVID, say area superintendents” by Becca Most from The News Tribune   “Four Vital Housing and Climate Bills Survive the Washington Legislature” by Ray Dubicki from The Urbanist   “WA Senate passes bill allowing duplexes, fourplexes in single-family zones” by David Gutman from The Seattle Times   “The Battle for the Seattle City Council, Part 1: The Incumbents” by Doug Trumm from The Urbanist   Find more stories that Crystal is reading here   Transcript   [00:00:00] Crystal Fincher: Welcome to Hacks & Wonks. I'm Crystal Fincher, and I'm a political consultant and your host. On this show, we talk with policy wonks and political hacks to gather insight into local politics and policy in Washington state through the lens of those doing the work with behind-the-scenes perspectives on what's happening, why it's happening, and what you can do about it. Be sure to subscribe to the podcast to get the full versions of our Friday almost-live shows and our midweek show delivered to your podcast feed. If you like us, the most helpful thing you can do is to leave a review wherever you listen to Hacks & Wonks. Full transcripts and resources referenced in the show are always available at officialhacksandwonks.com and in our episode notes. If you missed our Tuesday midweek show, Executive Director of 350 Seattle, Shemona Moreno, shared with me how the organization approaches climate justice work through deep systems of change. Today, we're continuing our Friday almost-live shows where we review the news of the week with a co-host. Welcome back to the program, friend of the show and today's co-host: former Pierce County Council Chair, Derek Young. Hey Derek. [00:01:15] Derek Young: Hey, thanks for having me back. [00:01:16] Crystal Fincher: Of course - always appreciate and enjoy having you on the show. There's a lot of news out of Olympia this week - I think we will start with talking about Washington officially abolishing the death penalty. How are you feeling about this? [00:01:32] Derek Young: If you'd asked me this question 15 years ago, I might've had a different answer, but I think it's pretty clear to me now that the system that we had was unjust and that it was not equitably applied. And that was ultimately the reason for that initial Supreme Court case - that said that you can't impose this penalty unless you can show that it's being basically ordered in all cases. And obviously, I think that the final straw for most people was Gary Ridgway - because if you're not gonna use it in that case, which is the worst imaginable, then how can you apply it in others? So we've been waiting for the law to actually be finally changed - because we had basically executive restraint, I would say, in imposing it - but now it's official. And I think it's not only from a moral sense - the good thing - but from a practical sense too. The more - at least I've come to understand - how often people are convicted that are innocent, or at least shouldn't have been found guilty because of defects in the case - you can always let someone out of jail or out of prison. And we see that happen more and more often, not necessarily in Washington - I haven't noticed many cases here - but the Innocence Project has done tremendous work around the country and proving that people were spending decades in prison. And while tragic in itself - if we had executed those folks, they would not have been able to reverse those decisions. [00:03:18] Crystal Fincher: Right - it is absolutely the correct moral thing to do and the fiscally responsible thing to do. As you said, we have not had an execution in Washington State in about 13 years, since 2010. You're right - we've been relying a lot on executive restraint - Inslee pledged to never sign a death warrant while he was in office. The Legislature, I believe in 2014, acted to put a moratorium on the death penalty - this officially abolishes it in the state. And I do think it is absolutely a moral issue. We should not be putting people to death. It's also more expensive, it's also impractical. We have a deeply, deeply flawed criminal legal system. To have death be a consequence that flows from a result, from a system that we know is deeply flawed, doesn't make any sense. For me personally, it doesn't make sense to put people to death from a state perspective anyway. And I hope more of this spreads to more places throughout the country. There are other states who have also outlawed the death penalty - hopefully more continue to do so. [00:04:22] Derek Young: Yeah, and I do think it's good to acknowledge why some people react really emotionally to this. There have been some really heinous crimes committed - certainly we've had our share here in Pierce County that I think really drove the conversation around that - just saying these crimes were so horrific, they deserve the ultimate punishment. And I certainly understand that. At the same time, the outcome is still the same if we ensure that those folks are never getting out, unless we can prove they're innocence. And if they can, then they should be let out. So there is a degree to which - I think we have to try to separate that desire for retribution for some rather horrific crimes, and weigh it with the moral and practical reality and financial realities of the death penalty - which is, it's hard to do, but I think it's important and the Legislature and the governor deserve credit for doing it. [00:05:25] Crystal Fincher: Absolutely. In other important legal news this week, we are today - as we are recording this in the morning - waiting on an expected Supreme, United States Supreme Court decision today about whether to allow restrictions on mifepristone, an abortion pill, to go into effect while a lawsuit brought by anti-abortion groups targeting the pill proceeds. This is going to be a big deal and really goes to show how - even a movement that some people here in Washington, a state that has moved to protect reproductive rights - thinking, Supreme Court, different states are outlawing abortion, but that's them, doesn't really affect us in other states. And if you want to get away from that, just move to another state - this is a states rights issue, and you can move to a different state if you don't like it. Moving to a different state does not necessarily mean that you will not be impacted, and this is a perfect example. How are you seeing this? [00:06:22] Derek Young: Yeah, I guess I should not have been surprised because it had been rumored that there were, there was some judge shopping going on to bring this case. And in fact, from my understanding, is that the organization that brought it literally just invented itself and opened up an office in one particular court district in order to bring this case - so they must've done their homework. But I thought, even more interesting, was that the attorney general and governor appeared to have been prepared for this both legally and practically - the governor had ordered the stockpiling so that we would protect some supply of mifepristone. But also the attorney general, within - I believe it was a day - had a case in front of the Eastern District in Washington and got essentially a counter case in order to try to stop things. I don't think that we can count on a positive outcome 'cause when you have conflicts, eventually these things tend to end up in the Supreme Court. And we know how that Court has been ruling and been behaving lately. But to me, it's just shocking that there would be a judge asserting their own judgment over the FDA in a case like this. And from what I understand from legal experts, it was a wacky case and decision - that there were a lot of assertions that simply aren't true, got way outside the law and into the efficacy and the safety of the drugs - that that's certainly not a judge's expertise. So I don't know - on the one hand, I wanna be shocked, but I don't think we can be at this point. [00:08:09] Crystal Fincher: Yeah, absolutely. And the heart of this is really about whether the FDA is the ultimate authority on this or not. And this is essentially overruling the FDA, which has years of data and studies and experts who deal with this, or a judge who was put in place to handle rulings largely like this in a way that conservatives were confident would be friendly to them and their position. So it's an interesting place. I absolutely applaud Governor Inslee's decision to buy what's anticipated to be a three-year stockpile of mifepristone and think that's an excellent use of our state funds to make sure that we protect women's and people's reproductive rights here in Washington State. It's going to be interesting to see what the result and outcome of whatever this decision is - certainly hope that reason and justice prevails. But as you said, reason and justice has not been prevailing with this Supreme Court, as currently constituted. So I generally do not hold much hope that their rulings are going to reflect what most legal authorities consider to be sound jurisprudence and reasoning. So we're eagerly awaiting. If we happen to get it while we're recording, we will let you know. Odds are it's going to happen later in the day, but we will see. [00:09:33] Derek Young: The thing that gives me a little bit of hope here is that the initial stay by Justice Thomas was extended - that suggests to me that maybe there is some behind-the-scenes dissent, I guess is the right word, that maybe this might even be a bridge too far for some of the core conservatives. I'm hoping that that's the case. But what's unusual about it is that typically the Supreme Court doesn't - when they issue stays, they don't put deadlines necessarily on them - it's when they want to come back to them, they will. This seemed to be tipping his hand that he wanted to rush this and couldn't quite get it together. So I'm hoping that says there's maybe - out of that block - one or two justices that are getting cold feet and maybe realizing that overruling administrators is a bridge too far. If you've ever complained about judicial activism, this is the ultimate judicial activism. [00:10:40] Crystal Fincher: It absolutely is. And not even a borderline attempt - this is wholesale. I know the law says one thing, I know precedent says one thing - but we're doing something different 'cause I feel like it time. Conservatives seem to have no problem with that when it goes their direction. Not what you would call small government, not what you would call a personal freedom and liberty, but here we are. [00:11:03] Derek Young: And it's not like the FDA is known for rushing through things. [00:11:06] Crystal Fincher: Not at all. [00:11:07] Derek Young: My biggest complaint with them is that they tend to be feet dragging and overly cautious. So this is long established - good science behind it. We understand its safety and efficacy. In fact, in nearly all cases, this would be the most, the best method for women to seek out. So I really don't understand the objection. [00:11:34] Crystal Fincher: Yeah, absolutely. This is just about the safest way to have an abortion. If you fit within the timeframes that this is supposed to be taken in, has the least amount of complications out of all of the methods here. It's been in use for decades. Not controversial at all, except for when a moral panic spins this up and here we are. We'll continue to follow this. And again, if we get this decision while we're recording, we'll let you know. Otherwise, you know to be on the lookout for it. This week, we also saw an article in The News Tribune talking about how Pierce County students are struggling after the pandemic. What were your takeaways from this article? [00:12:19] Derek Young: Yeah, it's one of those things that's unfortunately not surprising, but something that we really need to address. And it's obviously not just Pierce County - this is kids all over the country and frankly, the world. The impact to them during the pandemic was significant in terms of their social emotional wellbeing, and it's causing a crisis. And it's not just in our schools - we see it definitely in how they're doing academically - but in their lives in general. And certainly we've seen it unfortunately manifest itself on our streets with kids, at alarming rates, getting into violent situations. And so I think it's good to recognize and it's good to see our superintendents are on top of this. Social emotional learning is something that we worked a lot on even before the pandemic in public health, but the resources are thin. And so that's something that has to be addressed, likely by the Legislature. If we leave this up to local governments to sort out, it's gonna be tough to come up with the kind of resources we're talking about, but it needs to be dealt with because - I think everyone assumes that the problem was just being out of school and going hybrid for that time period. And that's a part of it - for sure - but kids suffered a lot of trauma. I don't think people realize - how many people lost caregivers, or how many of their caregivers lost income - and so their lives were thrown into turmoil at an important time in their lives. And so it's something that we have to hit head on, and I'm glad to see people taking it seriously. I also think it's worth noting the disparity between districts and how some of the rural districts would struggle to handle this on their own. And so it's something that I'd like to see our health departments, with the support of the state, take up and try to ensure that we have resources distributed equitably. I know Councilmember Hitchen, who has been - in her previous life before she joined the County Council with me, was a teacher in a rural high school - and is super aware of the impacts to the kids that she was there to educate. And so she seems to be taking this on, in particular, as Chair of the Human Services Committee and also a member of the Board of Health - I think the Vice-Chair now. So I'm glad to see that folks - after I left - are working hard on this. [00:15:18] Crystal Fincher: Yeah and this is a big issue, as you said, for rural districts. This is a big issue and they're really these - there were administrators from the Franklin Pierce School District, White River, Peninsula, Carbonado and Bethel school districts who got together - those superintendents got together and addressed Pierce County Council's Human Services meeting on Tuesday. They talked about lessons that they learned from the pandemic. Obviously the pandemic was a new experience for everyone at every level, so things didn't happen perfectly. A lot of people learned lessons. One of the things that they talked about was the confusion of navigating through a time where they were getting different guidance from the CDC, state authorities, health departments, and other leadership - whether it's the OSPI or the State - just all these levels of government who were trying to figure things out, but saying different things, giving conflicting information. And really superintendents in schools having to ultimately make sense of and implement that in a very uncertain time - was a challenge. And then they went on to talk about the impacts that the students are feeling that you articulated so well. And that yes, definitely impacts to the academics - reading, writing, math - but the most striking challenges that they're seeing are not academic. They're, as you said, social and emotional. They're dealing with the complications that everyone felt during this pandemic. This pandemic took quite a toll on the community. We talk about huge numbers - over a million people died, tens of millions of people potentially disabled with long COVID and not able to live life in the same way that they were able to before, or work in the same way that they were able to before. And when those are caregivers, when those are people who are responsible for the finances and the income in the family, that is incredibly destabilizing. And so we have these kids who just went through years of destabilization. Some of them were not able to stay in the same place, not able to keep doing the things that they've been used to doing. And it's just a big challenge. And they're seeing the impacts of that and how they deal with each other and how they're not able to emotionally regulate as effectively as they did before the pandemic - understandably. But this now creates a situation where we need to double down on the resources, on the help. This is not a time to be cutting resources in schools as unfortunately, a lack of state funding is forcing a lot of schools to do. But losing counselors, losing school nurses, losing resources, losing places where kids could congregate and teens had things to do - lots of those things were decimated throughout the pandemic, suspended, taken away, have not returned in the way that they did before. And so you have kids who are just floating away and being lost and compounded with challenges in rural areas, like a lack of stable and reliable internet access for many people in the district just creates all of these problems that are manifest. They manifest in our criminal justice system. They manifest in abuse - substance use and abuse. If we don't address this head on, if we don't pour resources and time into trying to solidify the future for these kids, I don't know what's gonna happen but it doesn't seem like it's gonna be good. [00:19:06] Derek Young: No. And I think the thing that is - you touched on something there that I think is really important. The districts were - I will say, as someone who was there at the time - they were doing their best to sort through it. And in this sort of chaotic environment where you're learning something new every day and trying to adjust on the fly, trying to adjust to conditions on the ground - they were doing their best. But I can also understand why they would have some frustration coming out of that. This is a good example of the sort of things - I am annoyed that we are not doing a better job of having some lessons learned coming out of this because there will be another pandemic at some point. If we don't figure out - here's the things that went well and here's went wrong - shame on us. And I had pushed - and Senator Murray to her credit had done so on the Congressional side - to create a joint task force at all layers of government to do an after-action report. For whatever reason, that didn't get into the final bill as something that we were going to push. I thought that it was gonna pass, but apparently there were some objections. And I just think that's a shame because we need some sort of trusted bipartisan report-out to tell us what we got wrong and what we got right. And just to your point on the - all of the experiences that kids had - it doesn't look like the same, it's not the same for everyone, right? You mentioned that we have people with long COVID and such. We also know that this disease causes neurological problems, and that's becoming something that we're more aware of now. I always point to it as - everyone's acting weird, right? We know that people's behavior changed during the pandemic and that's gonna come out in ways that are unexpected - and not only for the kids themselves, but also if your parents have changed in their behavior, that's gonna affect them as well. So it just feels like we need to address this as directly as possible, like you said, because if it's not - we know what happens when young people don't get their needs met. And that tends to be really bad outcomes later in life. So you're better off - financially - investing in the types of resources that will help support them, whether it's social services, some sort of social emotional learning programs, whether it's extra help in schools. I don't really care what that looks like, but it needs to be really well thought out. And it's no different than the impacts of what happens to a person when they lose housing. We know that that trauma lives with them for a very long time, if not forever. And so if you take a step back and say - What if we kept them in housing? Almost always, you're going to save a huge amount of money down the road. So these are kids - they're depending on us to fight for them - let's do it. [00:22:48] Crystal Fincher: Absolutely. And again, we all have a role to play in this, different levels of government have a role to play in this. This is not something that the districts can solve themselves. The White River School District Superintendent talked about how they suffer from a lack of programming and resources, saying that there are resource deserts that lack stable internet access, programming geared towards youth, pharmacies, grocery stores, and public transportation. The Bethel School District Superintendent said there were only three parks in his entire school district - no Boys and Girls Club, no YMCA - with over 20,000 students. No pool for kids to go to in the summer - just they lack resources in the entire community. And of course that's going to impact them. So we'll link this article by Becca Most in the resources in the show notes so you can read it. It's just something that we have to get our hands around. We know that bad outcomes are happening when we don't address this. And if we allow kids to go through this system, we're really cheating them. We're not giving them what we should be, what they're due. We're not living up to our paramount duty, as our State Constitution said, to provide a quality education. And we certainly aren't setting these kids up for success. We can and should invest in this. This article also talks about the increasing needs for special education students. And at a time where our Legislature is still debating about special education funding and whether there should be a cap and maybe not, we do have more kids who need this. This is not just frivolous over-identification - these are kids in need. And of course there's a greater need. So why we're capping that need - I don't know at all - but the need has certainly increased and we shouldn't be punishing, ultimately, districts and kids for presenting with those needs. [00:24:45] Derek Young: Yeah, absolutely. [00:24:46] Crystal Fincher: Also want to talk about the progress that we've made in housing. We talked a bit about this last week, but we have now seen more housing bills passed - four major housing bills have passed. Definitely HB 1110, the missing middle housing bill, passing was big. Also we saw HB 1293, which streamlined some development regulations, which has been cited as something slowing down the ability to build the capacity in housing that we need. Accessory Dwelling Units being allowed under HB 1337, as well as some transit-oriented development. When you think about these housing bills and the progress made on housing, what does this mean to you? Where are we, and what lesson should we take from this? [00:25:36] Derek Young: Yeah, first of all - my thanks to the legislators who worked hard on this, because it was one of the more difficult fights that I've seen in the Legislature. It's taken a couple of years to get these ideas through, not in this exact form, but certainly in something looking like it. And I'll start by saying housing is at the center of almost all of our social problems. And just to take a step back to the example we just used - Bethel School District, for those of your listeners that aren't familiar with it, it's basically that southeast corner of Pierce County. It starts in the urban area, but goes into the very rural areas, like Graham-Kapowsin area. And you could characterize it as - that's sprawl policy that Pierce County had for a number of years - the lack of infrastructure that you spoke about is a direct result of those land use policies. And it pushed more and more people away, but in a pattern of development that's not sustainable for basic services. And so what you end up with is people who are isolated, who don't have access to public transportation, good public services - like you said, parks. And it's really a tragedy. But if you also want to see us reduce vehicle miles traveled - because that's our number one source of climate pollution - if you want to reduce the amount of pollutants going into our waters, if you want to see reduction in housing costs, because it's the number one increased cost in the last 20, 30 years in our region. If you want to complain about inflation, that's the worst part of inflation. All of those things come back to whether or not we're providing enough housing in our urban areas. And frankly, we have a collective action problem. And the reason it's an issue is that you can basically say, each community can say - Well, that's all well and good, but I don't want it near me. And I understand why people have a fear about that - it's fear of change, and I guess that's reasonable. But I will just say that if you think that having someone live next to you with shared walls, like I have, is more of a problem than all of those other issues that I just listed out - I don't think many people would agree with you. But again, we have this collective action problem where at the local level, we're making these decisions, but having this regional problem. So it's really important that this get passed. And I don't think this is going to be - you're not gonna see skyscrapers in Mercer Island next year as a result of this. It's a pretty modest approach and really just allows fourplexes and sixplexes in a lot of areas with access to good transit. And so the advantage here is that we distribute the burden of growth - because I recognize there can be some impacts - but we do so in a manner that makes sense. And also just note that - people may wonder why the guy from Gig Harbor is always talking about urban development. And first of all, I live in a part of the city that actually had a lot of growth, and one of the denser neighborhoods you'll find anywhere. But the more important thing is that if we don't locate the housing for all this job growth that we've had in the region - particularly in King County, by the way - then that will push the market out further and further, and it will destroy more farmland, it will destroy more rural areas, and take up more of our natural lands. So we all have a part to play in protecting what makes this place so special. And that, ultimately, I think is why this passed with pretty tremendous bipartisan support, I will say. And that took a tremendous amount of work. That was - I don't think there was even a majority support in the Democratic caucus for a long time, in either Democratic caucus. So getting to the point where it passed pretty overwhelmingly - it took - to the credit of the principal sponsors. [00:30:32] Crystal Fincher: Absolutely, it makes perfect sense. I will also add that the GMA climate bill HB 1181 passed, which is important to ensure the planning takes place in the way that it should to enable this growth further in the future and trying to sow the seeds for making sure we do make climate-conscious decisions in all of the planning decisions that we make. This is a big deal. I hope Seattle does get its act together because everyone is relying on Seattle getting its act together. As you said, we're all impacted by what happens in the big city. Unfortunately, the big city is lagging behind. Hopefully this legislation from the state will assist Seattle in doing so. Also want to talk about just what you see in Pierce County - lay of the land - what's happening in election land, what districts, councils, positions are interesting, where is control at stake? What are you seeing that's noteworthy out there? [00:31:33] Derek Young: So as you know, this is a municipal election year. So all of the cities, school districts, special taxing districts have their races in this year. In Pierce County - our County Council, like the other partisan offices, are in the on-year election so those will take place next year. So I think you're starting to see these shape up - sometimes the municipal races don't start quite as early as a legislative race. So you may see people pop up during filing week. In fact, I've always thought it was funny that there's sort of a trend of everyone watching and refreshing their filing page - watching to see who jumps in and what race. So sometimes we have to wait 'til filing week. A couple trends that I think it's important to keep an eye on are school district races that used to be, frankly, pretty sleepy and sometimes it was difficult to recruit people to run. It's a volunteer job - thankless in the best of times - suddenly turned very political in recent years. And you've seen around the country how some of this has been weaponized by pretty extreme folks on the right, and questions about what should be taught in our classrooms about our history, about equity. And then frankly, the echoes of the pandemic - about policies that we had to protect students and staff. All of that has really worn on the districts themselves. But I don't think that - I think especially in the kind of more rural and suburban districts, we may see that trend continue where there's candidate recruitment happening to try to install board members who will do things like ban books. I don't know specific races where that is something that we should be keeping an eye out for, but given what we experienced here - like in my school district, in Peninsula, and thankfully was unsuccessful. But they've had more success in other places - I think it's important to keep an eye on that. [00:34:10] Crystal Fincher: Yeah, I agree it's important to keep an eye on that. What do you see in terms of Tacoma and the city council? [00:34:16] Derek Young: So one of the most interesting races - and this is often the case where Tacoma, like Pierce County, has a two-term limit on office. So very often you'll see re-election races not even get an opponent or maybe not a very serious one, but the open seats tend to be where there is a lot of interest. And so the district - I'm blanking on the district number, but the Hilltop District, Hilltop-Downtown-Central Tacoma District - Councilmember Keith Blocker is leaving and he's, I think, done a tremendous job for his community. And there are at least three candidates that I know of now that have shown interest or announced. And each kind of brings their own unique take to how they would approach the office. It's not one I'm engaged in personally, so I don't wanna tout anyone in particular, but that one I think is gonna be the most competitive that I can tell outside or looking in. I know in some of the other city council races, growth concerns are an issue and tend to be what drive city politics - which getting back to that state bill is also why sometimes you have to set some minimum standards so that they don't get in the way of good policy. But I know in my own community in Gig Harbor, but Lakewood, Puyallup, some of the larger core cities outside of Tacoma - they may see similar type races because there've been growth concerns there as well. And this is what kind of creates these conflicts - is that there's a lot of political incentives to try to push back. And so that is always interesting in how it plays out. [00:36:19] Crystal Fincher: It is. We will continue to keep an eye on how those unfold, as you said. During this recording, I've checked to see if anyone new has filed at the PDC - definitely a refresh-a-thon will be going on until the very end of filing week, in May. I think it's May 19th, isn't it? Is that the last day of filing week? [00:36:40] Derek Young: I know it's that week, yeah. [00:36:43] Crystal Fincher: It's that week in May. Yeah, it is, it is. Filing week is May 15th through 19th. So we will follow and see who hops in these races. Also, for a Seattle-centric review, Doug Trumm has started a great series, The Battle for Seattle City Council, with its first part looking at Districts 2, 6, and 7, which each have incumbents in the races. So we'll also include a link to that article in the show notes. And with that, I thank you for listening to Hacks & Wonks on this Friday - every time I say this date, it just is wild how fast time flies. It flies when you get as old as I am, let me tell you. Anyway, thanks for listening on this Friday, April 21st, 2023. The producer of Hacks & Wonks is Shannon Cheng. Our insightful co-host today is the former Pierce County Council Chair, Derek Young. You can find Derek on Twitter - if Twitter is still there - @DerekMYoung, that's D-E-R-E-K. You can find Hacks & Wonks on Twitter @HacksWonks. You can find me on Twitter @finchfrii, that's two I's at the end. You can catch Hacks & Wonks wherever you get your podcasts - I like Overcast as an app, but you can choose whatever you want - just type "Hacks and Wonks" into the search bar. Be sure to subscribe to get the podcast, be sure to subscribe to the podcast to get the full versions of our Friday almost-live shows and our midweek topical show delivered to your podcast feed. If you like us, please leave a review wherever you listen. You can also get a full transcript of this episode and links to the resources referenced in the show at officialhacksandwonks.com and in the podcast episode notes. Thanks for tuning in - talk to you next time.

6am hour -- new example of just how "pro-criminal" the WA Legislative Democrats are, 28 Washington mayors are now imploring the WA Legislature to pass a serious penalty for drug possession, the Democrats track record in Olympia is to make drug possession legal and simultaneously stop the death penalty for convicted murderers, WA gas prices have Spokane area drivers making a run for the border. 7am hour -- Biden Administration is poised to charge mortgage holders with good credit an extra fee to subsidize mortgage holders with bad credit, the Biden Admin. is "making suckers out of those who play by the rules", Tacoma's new RV homeless lot is experiencing problems already, the RV homeless lot is another example of how WSDOT refuses to get serious about blocking and cleaning up homeless/crime related behavior on state taxpayer owned property, GUEST: host of Full Measure, Sharyl Attkisson, previews an upcoming new report on boosting Americans news/media (i.e. political spin) literacy. 8am hour-- GUEST: ShiftWA.org's Randy Pepple, the abject defiance of the Washington Legislature when it comes to getting serious about the current drug possession law (SB 5536), even Tacoma (which voted 80% for Biden in 2020) is toughening its drug possession laws as the Legislature is refusing to do so, why the current Legislative bill is the "Blake fake" and should be voted down, GUEST: WPC's Todd Myers on how to properly celebrate Earth Day tomorrow.

The Washington Legislature passes a semi-automatic rifle ban bill to Gov. Inslee. The Democrats call it "an assault weapons ban". GUEST: our gun-rights "go-to-guy", senior writer for TheGunMag.com, Liberty Park Press, former NRA Board Member, Dave Workman, notes that legal challenge will be filed to the gun ban. The immediate question now is when Gov. Inslee will sign the bill because it has an emergency clause in the legislation that will put the law into effect as soon as the governor signs it. The emergency clause would prevent buyers from initiating the paperwork process for a 10-day waiting period to buy or transfer one of these newly banned guns. A sidebar story: the U.S. ATF Director cant or won't define "assault weapon" during Congressional hearing.

The Washington Legislature has passed House Bill 1240 banning the sale, purchase, or importation of rifles, pistols, and shotguns deemed to be “assault weapons,” although it is expected to face legal challenges from opponents. https://bit.ly/41tBQBK #TheCenterSquareWashington #WashingtonStateLegislature #2023LegislativeSession #HB1240 #HouseBill1240 #GunBan #GunSale #GunPurchase #GunImportation #Rifles #Pistols #Shotguns #AssaultWeapons #LegalChallenge #WashingtonState #VancouverWa #ClarkCountyWa #ClarkCountyNews #ClarkCountyToday

A roundup of final housing bills moving through the state legislature and likely to become law are featured.

Washington state is one step closer to eliminating non-binding advisory votes on tax increases from the ballot, with Senate Bill 5082 passing the House of Representatives and heading to Governor Jay Inslee's desk for signature. https://bit.ly/3MSIflx #TheCenterSquareWashington #WashingtonStateLegislature #SenateBill5082 #SB5082 #AdvisoryVotes #TaxIncreases #2023LegislativeSession #WashingtonStateHouseOfRepresentatives #VoterOpinion #NonBindingMeasures #WashingtonState #ClarkCountyWa #ClarkCountyNews #ClarkCountyToday

The click is ticking today, Tues. March 28th, for the dwindling time to pass a realistic police pursuit reform bill in the Washington Legislature. KVI's John Carlson and ShiftWA.org's Randy Pepple explain the House Democrats decision to schedule a vote on a watered-down version of a bi-partisan reform bill rather than holding a hearing where the public could testify to House Representatives as public safety advocates are urging amendments be added to the existing bill, such as allowing police to pursue suspected stolen car drivers. The Washington House of Representatives are set to vote on this watered-down bill at 4pm today.

GUEST: ShiftWA.org's Randy Pepple explains why Democrats in the Washington Legislature are waiting to act on a major proposal by Gov. Jay Inslee to float $4 billion worth of bonds to pay for a housing plan that Inslee says will reduce homelessness.

On this midweek show, Crystal is joined by Mike McGinn of America Walks and Coté Soerens of Reconnect South Park to learn about their work with the Freeway Fighters Network. Mike shares a broad overview of the movement's efforts to remove crumbling highway infrastructure while addressing the climate, health, and equity issues these concrete structures have caused. As a resident of Seattle's South Park, Coté reflects on the throughline of Highway 99 running through the middle of her community – connecting a history of red-lining, displacement, and racism to the present-day impacts on the neighborhood's livability, pollution exposure, and life expectancy. Mike and Coté call out the lack of imagination exhibited by the country's attachment to highways and paint a compelling vision that replaces underutilized thoroughfares with vibrant, connected communities. As always, a full text transcript of the show is available below and at officialhacksandwonks.com. Follow us on Twitter at @HacksWonks. Find the host, Crystal Fincher, on Twitter at @finchfrii and find Mike McGinn at @mayormcginn and Coté Soerens at @cotesoerens.   Mike McGinn Mike is the Executive Director of national nonprofit America Walks.  He got his start in local politics as a neighborhood activist pushing for walkability. From there he founded a non-profit focused on sustainable and equitable growth, and then became mayor of Seattle. Just before joining America Walks, Mike worked to help Feet First, Washington State's walking advocacy organization, expand their sphere of influence across Washington state. He has worked on numerous public education, legislative, ballot measure and election campaigns – which has given him an abiding faith in the power of organizing and volunteers to create change.  Coté Soerens Coté Soerens calls herself a midwife to a thriving local coffee shop that has become a hub for community organization and activism. Living in the South Park neighborhood of Seattle, Washington, a community filled with immigrants and people of color where opportunities are limited, Soerens felt called to create spaces of belonging. In 2017, while hosting a dinner for neighborhood friends, Soerens realized that, even without secured funding, she had all she needed to create a local coffee shop, where local youth could find employment and where neighbors could meet to discuss local issues and organize. Soerens, along with the neighborhood, has even bigger dreams. Reconnect South Park initiative's dream is to ultimately decommission the highway which cuts the neighborhood in half and to reclaim those 44 acres for equitable development.   Resources Freeway Fighters Network   Reconnecting Communities Campaign | America Walks   Reconnect South Park   “South Park Joins Growing Movement to Dismantle Freeways” by Agueda Pacheco from The Urbanist    “Seattle residents drive movement to tear out Highway 99 in South Park” by David Kroman from The Seattle Times   “Feds award money to study removing Highway 99 in one Seattle neighborhood” by David Kroman in The Seattle Times   Transcript [00:00:00] Crystal Fincher: Welcome to Hacks & Wonks. I'm Crystal Fincher, and I'm a political consultant and your host. On this show, we talk with policy wonks and political hacks to gather insight into local politics and policy in Washington state through the lens of those doing the work with behind-the-scenes perspectives on what's happening, why it's happening, and what you can do about it. Be sure to subscribe to the podcast to get the full versions of our Friday almost-live shows and our midweek show delivered to your podcast feed. If you like us, the most helpful thing you can do is leave a review wherever you listen to Hacks & Wonks. Full transcripts and resources referenced in the show are always available at officialhacksandwonks.com and in our episode notes. Well, today I'm thrilled to welcome two guests to the podcast. The first, Mike McGinn - you're used to hearing him on Fridays, as we do weeks-in-review. But today we are talking about what's in his wheelhouse, really, in America Walks, the organization that's helping to build a nationwide movement to reconnect communities divided by wide roads and overbuilt arterials - that hosts the Freeway Fighters Network, which calls for increased investment in walkable, equitable, connected, and accessible places by divesting from polluting highways. And Coté Soerens with the Freeway Fighters Network - representing a broad coalition of public and private sector leaders, community activists, and multidisciplinary professionals - dedicating ourselves to championing design, equity, and policy principles that center people before highways. Welcome to you both. As we get started, I just wanted to start with you, Mike, and what got you involved with this work? [00:01:53] Mike McGinn: Oh my God, it just depends where you want to start. Probably a big starting point for me was the realization, as a climate advocate, of the role of transportation in climate emissions, which - when I was working in the mid-2000s on Seattle's Climate Action Plan, transportation was 40% of all emissions because we had hydropower. We'd already gotten off of coal. What's fascinating now is that as the nation is getting off of coal, which is great and renewables are the way to go - it's just the cheapest, best way to go - that's now what's happening nationwide. Transportation is now the largest source of emissions. But then once you start getting into it, even the littlest bit, you also see tremendous equity issues, like who has access to the transportation system. Right now it requires a car mainly - and if you have to walk, bike, and use transit, you're denied of a lot of opportunities because we've built a system that's very hostile to getting around that way. And oftentimes it's hostile because it's wide, fast roads, it's freeways that have divided communities, lack of sidewalks, not having bus lanes, they're not prioritizing transit, all of that. So huge equity issues, huge health issues as well. Apartment buildings tend to be, and residences tend to be near those wide roads - and all the pollutants you breathe in has tremendous negative effects on the health of everyone living nearby. And again, that's an equity issue as well. We intentionally do this. You'll hear people argue for this - the apartment buildings belong next to the arterials to protect the single-family neighborhoods. So in other words, the people of lower incomes need to breathe more pollution so that we, in the leafy green neighborhoods, who are better off can breathe less pollution. It's - yeah, the whole thing is just an extreme failure of public policy, and planning, and building for the future. And of course, it's not even a good transportation system. Obviously when you're excluding a huge portion of the population that doesn't drive because of age, because of ability, or because of income - already it's bad. That's not a way you raise all boats, so to speak. That's not a rising tide that lifts all boats. It's something that divides us, but it's also extraordinarily wasteful and expensive. Which kind of brings us back to the freeway work as well. We're at the stage now - and the Alaska Way viaduct on our waterfront was an example of that - where after you've had that concrete structure around for 50 or 60 years, it's ready to be replaced. It's gonna fall down. It's gonna take a big expenditure to replace it. And what more and more places are realizing is - Let's not replace it with another highway. Let's replace it with a surface street, or maybe no street at all. And let's put the dollars we would have spent into rebuilding this inequitable, polluting, climate-changing monstrosity of infrastructure - let's put the money into walking, biking, transit, or geez, how about affordable housing? How about letting people live back in communities again - live near jobs and services? And those are all the arguments. We've had no shortage of arguments - good, really good ones - why we should do this. We're starting to see them take hold, but the US still has not let go of its highway-building mania with all its negative effects, but we are starting to see some cracks, so to speak, in the unity that's been around highway building for decades. And we're actually seeing the beginning of a freeway removal moment, and at the very least, we should be stopping highway expansion, and I get to do that work now at America Walks, too. [00:05:26] Crystal Fincher: And Coté, how did you get involved in this work and why is it important to remove freeways? [00:05:31] Coté Soerens: Well, I got involved in this work by living in a neighborhood that was cut in two by a highway that was never actually very popular. For residents in South Park, this portion - it's a portion of Highway 99 State Route - was fought very proactively by the residents of South Park back in the '50s, but Washington State Department of Transportation at the time decided to go with it anyway. What I do love about this movement of highway removal and walkability is basically the emergence of a new imagination, nationally, around how life should be lived. It seems that if you look at the time that this highway in my neighborhood was built back in the '50s, the imagination then was - Let's expand car availability - and there were different values that were being worked at the time. And now, 70 years later, we want different things as a society, we need different things. We tried the car designs, urbanism, and we have found that it's not equitable, it's also horrible, and also - it's funny - you have to pay a premium for a walking score of 90. Now it's like a privilege to live in a walkable neighborhood. So back to the question how I got involved in this. I've lived in South Park for 10 years. I've raised three boys in this neighborhood and South Park, actually, it's a pretty interesting place in Seattle. It's been a red-lined neighborhood back in - if we get a little wonky with history - back at the turn of the century. And then I feel that I find this history of South Park fascinating because it seems to be a history of government consistently missing out on what residents of our community are saying. It seems like - We hear what you're saying, and yet we don't care. We're gonna move forward anyway. So this story has been replicating itself around this highway. Back in the 1900s, South Park was a farming community - it was its own little town in Seattle. And it was a thriving neighborhood of farmers that actually started the Pike Place Market, which is very famous nationally. And it's always been a community after - the Duwamish were here originally in the ancestral lands - then it's been a community of immigrants, and it's been a community of Italian immigrants back at a time where Italians were not considered white. And in the planning map of the town, of the time, South Park is seen as "hazardous," which is a word that has been used in planning before to say it's non-white. And now that it's environmentally challenged, we see the word "hazardous" and would say - Oh wow, yes, of course, there is a Superfund in it - there is the Duwamish River. But if you go back to the time - no, it was a farming community, which changes the meaning of "hazardous." So at the time, Seattle wanted to annex this little town of South Park into the city with very different expectations than the residents had. So at the time, Seattle City Council thought - Well, there is a river in the park that is really good for industry. So we're going to annex this neighborhood to make it industrial and push out all the residents. The residents, on the other hand, were thinking - Whoa, if we get annexed to Seattle, we can get better permits for our sewer system and other amenities. So they both entered into this "agreement" and with very different expectations. Now, the City of Seattle - wanting to make this place industrial - what got accomplished out of that was the Duwamish River became a Superfund site and then industry was started popping around. And by the time the plans for the highway to cross this residential core were conceived, it was thought of as a very convenient way to discourage the residential - so that we could continue with the work of making this area industrial. So all the protests of the time, in the '50s, of residents were sorely ignored. That highway didn't make any sense and it still doesn't make any sense. It's a very redundant grid. Many people don't know this, but when we talk about removing the portion of Highway 99, people think that we're talking about this other one - this 509 - which is what people use to get to the airport. And it's not that one. You can still get to the airport. It's a portion that connects I-5 and 509 and it goes right connected to it. So I'm totally not answering your question, Crystal, about how I got involved. So the way I got involved was Cayce James and the City at the time, put together a group of people - stakeholders in the neighborhood - to walk around the neighborhood. And we were making different tours of different places around the neighborhood - the community center, the library. And on every stop, people will be talking about problems caused by this portion of the highway. So I remember looking around to my tour partners and saying - Hey guys, you all realize that all these problems go away if you just shut the dang highway, right? And the reaction was a reaction that I often get, which was to look at me and say - Cute, moving on. They really didn't think of this as a viable solution - to just cut an underutilized highway in order to resolve issues such as pollution, safety, lack of walkability, lack of access for kids to their school, and other problems this highway creates. And what that did for me was to see firsthand the problems with the illusion of permanence. People do see a highway and they think it's been there forever and it will be there forever. They don't think about it like - No, this was actually an expression of certain values that we hold as a society, and when our values change, we can also change our built environment. We can change the highway. At some point, I remember Cayce James, who hosted this tour around the neighborhood, reached out and we started talking and she said - Hey, you know what? I've been thinking about this too. I think it's possible to remove this highway. So we started talking and then we got connected with the folks from PlacemakingUS, who I just mentioned this idea - Hey, Madeleine Spencer and Ryan Smolar. Hey, how about - I've been thinking about removing this highway. What do you think? They said - Hey, there is a whole movement across the country on highway removal. And we were connected with Freeway Fighters, and then we started learning that across the country, so many communities were having this idea of reconnecting communities, thinking about land differently, really considering the opportunity cost of having a highway crossing the neighborhood. For us in Seattle, we have had problems with affordability for a long time. The City has not been effective at creating policy that will stabilize the real estate market and actually preserve cultural space, preserve housing, affordable housing - particularly for communities of color. When thinking about this portion of the highway crossing South Park, you can see 44 acres of land that could be utilized in a different way. That, to me, creates a once-in-a-generation opportunity to actually make more land for equitable development. So for all these reasons, I am particularly excited about getting this highway out of our neighborhood. And another thing that I need to mention is that this highway - it's so interesting how it was designed - it goes through every single place where kids play. It goes right next to the community center, the skate park, the library, and the elementary school. It seems to have been designed to cut children's life expectancy by 13 years, which it does. There are studies about this. So I can talk to you for three hours about reasons why this highway needs to be removed. [00:12:35] Crystal Fincher: Yeah, it's really important. It makes a difference. And both of you touched on the racialized history of highways and just the impact that this has on communities, on families, and particularly on health. Transportation is the number one polluter in our state, in our area. And what you just talked about - I feel like sometimes people hear statistics and they don't really apply it to people's lives. But when you talk about a life expectancy that is that much shorter - in Seattle - it feels neglectful. It feels criminal almost. It feels wrong that we know that these types of harms are being forced upon our children. And we aren't taking that into account so often when we have these repeated conversations every single year about what highways we're gonna build, expand, put in. And these are conversations that aren't just - they certainly absolutely started in the '50s and we started that whole domino effect rolling. But now we have the chance to review what we're doing to make modifications, whether it's Highway 99 in South Park, whether it's the Interstate Bridge Replacement between Washington and Oregon. We had this out - and Mike McGinn is notorious and has been pretty much vindicated, it looks like - for fighting against the Highway 99 tunnel in Seattle. But we seem to so easily dismiss the negative harms that this has on neighborhoods, on affordability, on health, on just our quality of life. How do you view just the importance of really taking all of these factors into account as we make these policies, Mike? [00:14:19] Mike McGinn: Well, first of all, I just have to say that as a mayor, you're not supposed to have any favorite neighborhoods. But if I had a favorite neighborhood, South Park would be pretty darn close. I spent a lot of time down there as mayor, but I also spent time there before mayor - my kids played basketball in the rec leagues and I played ultimate frisbee in the schools. And I'd be down there in those playing fields at South Park Community Center. And yeah, you're right next to the highway. And that highway doesn't carry that many cars either. The reason people confuse it with 509 is because it's not really that useful a section of highway, but it certainly carries enough cars for the noise and pollution to be meaningful. And it's also not at all surprising, tragically, that it's a community like South Park that gets a highway like this. What you see is - when you look at where freeways were built across the country, they almost always went through Black or Brown or poor neighborhoods - because that was where there would be the least political resistance to building it. And they oftentimes would get a little more convoluted in the route to avoid wealthy neighborhoods. So it's worth thinking about that - would you - and take a look at where the, take a look at the property values near big bustling highways and the ones further away. I'm not talking about downtown, which has its own economic thing - but even there, the properties right next to the highway were the last to develop. And the ones that are a few blocks away developed faster. And if you look at Seattle, the wealthiest neighborhoods are the furthest from the highway. So we built a system that was designed to speed people in and out of the city at the expense of other people. And the equity issues are really tremendous. And South Park - it's a textbook case, really, of that - when you see all the highways going through South Park. And then of course they're under the airport and everything else - under the airport flight routes. So you'd like to think that decisions about how to build a transportation system and how to route highways and all the rest were based on rigorous analysis of the data - what's the most public good we can generate from this. And certainly we dress it up that way - that there's a plan and it was done for a certain way. But anytime you dig into it, you found that it's really a reflection of who did have power in the political system at the time and who did not. So we speed the commute of people from wealthier places and we subsidize that with the lungs and health of poor people where those highways go through. And if it were your neighborhood, you wouldn't stand for it. So of course South Park would like to see it removed. And we're talking about SR 99 here, right - which is kind of a weird route - it's not 509, but they intend to extend 509 to connect with I-5 right now. This is underway. And when that connection is complete - they've been working on this for years - they call it now the Puget Sound Gateway Project, used to be called the SR 509 extension. It's been labeled nationwide as a highway boondoggle - it's a nationally known highway boondoggle - the 509 extension. That's gonna siphon off tens of thousands of cars a day from I-5 to send them to a back way into Seattle, which is not gonna be that fast 'cause that back way is gonna run right into the First Avenue South Bridge, which is always backed up. And so where will that traffic jam be - at the First Avenue South Bridge? It's gonna be in South Park again. I mean, honestly - WSDOT should rip out 99 just as an apology for building the 509 extension 'cause they're actually making it worse right now. [00:17:55] Coté Soerens: So you do have, yes - the equity issues are so blatant when you look at the highway grid in Seattle. Even if you have wealthy neighborhoods next to the I-5, you have sound barriers and other appropriate ways to mitigate the effects of it. But there are things in the history of this particular portion of the highway that are really painful. For example, the land upon which it was built - it was conveniently left vacant by the Japanese internment. Much of that land was built on homes that belonged to Japanese farmers. There is a house actually that was transported from South Park to the Hiroshima Museum of the Japanese-American Experience. So there are these undertones to this highway that, in a way, make it a monument to racism. And as we are removing monuments across the country, this one might be one of the ones that we can remove. But also what I find very concerning is the lack of imagination - 'cause that's also part of it. I don't see anybody at Department of Transportation being - Hey, let's be as racist as we can. I think it might be, it is often an issue of - We know to do highways, so we're going to just do highways. And when it came to the decision of building this portion of 99 across South Park, the history of it tells us the story of residents making their case that it shouldn't be built. And Washington State Department of Transportation said - Yeah, we know, but we already started. We have the plans, we're about to start, so we're gonna do it anyway. And it was supposed to be a federal highway, but it was so underutilized - as it is today - that nearly six years later, six years after its completion, it was demoted from a federal highway to a state route, which to us is a smoking gun right there. Yes, it's a very irrelevant piece of highway in the grid. The need for a new imagination, the need for people to think of a better way to live life that does not rely on highways and to be able to invite departments of transportations across the nation to think differently about transportation - I think that's a really great opportunity that this movement has. And I think that Pete Buttigieg has really, really done the movement a favor in the sense of making this idea more mainstream in ways. There is a lot of room to grow, of course, with the Reconnecting Communities Initiative, but I'm actually hopeful about the ability of people in communities to think of new ways about how to build their communities. I'm really hoping that this is a good means for neighborhoods and cities to think differently. [00:20:34] Crystal Fincher: Now, I want to talk about the how of this really - 'cause there's still a lot of people, and a lot of the general conversation for people who don't follow this for their job is - Hey, you know what? You just said that this highway will take some pressure off of I-5 and man, I'm sick of sitting in traffic on I-5. So isn't that a positive thing? And wow - this is supposed to connect people and help people get from A to B faster? What does it mean to remove a highway? Does nothing go in its place? Where do those cars go? Is it going to be a burden for everyone? How do you answer that, Mike? [00:21:12] Mike McGinn: Well, the first thing you have to realize is that we've created - if the idea was that by building a freeway system through populated places, we would make transportation work really smoothly - I think we got about 50 or 60 years of evidence that it's a failure. Any economically successful place cannot possibly accommodate all of the mobility needs of its residents through limited access freeways and through single occupancy vehicles. And it's not a question of ideology or even climate or health or anything else - it's really just a question of geometry. A car that holds 1-1.5 people per trip on average - there's not enough room for all the cars, which is why we also saw so many downtowns kind of get the parking crater around their downtown office buildings, where you got - parking lots had to be built to accommodate all the vehicles. And it's not something that can be met. The other thing you do when you do a system like that is you really encourage everybody to sprawl out over the landscape. Whereas before you needed to be within a closer proximity for transit to work, or maybe walking to work, or streetcars to work - now you can live in more distant places. So those freeways then fill up again, 'cause what you've done is you've filled up the landscape with people that have to drive, right? They have to spread all over the place. So now once you do that for 50 or 60 years, as we've done, it's kind of reasonable for people to go - Well, how could you do something differently? We're now at a point where people, for most of them in their lifetimes, have not lived in an environment in which that wasn't true. But we can look at other places around the globe, or we can look at smaller units of our country, and see where many more people are moved by a combination of walking, biking, and transit - particularly if you put the housing closer to the destinations. So that's what we haven't done. Now, what we've seen, now let's just - now that may sound all pie in the sky. Well, that'll take forever to build all that transit and do all that housing. But let's take a look at SR 99 on the waterfront. How many times did we talk about the Carmageddon that would come when the viaduct closed, as it did for lengthy periods of time for construction reasons, and it never materialized. And it didn't materialize because actually a lot of those auto trips are by choice. People could choose a different time of day. They could choose a different place to go. They could combine trips, or they could choose an alternative like transit. So what you saw every time the viaduct was closed was that in fact, everything worked a little more smoothly, believe it or not, because people - it turns out people have brains and they will not mindlessly drive into traffic and they will adapt their behavior. And that's what we see happen again and again - not just on the Seattle waterfront, but every place this is predicted. And those cities that have removed highways, what they find is that the Carmageddons don't materialize, but they regain this land just as Coté was talking about. They regain this land for, really, all these other great purposes. One of the best purposes would be housing - what we know is so many people - our young people, our immigrant and refugee communities, our Black and Brown communities that have been lower income communities, service workers pushed out of the city by higher housing prices. What if we started investing those dollars in making it easier for people to drive from further and further away? We say easier, but you got to own a car for that. You got to pay all the expenses of that. What if instead we put people closer where they could actually use transit and could be taxpayers in the city? What a crazy concept, right? Okay, so for all you fiscal conservatives out there, WSDOT isn't paying taxes to the City of Seattle for all that land. So if you're a fiscal conservative, you should love this idea because you bring a bunch of new housing in there - you got sales taxes, you got property taxes, you've got all the other taxes that people who live in a city pay as taxpayers - and you have all the economic activity that goes along with that. And you've reduced household expenses because people can live in a place without a car. This is - the fiscal prudence of this alone - if you are not convinced by health or climate or anything else, if all you do, if all you care about is hard line, bottom line, dollars and cents considerations, the last thing you want to do is invest in a freeway through a populated part of your town. [00:25:52] Coté Soerens: That's why this is such a great idea because you have arguments on every side. So yes, we do need - there are more progressive causes that are pushed by these initiatives such as affordable housing and environment. But also fiscally - I really - I'm worried about seeing the City of Seattle consistently spend hundreds of thousands of dollars on mitigation strategies to deal with this highway - that is underutilized. One of the reasons we decided to move forward with this Hail Mary initiative - let's see if we can pull it off - was when we saw the traffic counts. Hey, this is not something that is necessary to anyone we are aware of. Again, there is a feasibility study underway, but so far with the data we have, we calculated that it would maybe add 7 minutes to a commute, which again - compare 7 minutes to 13 years of life expectancy of children. This is the youngest neighborhood in Seattle, but nothing in the built environment will tell you that. Most children live per square foot in South Park than anywhere else in the city. Also there is - particularly in South Park, because of the disinvestment that the City has practiced over South Park - because they want it to be industrial, so we have like 100 years of disinvestment on affordable housing and other amenities - and we pay the same taxes. There are people - the residents in South Park have consistently had to organize to make things happen in this neighborhood. So you have generations of immigrant families who have really put sweat equity in the development and livability of South Park that now are being pushed out. That to me was a tragedy and something I felt we needed to do something about. So making more land available in this neighborhood for families who have invested their lives here to be able to remain and thrive in place - that, to me, is a big win that this project could bring, among other things. But I love what you said, Mike, about the fiscal aspect of this - the amount of revenue that we will bring as far as property taxes, businesses. Somebody at the Legislature, Washington Legislature, mentioned this opportunity cost that I thought it was a really important point when we think about land being used for cars. [00:28:06] Crystal Fincher: Yeah, really for cars versus the community. And you're right, it absolutely makes a humongous difference. It is absolutely fiscally responsible and it has a stimulative effect to the local economy. There's just a - gosh, I'm trying to remember this study - I'll find it, I'll try and put it in the show notes resource section. But there was a study done for local business owners, who we all - who employ most people in cities, small businesses employ most people in the area - and they asked them to estimate how many people arrive to their stores and shops via car, versus via foot, on bike. And they all overestimated how many people arrived by car to the tune of 4-5x as much. They estimated 60, 70, 80%, and it was uniformly under 20%. I think people underestimate how much a community connection makes a difference to the local and regional economy. And that's absolutely something that makes a difference. I live in an area close to a freeway that really cuts us off from a significant portion of the city, or just makes it really, really inconvenient. And is a 5 minute detour by car, is a 20 minute detour to 30 minute detour to walk around - and just walk across the street, walk three blocks one way, if there was not a freeway there. What does it mean to South Park? And you talk about the opportunity with the additional land - South Park is, as you said, the youngest neighborhood in Seattle with almost a third of the residents being under 18. What will it mean to kids and families, and really the future of this area and region, to be able to reclaim that space? [00:29:54] Coté Soerens: Well, we'll see because - so something that is really important to mention is that the process that we're engaged in right now is a community envisioning process - to provide the opportunity to South Park residents to say what ought to happen in these 44 acres. So we have - because we're part of this neighborhood and we've heard people speak for years - we have a hunch that it will be about affordable housing, first and foremost, but also places for children to play. Infrastructure for kids is not great, and it's actually - compared to other places in Seattle - it's upsetting to see the quality of the community center and the playgrounds. Again, I have three school-aged children and I have stories about the places they have access to play, or the places we have access to bike. It's very dangerous to bike, to connect from South Park and other places. So the opportunity of these 44 acres - to actually let the neighborhood have a say on what the built environment should look like - I think it's incredibly powerful. And it's one of the benefits of engaging a whole neighborhood into a community envisioning process, which now we have just started the contract with the City to begin this process. There will be three or four big meetings and we have partnered with very skilled community organizers and - that do understand the importance of clear communications across the neighborhood and the ability of people to say their opinion in an equal playing field with others about what ought to happen in this 44 acres. In the Reconnect organizing team, we have shied away from saying what needs to happen because we are basically quarterbacking the project. We are kind of bringing the resources together and bringing the platform together, but the conversation needs to occur within South Park by South Park people. So I have opinions about what I would like to see on this 44 acres, but I think the most powerful work will happen when everyone in the neighborhood is given the chance to say - I would like this to happen, or I'm concerned about that. There's some people who are concerned about - Hey, if we shut that portion, then will the traffic be diverted to 14th Avenue South? How are we going to deal with that? Those are all incredibly important questions. So what is important right now - the way we see it at Reconnect South Park - is the dialogue. How are we able to host a democratic dialogue within the neighborhood is the most important. And then at the end, the story of government completely ignoring the voice of the residents and not being accountable to it, does the story want to change? And also we, as residents, also can use a dose of imagination as well. 'Cause for many of us, it's been like - Oh, there is a highway there, whatever. No, hey - you deserve better. So engaging people in that conversation - that I think it's - I'm a retired therapist, so I see things as therapeutically speaking. So I think that's a nice therapeutic process for this neighborhood's healing. [00:32:56] Crystal Fincher: Excellent. That makes complete sense. So as we get close to drawing this conversation to a conclusion - Mike, for people who are looking to get involved, who understand the importance, or just want to make their voice heard here - how can they get involved? And also as importantly, as we consider the several city council candidates - including in District 1 in Seattle, which includes South Park - what should we be looking to hear from those candidates, and how can we hold them accountable to listening and serving this community? [00:33:33] Mike McGinn: Well, the question answers itself, doesn't it? But let's just first start by saying - to celebrating the fact that there is now a grant from the federal government to study this, the Reconnecting Communities grant. But a study is a long way from success. And there will be powerful interests locally that will fight to maintain the highway. We're already hearing from the Port that somehow or another this is essential to them, but I'm sure they're not prepared to pay the costs of all of those shortened lives. It's not worth that much to them. So I think you do have to understand that there will be a fight here. And you'll never be able to push this through the State Legislature in that fight without strong local champions. So first of all, support Coté and everybody down there in South Park in the effort. It's gonna take public demand. Second, let's get people on the record. Do we need a highway in South - do we need that SR 99 in South Park? Get them on the record. And I really think it's not just the city council candidates, but the mayor as well. 'Cause if you can get the City united around that, there'll be a fighting chance with WSDOT. But that's gonna be extremely difficult - because let's be really clear that it is not just the Port businesses. It's a lot of labor unions down there at the Port too that believe in this stuff. They've still got 1950s and 60s outdated notions of what should happen and that highways are good. So against that combined political might, it's really gonna take a significant public demand to move elected officials. And now's the best time to make those demands as elections are occurring. [00:35:11] Crystal Fincher: Thank you for listening to Hacks & Wonks, which is co-produced by Shannon Cheng and Bryce Cannatelli. You can follow Hacks & Wonks on Twitter @HacksWonks. You can catch Hacks & Wonks on iTunes, Spotify, or wherever you get your podcasts - just type "Hacks and Wonks" into the search bar. Be sure to subscribe to the podcast to get the full versions of our Friday almost-live shows and our midweek show delivered to your podcast feed. If you like us, leave a review wherever you listen. You can also get a full transcript of this episode and links to the resources referenced in the show at officialhacksandwonks.com and in the episode notes. Thanks for tuning in - talk to you next time.

Despite a surprising turn of events Wednesday that saw legislation pass the Senate giving police in Washington state more discretion in engaging in vehicular pursuits, the ultimate fate of the bill remains to be determined. Engrossed Senate Bill 5352, which passed on a 26-23 vote, would let police pursue if they have reasonable suspicion that a person in the fleeing vehicle has committed or is committing a violent crime, a sex offense, a vehicular assault, domestic violence, an escape, or driving under the influence. Amendments to the bill call for extra training and communication with local law enforcement during chases to protect bystanders. --- Listen to Other ATN Productions: America in Focus: A weekly feature of the top TheCenterSquare.com stories of the week out of Washington D.C. with commentary from The Center Square editors and more! America's Talking: An interview podcast hosted by Austin Berg. Guests include professors, journalists, artists, business and nonprofit leaders, authors, and more. Everyday Economics: Join economist Dr. Orphe Divounguy and Chris Krug as they discuss global markets, inflation, and everything else that will help you understand the economic world around you. Future of Freedom: Future of Freedom is a bi-weekly podcast highlighting the work of the non-profits which are shaping the future of the freedom movement. Listeners will hear civil, intellectual conversations about why the organizations exist, what their mission is, and how they work to achieve it. Hosted by Scot Bertram. --- Support this podcast: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/washington-in-focus/support

President of the Republic of Finland Sauli Niinistö made history Monday as the first foreign head of state to address the Washington Legislature.

The Camas boys basketball team is shifting its focus to the possibility of finishing fourth in the state after losing in a Class 4A quarterfinal game against Curtis on Thursday morning. https://bit.ly/3y6tQJD #CamasPapermakers #CamasHighSchool #CurtisVikings #HighSchoolBoysBasketball #WIAA #TacomaDome #Class4A #StateBoysBasketballTournament #HighSchoolAthletics #Class4AGreaterStHelensLeague #4AGSHL #CamasWa #ClarkCountyWa #ClarkCountyNews #ClarkCountyToday

Emergency powers reform legislation also failed to pass in each of the previous three legislative sessions. https://bit.ly/3kC1a8a #TheCenterSquareWashington #EmergencyPowersReform #WashingtonStateLegislature #SentateBill5063 #SB5063 #SenLyndaWilson #BipartisanApproachToLegislativeAuthortyNecessaryInContinuingEmergencies #BALANCEActOf2023 #WashingtonState #ClarkCountyWa #ClarkCountyNews #ClarkCountyToday

Under legislation proposed in the Washington state Senate, drivers would face new limits on when it's permissible to make a right turn at red lights. https://bit.ly/3XoQ3gt #TheCenterSquareWashington #WashingtonStateLegislature #RedLight #DontTurnRight #Legislation #SenateBill5514 #SB5514 #ChildCareCenter #PublicPark #Playground #RecreationCenter #Library #PublicTransitCenter #Hospital #SeniorCenter #WashingtonState #ClarkCountyWa #ClarkCountyNews #ClarkCountyToday

Highlights of bills currently pending in the Washington State Legislature and their impact on multifamily owners and developers are featured.

The Washington Legislature has a lot of prickly problems on its plate. But there's a new one that may be the prickliest of all: Should lawmakers designate an official state cactus? A school class proposed a native cactus for the honor and they now have a sponsor in the Legislature.

KVI's John Carlson and Lars Larson discuss a new bill in the Washington Legislature that would impose new restrictions on when police can pull over drivers. The bill is proposed by Democratic lawmakers who control both the State House and Legislature which increases the likelihood that the bill will advance if not pass at some point this session. The irony is that the bill is proposed just over 5 years after Legislative Democrats and Gov. Jay Inslee approved a "distracted driving law" that forbids drivers to even hold a cell phone. The 2017 law is so strict it's illegal to hold a cell phone in your car while driving even if you're stopped at a red light.

Free college tuition. Free health care. Free metro bus and light rail pass. Now add free K-12 school lunch to the list of free things Democrats want to give away with taxpayer money. KVI's John Carlson and his interview guest, Randy Pepple from ShiftWA.org, discuss the bill in the Washington Legislature that would provide free public school lunch to every student if it passes the Democrat controlled House and Senate. Its believed to be a certainty that Gov. Jay Inlsee would sign such a bill if it passes both chambers. The biennial cost estimate for the free lunch program in WA is $197 million, this bill has been supported by OSPI Chris Reykdal, why this "free" lunch program is more likely to be wasteful than beneficial, why this is another example of the "nanny state" in WA.

Democrats in the Washington Legislature are proposing a bill that would establish a domestic extremist commission. HB 1333 is apparently intended to prevent "well connected extremist networks" in the Pacific Northwest that are able to raise money for bail funds if a member is arrested, according to the associate director of the Anti-Defamation League, Emily Kaufman, who testified recently to a House committee in Olympia. KVI's John Carlson evaluates this proposed bill and speaks to a member of one of the groups mentioned by Kaufman, the Washington 3%ers during this interview segment.

Numerous Democrats in the Washington Legislature are backing a new proposal to make voting in elections compulsory. Citizens are required by law to cast ballots in about 25 counties, but in no other U.S. states. Republicans in Olympia described the idea as "un-American."

KVI's John Carlson urges listeners to support HB 1363 in the Washington Legislature which would revise the current restrictions of police pursuits on criminal suspects.

In a report submitted to Gov. Jay Inslee and the Washington Legislature, the Washington State Transportation Commission proposed a new tax scheme to replace falling fuel tax revenues. http://bit.ly/3GWjFvd #TheCenterSquareWashington #WashingtonStateLegislature #WashingtonStateTransportationCommission #NewTaxScheme #Governor #JayInslee #TollRoads #FuelTaxRevenues #VancouverWa #ClarkCountyWa #ClarkCountyNews #ClarkCountyToday

On this Hacks & Wonks week-in-review, political consultant and host Crystal Fincher is joined by Seattle political reporter, editor of PubliCola, co-host of the Seattle Nice podcast and author of Quitter: A Memoir of Drinking, Relapse, and Recovery, Erica Barnett! They catch up with all of the news out of the legislature this week, as well as Seattle City Councilmember Kshama Sawant not seeking re-election, a dodgy push-poll, South King County pedestrian fatalities on the rise, and lawsuits against the Low Income Housing Institute (LIHI).  Breaking down the flurry of news out of the legislature this week, Crystal and Erica discuss proposed legislation for a wealth tax, middle housing, lowering the blood alcohol limit for driving, limiting rent increases, reducing the disparity between products advertised towards women versus men, alternatives to jail for behavioral health crises, and a potential expansion of law enforcement's ability to conduct vehicle pursuits.  The trend of current Seattle City Councilmembers announcing they won't seek re-election continued this week when councilmember Kshama Sawant revealed she won't again this year. With four of the seven open seats on the council this year without incumbents, this years' election is guaranteed to bring a large change to the city's leadership.  A seemingly non-scientific push-poll designed to show support for a potential ballot measure to fund more police hires and spending was sent to a number of Seattle residents. They use it as a jumping-off to discuss manipulative polling and how it's used to justify unpopular policy. Crystal and Erica also discuss the alarming increase in pedestrian fatalities in the region, especially in south King County. The data supports the need to make wide-spread improvements to our pedestrian infrastructure to truly make our cities safe for people who walk and bike.  Crystal and Erica end this week's show looking at two lawsuits against the Low Income Housing Institute. A former resident has sued the organization, claiming that LIHI illegally evicted them by not giving proper notice. The case hinges on whether LIHI's housing is emergency shelter or transitional housing, the latter requiring stronger resident protections. LIHI is also facing accusations that the conditions of their tiny house villages are not adequate to support their residents. As always, a full text transcript of the show is available below and at officialhacksandwonks.com. Find the host, Crystal Fincher on Twitter at @finchfrii and find today's co-host Erica Barnett at @ericacbarnett.   Resources “Tackling Poverty with Misha Werschkul of the Washington State Budget & Policy Center” - Hacks & Wonks   “WA lawmakers trying again to tax wealth, as part of nationwide effort”  by Claire Withycombe from The Seattle Times   “Two State-Level Housing Bills Aim to Stabilize Rent and Protect From Rent Gouging” by Vee Hua from The South Seattle Emerald   Washington Coalition for Police Accountability's letter on vehicle pursuit bills SB 5352 and HB 1363   “State Proposals Aim to Lower Traffic Deaths by Improving Driver Behavior” by Ryan Packer from Publicola   “Washington lawmakers discuss an alternative to jail for mental health crises” by Doug Nadvornick from KUOW   “Seattle City Council Member Kshama Sawant Will Not Seek Reelection” by Hannah Krieg from The Stranger   “Why I'm Not Running Again for City Council” by Kshama Sawant from The Stranger   “South King County Sees Alarming Jump in Pedestrian Fatalities” by Andrew Engelson from The Urbanist   “WALeg Wednesday: Saldaña Drops Bill to End Jaywalking” by Ray Dubicki from The Urbanist   “Former Tiny House Village Resident Sues Nonprofit, Alleging Unlawful Eviction” by Erica C. Barnett from Publicola “Homelessness Authority, LIHI Clashed Over Reporting of Two Deaths at Tiny House Village” by Erica C. Barnett from Publicola   Transcript [00:00:00] Crystal Fincher: Welcome to Hacks & Wonks. I am Crystal Fincher and I'm a political consultant and your host. On this show, we talk with policy wonks and political hacks to gather insight into local politics and policy in Washington State through the lens of those doing the work with behind-the-scenes perspectives on what's happening, why it's happening, and what you can do about it. Be sure to subscribe to the podcast, get the full versions of our Friday almost-live shows and our midweek show delivered to your podcast feed. If you like us, the most helpful thing you can do is leave a review wherever you listen to Hacks & Wonks. Full transcripts and resources referenced in the show are always available at officialhacksandwonks.com and in our episode notes. Today, we are continuing our Friday almost-live shows where we review the news of the week with a co-host. Welcome back to the program, friend of the show and today's co-host: Seattle political reporter, editor of PubliCola, co-host of the Seattle Nice podcast, and author of Quitter: A Memoir of Drinking, Relapse, and Recovery, Erica Barnett. [00:01:08] Erica Barnett: Hello, hello. [00:01:09] Crystal Fincher: Hello, hello - and welcome back. Always a pleasure to have you and your information and insights. Think today we will start off just talking about the week in the Washington Legislature, now that our legislative session is off and running. What did you see this week? [00:01:28] Erica Barnett: There's a lot going on as always. This is a long session, so there's a lot more policy legislation coming our way. There's a proposal to revive a wealth tax that has moved forward but then floundered in previous sessions - it would be a 1% tax on intangible assets like stocks and bonds - and so we'll see how that goes this year, maybe third time is the charm. Legislation is moving forward to allow sixplexes around the state in areas that are ordinarily or that are traditionally single-family only - that's Jessica Bateman's bill - and that too has been proposed in the past, but it may have a better chance this session because one of the sort of obstructionist legislators, Gerry Pollett, is no longer in charge of the committee that determines whether that bill goes forward. There's a bill that would reduce the limitations on police pursuits. Police say that they, that legislation from - I believe it was either last year or 2021 - limiting the instances in which they can go after somebody in their car to violent crimes and sex crimes is inhibiting their ability to chase what they call criminals - people committing property crimes and things like that. So that proposal is up and it has a lot of support from the right-wing pundit class. And I'm missing a lot of other stuff - there's a bill to lower the blood alcohol limit for driving while intoxicated to 0.05 percent like Utah, which has been really effective in that state in reducing drunk driving deaths and a whole lot more. [00:03:18] Crystal Fincher: I think that's a good start. There's lots of things just getting out of the gate and people trying to figure out what does have the momentum and the support to move forward versus what doesn't. I think another one that I was looking at - in addition to the middle housing bill, which came out with a ton of support in a hearing that it had earlier this week - are also some bills aiming to stabilize rent and to protect people from rent gouging. So looking at capping rent increases between 3 and 7% annually, depending on the rate of inflation. There's lots of conversations about, absolutely, the need to increase housing supply - there's widespread agreement on that, and that certainly is necessary to long-term affordability. In the short-term, things like rent stabilization policies are going to be critical for reducing displacement, evictions, and can make more of a difference in the short-term than increasing the housing supply. So lots of people sometimes have either-or conversations about those. I personally love the opinion that both are necessary and useful. I've talked about before - I've had neighbors with rent increases over 40%, had rent increases personally of over 30%. And that is just completely unaffordable for so many people, and contributing to the amount of unhoused people that we have - so definitely looking at that as another one. There was another bill that just was a cool thing - with Senator Manka Dhingra, who works with students and youth in the area to introduce legislation. And they suggested legislation, which she has introduced now, which seeks to bring equity between pricing for products marketed towards men versus women, and how frequently the same exact product marketed towards women will cost more for no apparent reason. And so a bill trying to address that - I think that was most of it. There was another interesting one this week about an alternative to jail for people experiencing mental health crises. Instead of going to jail - which really doesn't address the root cause - talking about a kind of a 24-hour cooling off center where instead of being an environment that is not helpful at de-escalating or calming situations, that a place that is not jail that can seek to maybe stabilize or calm down a situation to hopefully get a person in a place where they're either stabilized or in a place where they can seek services. It sounds like that is in the beginning stages of conversation - does not have funding attached to it yet, that would be necessary - but those are the things that have been on my radar. [00:06:32] Erica Barnett: That last bill that you mentioned, also from Senator Dhingra - it's based on a similar program in Arizona - and I'm getting this from KUOW's coverage. And it's interesting. I really want to read up more about it because it's a 23-hour hold, essentially. And we have various types of involuntary and voluntary mental health facilities. 23 hours - my immediate response is - what happens after that 23 hours? Do we just release people back to the streets with no care plan? I'm assuming that is not the intent, and I'm assuming that 23 hours actually must come from some limitation in the law. But at the same time as this bill is moving forward, there is a proposal that's going to be on the ballot in April in King County to create crisis care centers where people can just walk in and - voluntarily or be brought there by police, I suppose - to receive crisis care. And it's for a longer period than that 23 hours, so it feels like there is an emphasis right now on trying to get an entire continuum of care for people in crisis. And none of this has passed yet. As you said, the bill in the Legislature does not come with funding. But there is more discussion of this than I've ever seen in the state, and that's really encouraging because right now, primarily what we do is put people in jail when they're experiencing a crisis that is causing a threat or perceived threat to public safety - and that really can be extremely destabilizing for people. [00:08:17] Crystal Fincher: And then you had talked about the vehicle pursuit legislation that is being worked on this week - and really interesting dynamics in between those. There certainly are folks led by a lot of law enforcement organizations who are saying that they're being limited - lots of times we can't chase people, or crime is on the rise because we've been essentially handcuffed from going after "bad guys." Senator Dhingra talked about it - we did an interview with her on Hacks & Wonks and in a Democratic media availability this past week - talked again about there's no data showing a linkage between a rise in crime and the limitations that were placed on police pursuits before. Now they're asking for an expansion of those. It is unclear why that would make a difference according to their logic. One, they actually are still allowed to pursue those most serious cases and have been. We've had several stories over the past few weeks of pursuits that have happened. And this is really a question of is it worth pursuing something, someone - no matter what - if someone stole some Tide detergent, is it worth a high-speed pursuit on residential streets where people are being put at risk and innocent bystanders are frequently harmed and killed in these situations. In fact, in the city of Kent, a police officer was killed during a high-speed chase. These are actually really dangerous events that happen. And there's a real question about - is it worth the loss of life, when frequently if you can identify the person you can find and pick them up - which has happened frequently - after the fact without risking the lives of everybody in the area. So that's going to be an interesting conversation moving forward. Senator Dhingra chairs the Law & Justice Committee and is not eager to bring this up for a hearing, but there are certainly Republican legislators and some Democratic ones who are in favor of expanding the ability to conduct these pursuits. And so that conversation is definitely going to be one that we follow throughout this session. Looking at events this week in the City of Seattle, one notable announcement came earlier this week about a councilmember who is not going to be running again. What was announced? [00:11:06] Erica Barnett: Kshama Sawant - I laugh because this was just so widely covered compared to other councilmembers who are not running - part of a trend of councilmembers on the current council saying that they are not going to seek re-election, but Kshama Sawant will not be running in District 3. She's going to be starting some sort of labor-related organization, and I say that vaguely because there wasn't a whole lot of detail in her announcement about what this group will do, but it's called Workers Strike Back. And what it will not do, apparently, is pursue elected office for its members. Sawant's organization, Socialist Alternative, is a small, Trotskyist offshoot of the socialist parties in America, and it's definitely one of the smallest. And they have not had a lot of success at getting people elected around the country. Sawant was really their shining example of a member who actually made it to elective office and was in there for three terms, for 10 years - one of those terms was a two-year term. And so they're going on and they're saying that they're going to start a workers' movement worldwide, so it remains to be seen what will happen with that. But Sawant will no longer be on the council, and a lot of people are already lining up to try to replace her. [00:12:42] Crystal Fincher: There are. I saw a couple of candidates have declared already, which has also received a lot of coverage. You are right - we got some kind of brief mentions for prior councilmembers, including Lisa Herbold and Alex Pedersen, announcing that they are not running. But there seems to be strong opinions about Councilmember Sawant and therefore strong reactions in both directions - people sad to see someone who has been a fierce and unabashed advocate for issues about workers' rights for a long time. Councilmember - Mayor Harrell also said one thing he never doubted was her fierceness and advocacy. But this is definitely going to be a change on the council, and she has definitely left her mark - coming to office following the $15/hour initiative in the City of SeaTac that was run by a number of unions and advocates and folks. Following that, she ran in the City of Seattle as a dramatic underdog who people didn't really take seriously for almost all of the campaign - running on 15 Now, $15/hour in the City of Seattle - and running successfully, making Seattle one of the first cities - major cities - in the country to pass that minimum wage. And we've seen minimum wages increase across the country since then, with first SeaTac and then Seattle. So really interesting, certainly has been a lightning rod for a lot. So we will see who is going to wind up replacing her and how those campaigns take shape. What do you see as - just how this election season in the City of Seattle, with so many open seats - may unfold? [00:14:52] Erica Barnett: Yeah, I was just doing the math in my mind - because I have to do it every time - and four of the seven seats that are going to be up are definitely going to be open seats. Open seat elections are always more interesting in my mind because you don't have that built-in power of incumbency that sometimes keeps people away, but often we re-elect incumbents. So we'll see what - Andrew Lewis has already said that he is going to be running for re-election in District 1. I believe Tammy Morales will be running for re-election - I would put money on that at this point - not a lot of money, but a little money. And Councilmember Dan Strauss also seems to be showing signs that he will run for a second term up in District 6. So still, with four open seats, that's going to be - that's a number that could swing the tenor of the council if there's any kind of trend in whether those seats swing left or right. But importantly, one thing that happens when you have massive council turnover is you both get a sort of breath of fresh air, but you also lose a lot of institutional knowledge. I think, and I said on Seattle Nice, I think Sawant's actual influence on legislation has been somewhat overstated. She didn't achieve $15/hour in Seattle - that was very much a union effort that she got on board with, and it was a process of collaboration and compromise. Her thing was, as you said, it was 15 Now - just do it now and screw anybody that opposes it. But she also has institutional knowledge and institutional memory, as does Lisa Herbold who's been there for - been in the council milieu in some capacity for 25 years. It's going to be a loss of that kind of institutional knowledge, and I think that that is important when you're a city council going up against a mayor who - and I say going up against because they often clash. Historically, the council and the mayor are often on opposite sides of issues. When you don't have that institutional knowledge of how processes work and how legislation gets done and how the budget gets done, the mayor can roll you over. Bruce Harrell has a lot of experience himself being on the council for a long time, so it'll be interesting to see how that affects the power dynamic between the mayor and the council as well. [00:17:36] Crystal Fincher: It absolutely will be. I'm also interested in something else that we saw this week that flew a little bit under the radar, but definitely was noticed in a number of political circles - which was a public safety online poll that was sent to people via text, several people this week. In fact, so many that it really didn't seem like it was a randomly targeted poll. It looked like someone got a hold of some political lists and sent it out, but what did this poll seek to ask and what was it comprised of? [00:18:10] Erica Barnett: Yeah. Unfortunately, nobody sent me this poll - which if you're listening to this and you want to send me poll information, please do - but from what I gather, it's a push poll designed to elicit the feeling that Seattle is less safe and needs more police. The goal seems to be gauging support for a potential public safety funding initiative at some point in the future. And again, I don't know anything more about the idea behind this initiative, but it would essentially - or at least according to the poll - get the police department up to 1,450 officers within five years. The premise behind this is pretty flawed, which is that all we need is to pour more money into the police department and they will magically be able to hire 500, 600 new officers - when the police department itself has said that's not the issue. Now, they would define the issue as people don't want to be police officers in Seattle because there's insufficient support for police in institutions like the City Council. I would say police departments across the country have had trouble recruiting in the last three years and this is just a sign of that. But the police department has a lot of money - they fund tons of, hundreds of vacant positions every year - and so I don't think a massive increase in their budget is going to have a whole lot of impact because their budget is not really the problem. However you define the problem, it's not that we aren't funding police sufficiently. [00:19:54] Crystal Fincher: Yeah, absolutely. And this was really interesting - and for those who have listened and who know me, thank you for capturing this poll and sending me all of the screenshots. Just FYI - always do that with polls - take screenshots, send them on over if you get called for a poll, note what it is and all of the questions. Really interesting to see what people are asking, how people are asking. And with polls like this, I would not be surprised to see - obviously someone is thinking about this initiative - but looking at something like this, sometimes we see these announcements or stories in the media which cite numbers from vague polls. And this is not a real poll - this is someone sending around some surveys, very non-scientific, and the questions are almost comically skewed and written here. So it'll be interesting to see if someone uses this to try and signal support for the poll. I would also be interested just in seeing the raw numbers because traditionally, folks in the City of Seattle do not react well - even if this was a scientific poll - so this is going to be really curious to follow, but obviously someone is thinking about running a public safety initiative - really a police hiring initiative, which this really is. And it really does seem to be misguided. If there is one thing the City has definitely been trying to do for the past couple years, it's hire more police officers. How many times have they tried to increase hiring bonuses? They're advertising everywhere. This has been a monthly conversation in the City for, I feel like, two solid straight years - and if money could fix the problem, it would have. But we'll see how this continues to unfold. Another unfortunate bit of news that we have seen reinforced over and over again - but that has been made official - is just the increase in pedestrian fatalities and what kind of impact that is having. Some unfortunate news that we've seen, which has been reinforced repeatedly in news that we've seen, is pedestrian fatalities across the board have been increasing. There's been great coverage in The Urbanist about an alarming jump in pedestrian fatalities in South King County - just, it's really bleak. Really looking at the data put together by the State Department of Transportation - since 2013, the total number of crashes resulting in death or serious injury to pedestrians has climbed from 33 in 2013 to 95 in 2021. And that number continues to increase, and it is really alarming. And looking at the areas that are the most dangerous - Highway 99, also known as International Boulevard or Pacific Highway South, is one of the most dangerous roads for pedestrians in addition to Benson Highway or 104th - these go through several south County cities - but it's basically a high-speed highway in the middle of these cities. I remember they did work related to RapidRide Line A - a revamping of Pacific Highway South and International Boulevard - and unfortunately, one of the features that we saw was that there are long stretches of road with no pedestrian crossings. And mixing that with speeds that are 50 mph in some places is just a recipe for a disaster - when you're forcing people to sometimes take a - choose between walking directly across the street, which would be categorized as jaywalking, or taking a 10 to 15 minute detour to walk down to the nearest light or crossing and then walk all the way back, which is challenging for people with mobility issues - there are a lot of age and the disabled people, there are a number of services and health clinics on these roads. And so predictably, people are going to attempt to cross the road to avoid those really long crossings. To me, this was foreseeable just because of the design in these areas - and just mixing such high speeds in such high traffic pedestrian areas - and so it's unfortunate. These cities have recognized the problem, but some of the solutions that they've presented for the problem have been challenges. In fact, there was coverage of a meeting by Ryan Packer, actually, at the state where some City of Kent officers, at least who've been involved in traffic enforcement, really seemed to almost victim blame in the situation - talking about they would do emphasis patrols to help stop jaywalking, which is a cause of this. I would say that's more predictable impact of design there and people making a choice because sometimes they can't walk that distance. And also characterizing people who are on foot or even on bike as unhoused people or people in poverty, as opposed to lots of people who are commuting. This is a site where several accidents have - several fatalities and crashes that have injured and killed pedestrians have taken place. It's going to be - a new light rail station is in process of being built there. This is a very high traffic area, lots of commuters, it's near a Park and Ride - and so there's a whole cross-section of people, lots of professionals. I used to be frequently on transit as I was commuting to work via Metro in Seattle daily. It's just disappointing to see a lack of recognition of what some of these challenges are. The Urbanist addressed some of these in that article, but it is really, really challenging, and I wish the conversation in terms of solutions and increasing safety would focus more on things that didn't blame the victim or seek to target them, instead of help keep them safer. [00:26:51] Erica Barnett: Yeah. The idea that our roadway problems and our pedestrian and cyclist fatalities are because of individual behavior - it goes both ways, right? There's also an emphasis on people driving too fast, and this report does talk about people going - this report in The Urbanist talks about people going 80, 90 mph - and that is a huge problem and people should not be driving that fast. And two, these roads are designed for that. And the only way that you can make it possible for people to cross the road without "jaywalking" and the only way you can get people to stop speeding - and even driving the speed limit is often more than fast enough to cause fatalities - is you've got to put crosswalks in, you've got to slow down traffic. And the way you do that is through road design. And some of these - you can't necessarily go and narrow a highway - you can, but it's expensive and controversial. You can put in stoplights, you can put in bus lanes, you can do things that slow down the flow of cars - and I would say that it's not just that these things cost money, it's that they cost political will, and they're just - in a lot of these cities, and in the state, and including in Seattle - there is not the political will to do something that will slow down motorists. I remember - I don't live on Rainier anymore, but I lived right on Rainier for many years, or just a couple blocks off it - and I would use the 7 to get everywhere and run errands. And I am somebody who is physically capable of running across the street, and let me tell you - I did not go half a mile in one direction, walk across the approved pedestrian infrastructure, and walk half a mile in the other direction, just because that's what the road was telling me to do. I would run across the road. So people act rationally - and in that situation, it is rational to run across the road and just risk it, because I didn't have time to spend 30 extra minutes crossing a street that traffic engineers had decided was a highway through the middle of a neighborhood. And that causes really risky behavior. And the only solution, and the solution that obviously we haven't taken - because traffic fatalities are going up and not down everywhere - is to change our roads and to inconvenience drivers a little bit in order to save some lives. [00:29:32] Crystal Fincher: Absolutely, and I do just want to underscore - between 10 and 15 years ago, the conversations about traffic calming in Seattle and hearing pushback, and - Oh my gosh, this is going to change my commute and things are going to take forever, there's a war on cars. And the impact to cars and drivers was really negligible - literally talking about differences of one and two minutes, which can have such a powerful impact on safety and truly save lives. We really do have to ask ourselves the question, Do we really believe cars should be able to just go as fast as possible and have absolute priority in anything that might slow them down? It's bad even if it costs lives and money and so much. Or can we spare a minute? Can we spare two minutes to spare some lives? It really does come down to that, and I wish we would more openly have that conversation - because there are so many people who are walking, and who are riding bikes, who are in proximity to that. And it has to be part of the solution to public safety, people being safe on the roads. I just wish we would be in a different place with that. I do want to definitely talk about some great coverage in PubliCola this week about the Low Income Housing Institute, also known as LIHI, being sued for unlawful eviction. What happened here? [00:31:11] Erica Barnett: This is one of a couple of lawsuits actually that have been filed against LIHI. One was dismissed at the court commissioner level, but this one was just filed this past week by a guy who lived in a tiny house village - actually in Olympia - run by LIHI. And he was kicked out after an altercation with one of the staff. And the lawsuit essentially is asserting that this was an eviction, that LIHI's tiny house villages are housing. This guy lived in the tiny house for more than two years when he was kicked out, and LIHI said - You have to be out within 48 hours, take all your stuff, goodbye. And he did vacate, but he's saying this was not legal, and it was an eviction, and the tiny house was his home. And I think as a matter of law, what is interesting - there's a couple of things that I think are interesting about this case - as a matter of law, LIHI has long been classified, or was long classified - their tiny house villages were classified as encampments. And they got an upgrade during the pandemic - the city, and then eventually the federal government, now considers them enhanced shelter. But what they're saying is that it's essentially transitional housing, and it meets these definitions of transitional housing that were adopted by the State Legislature just a couple years ago. So there's an interesting legal argument there about - once you have four walls, a door that locks - is that everybody who supports LIHI likes to say - is that housing? And does LIHI have more obligations to give notice and to give reasons and to allow people in some cases to rectify whatever is wrong? LIHI says that they are not transitional housing and that if you started defining their tiny houses that way, it would create a situation where every type of enhanced shelter would start looking at the people they take in differently because they wouldn't want to have to keep people around if they were causing a problem in the community. And if you had tenant rights, that would create a situation where people could live there for a long time while continuing to cause problems. So if it goes forward, that would be an interesting legal discussion. And separately, I think that there's been a lot of complaints from residents of the tiny house villages that the conditions there are not always the greatest. One thing that this gentleman who's suing brought up to me was that they have these kind of outdoor kitchens, that he said the nutrition is really bad, there have been times when the washing machines have been broken so they can't wash their clothes, where there's been no hot water for a month on end in this particular village. And so I think there's questions too about the quality of life at tiny house villages. And so those are not really being litigated, but they're being discussed and I think that that will continue to be the case. LIHI is under a microscope with funding from the new King County Regional Homelessness Authority, whose CEO Marc Dones has never been a big supporter of tiny house villages. So I think they are under fire right now, and their CEO Sharon Lee is definitely someone who fights back and you can read my coverage for her comments on that. [00:34:59] Crystal Fincher: Yeah, this is an interesting situation. I think it really brings up a lot of issues to a lot of folks that just because someone does not have shelter, if someone is responsible for providing them shelter or housing - and some of these people can be housed for months in tiny home villages - does that mean that they are not entitled to the same kinds of protections that everyone else is entitled to? And it seems like the argument against that is that - Well, this is a more challenging population and if we're going to serve them, providing those kinds of protections is dangerous for us as an organization and maybe we couldn't do it overall. When I think there are a lot of people who would love to talk about, Okay, what are ways that we can ensure that there isn't abuse or exploitation, more dangerous conditions? Just because someone does not have the means to pursue a lot of recourse or is coming from a bad environment, does that mean that we're fine with letting them settle for any old thing and any old treatment? And that is not to say that this is not a challenging and complex issue. Certainly this is a population that because they have been unhoused and out on the streets, they've been made more vulnerable to a host of challenges - whether it's health problems, safety issues, mental health issues, substance use disorder - the things that afflict society at large afflict this population also, and they're at risk for so many other things. And so I just hope we have a conversation that really does start from a place of how can we keep this population as safe as possible? And how do we keep people accountable to ensure that there aren't abuses? I feel like it's a risky place to be to say - If we aren't here, no one's going to be. And so take it or leave it with whatever there is, or not being introspective about how services can be provided in a better, safer, more equitable manner. I know that's what I thought when I first saw the coverage. What kind of reaction are you seeing from people? [00:37:20] Erica Barnett: It's interesting. I think there is a lot of opposition to LIHI right now that I'm seeing in places like Twitter. I did want to say - just to flip your comments a little bit - I've also heard lots of complaints over the years from people who live at encampments but also in tiny house villages, that the environment can also be made unpleasant and challenging by other residents. People talk about - because tiny house villages - many of them are low-barrier and they allow people to use drugs and alcohol. People talk about that creating a bad environment in some tiny house villages. And when you have a population that is largely actively using, it can be really challenging for people who aren't. I don't want to discount the fact that when you are completely low-barrier, that creates challenges in itself - if somebody's trying to stay sober and they're in that environment, for example. But there can be lots of challenges in these communities - they're communities of people who are all struggling with different things. I just wanted to signpost that a little bit. Like I said, I think there's pushback to LIHI right now. It receives a lot of contracts from KCRHA and people are starting to really put a spotlight on them more than on other organizations. My coverage has been pretty factual, I think, so I'm trying not to reflect a bias one way or the other. And people can read into it their own biases and opinions and are doing so. [00:39:12] Crystal Fincher: Yeah, definitely. And it'll be interesting to see - I think one of the issues is that this is one provider who is doing so much of this work, and almost has a monopoly on the ability to provide these services. And are there - I certainly don't want to suggest that there are not challenges and that residents may not be, safety issues and sometimes, and thank you for bringing that up. I do think that it would be interesting to see what other similar shelters are doing and if they're in line with this. I do not know if they are in line with what other shelters who provide similar services or other tiny home villages are providing, but I hope that that is being looked at. [00:40:02] Erica Barnett: I will just say - really briefly - compare it to another enhanced shelter, the Navigation Center. Navigation Center kicks people out all the time. We don't necessarily talk about that as much because it's not as high profile. People aren't - the Navigation Center doesn't have an Andrew Lewis on the City Council constantly singing its praises and inviting criticism, but shelters do kick people out. It happens a lot for behavioral issues, so people should not be under the impression that this is uncommon. [00:40:34] Crystal Fincher: Absolutely. And with that, we will thank you for listening to Hacks & Wonks on this Friday, January 20th, 2023. Happy birthday, Terrance. Hacks & Wonks is co-produced by Shannon Cheng and Bryce Cannatelli. Our insightful co-host today was Seattle political reporter, editor of PubliCola, co-host of Seattle Nice Podcast, and the author of Quitter: A Memoir of Drinking, Relapse and Recovery, Erica Barnett. You can find Erica on Twitter @ericacbarnett and on PubliCola.com. You can follow Hacks & Wonks on Twitter @HacksWonks and find me on Twitter @finchfrii with two I's at the end. You can catch Hacks & Wonks on iTunes, Spotify, or wherever you get your podcasts - just type "Hacks and Wonks" into the search bar. Be sure to subscribe to get the full versions of our Friday almost-live shows and our mid-week show delivered to your podcast feed. And if you like us, leave a review. You can also get a full transcript of this episode and links to the resources referenced in the show at officialhacksandwonks.com and in the episode notes. Thanks for tuning in - we'll talk to you next time.

Gov. Jay Inslee's $70.4 billion budget proposal assumes $1.4 billion in revenue from the capital gains income tax that lawmakers passed and the governor signed into law in 2021. https://bit.ly/3Wk8thL #TheCenterSquareWashington #Governor #JayInslee #BudgetProposal #Revenue #CapitalGainsIncomeTax #Lawmakers #SignedIntoLaw #WashingtonStateLegislature #OperatingBudget #WashingtonStateSenate #VancouverWa #ClarkCountyWa #ClarkCountyNews #ClarkCountyToday

KVI's John Carlson and Environmental Policy Director at The Washington Policy Center, Todd Myers, discuss a proposed bill in the Washington Legislature that would establish an arbitrary recycling level as the state has had repeated failures in meeting other arbitrary metrics for climate change or environmental standards. Myers says the bill would give Dept. of Ecology "carte blanche" to ask for money to run this open-ended program, raising red flags about cost and accountability. Myers says, "this bill would do more harm than good" and explains the example of Styrofoam recycling. Myers concludes, "this is just government bureaucracy completely out of control to meet an arbitrary target."

Nancy Churchill discusses an important public hearing in the House Civil Rights and Judiciary Committee where concerned citizens can submit public testimony on four gun control bills. https://bit.ly/3WhrVvi #Opinion #Columns #Commentary #NancyChurchill #DangerousRhetoric #WashingtonStateLegislature #PublicHearing #HouseCivilRightsAndJudiciaryCommittee #ConcernedCitizens #PublicTestimony #GunControlBills #VancouverWa #ClarkCountyWa #ClarkCountyNews #ClarkCountyToday

Bill Radke discusses the week's news with freelance journalist Joanne Silberner, Puget Sound Business Journal's Alex Halverson, and Seattle Times Elise Takahama.

Washington state voters and lawmakers appear to be in close alignment on their top priorities for the incoming Washington Legislature. The 2023 session gavels to order at noon on Monday, January 9.

Washington state is home to 29 federally recognized Native American Tribes, but only one Native person currently serves in the state Legislature. That will change next year. Three enrolled members of Native tribes are poised to win their elections this fall.

Long-time Associated Press Capitol Correspondent Rachel La Corte is stepping down from the AP after nearly 18 years covering the Washington Legislature and state government. Her recollections about the headline stories, the changing nature of the media, and much more.

KVI's John Carlson interviews Glenn Morgan, from the group Let's Go Washington, about the eleven initiatives the group is collecting signatures for that will cover public safety and taxation issues. The eleven different initiatives cover issues like restoring police pursuits, restoring criminal penalty for possession of hard drugs, reducing the state sales tax and the state gasoline tax. The groups Let's Go Washington and Restore Washington are both collecting voter signatures to submit to the Secretary of State's office before 2023. The initiative sponsors say the various measures are intended to force the Washington Legislature to pass these reforms or put them up for statewide public vote in November 2023.

GUEST: Snohomish Co. Sheriff, Adam Fortney, joins KVI's John Carlson to talk about urging the Washington Legislature to revise police pursuit law they changed nearly two years ago. Fortney says police chases all have varying circumstances and officers need discretion of when to pursue. Fortney says we need a "balancing test" of risk and reward for police pursuit and concludes "politics got in the way of community safety".

Hour 1 -- the irony that Biden Administration says Trump Mar-A-Lago search was about nuclear weapons documents while the Biden Administration re-opens Iran nuclear program talks, Ken Griffey Jr and Sr. featured in cameo at last night's MLB "Field of Dreams" game in Iowa, notice that no Seattle 'affordable housing' advocates are stepping up to oppose another price hike, notorious Seattle juvenile criminal Billy Chambers now charged in Bellevue organized theft ring, authorities say the Bellevue theft ring stole $100,000 in merchandise from designed clothing stores, reality meets 'woke' politics for one 80-year-old Pt. Townsend WA woman. Hour 2 -- new police body cam video shows a very sleepy and allegedly intoxicated former Seahawk--Marshawn Lynch--sitting in a damaged car in Las Vegas, examining the political cost(s) of a Republican voting to indict/impeach Pres. Trump in Jan. 2021, Marysville Salvation Army gives out free backpacks to students on Aug. 22nd, some social justice snark from a DEI skeptic, former Seahawk player's house sacked by Mother Nature, Hour 3 -- Sen. Joe Manchin's public approval rating nose-dives after supporting Congressional Democrats IRS/Climate Change spending bill, Occupy Democrats group shows their hypocrisy about which judges they want to keep safe after Mar-A-Lago search of Trump's house, Gov. Jay Inslee sings the praises of Al Gore, 10 south King County mayors co-sign letter urging state lawmakers to address increasing crime problems, GUESTS: Renton and Kent Mayors, Armondo Pavone and Dana Ralph, talk to KVI about why King County's top elected officials and the Washington Legislature need to act to improve public safety, the pathetic response the mayors received from KC Exec. Dow Constantine's office about their request, crime statistics not reflecting the reality on the streets for south King County cities, "you wake up in the morning" hoping your city did not make the news overnight, even Everett's mayor is pushing the state for fixes to the public safety and lawlessness problems, GUEST: economist Steve Moore tees off on the claim by Pres. Biden there was "zero" inflation in July, DC bureaucrats are still hiding behind COVID-related work from home directives, new polling shows only 12% of Americans think the Inflation Reduction Act will actually reduce inflation.

Renton Mayor, Armondo Pavone, and Kent Mayor, Dana Ralph, talk to KVI about why King County's top elected officials and the Washington Legislature's policies are making their cities more dangerous places. Ten mayors in south King County are co-signing this letter to King County and Legislative elected officials demanding "prosecution of crimes...and incarceration of those (criminals) that need it". Mayor Pavone says "the direction we're going (politically) is not making our neighborhoods and cities safer" in King County. Mayor Ralph says, "you wake up in the morning" hoping your city did not make the news overnight due to continuing crime problems. Mayor Pavone adds that the current Seattle political environment has made it difficult for cities to retain police officers.

CPAC presents 40 lawmakers awards for conservative voting. https://bit.ly/3zP39uA #WashingtonStateLegislature #WashingtonLawmakers #WashingtonLegislatures #Conservative #Analysis #CenterForLegislativeAccountability #CPACFoundation #AmericanConservativeUnionFoundation #VickiKraft #BrandonVick #LyndaWilson #EdOrcutt #LarryHoff #VancouverWa #ClarkCountyWa #ClarkCountyNews #ClarkCountyToday

And now a Republican leader in the Washington Legislature is urging a special session to suspend the state gas tax.

Democratic-led states on the West Coast are setting ambitious timelines to phase out sales of gasoline-powered cars and light trucks. The Washington Legislature just approved a goal that all new cars sold in the state beginning with model year 2030 be electric. Oregon and California have 2035 as their target. Some of these dates are aspirational, but one has teeth.

At the beginning of this year, few people expected the Washington Legislature to take it on.

On today's Hacks & Wonks week-in-review, Crystal is joined by Pierce County Council Chair, Derek Young. They reflect on the triumphs and tragedies of this legislative session including a transformative transportation package, the failure to pass the climate and missing middle housing bills, rollbacks in police accountability, and a victory for legislative workers. Then they dive into the mega-city proposed in south Pierce County and the challenges unincorporated areas face from missing out on the investments that cities make. As always, a full text transcript of the show is available below and at officialhacksandwonks.com. Find the host, Crystal Fincher on Twitter at @finchfrii and find today's co-host, Derek Young, at @DerekMYoung. More info is available at officialhacksandwonks.com.   Resources “WA Democrats agree on funding for $17B transportation package” by David Kroman from The Seattle Times: https://www.seattletimes.com/seattle-news/transportation/wa-democrats-agree-on-funding-for-17b-transportation-package/    “Why Washington state's missing middle housing bill died” by Joshua McNichols from KOUW: https://www.kuow.org/stories/why-washington-state-s-missing-middle-housing-bill-died    “5 major things the Washington Legislature approved in 2022” by Melissa Santos from Crosscut: https://crosscut.com/politics/2022/03/5-major-things-washington-legislature-approved-2022    “These clarifications to police accountability legislation will go into effect immediately” by Shauna Sowersby from The Olympian:  https://www.theolympian.com/news/local/article259078253.html    “Legislation Will Allow Police to Use Force to Stop People from Fleeing” by Paul Kiefer from Publicola: https://publicola.com/2022/03/08/legislation-will-allow-police-to-use-force-to-stop-people-from-fleeing/    “How pro-worker bills fared in Olympia” by David Groves from the Stand: https://www.thestand.org/2022/03/how-pro-worker-bills-fared-in-olympia/   “‘Mega City' proposed for south Pierce County” by Tony Overman from The News Tribune: https://www.thenewstribune.com/news/local/article258930478.html     “Pierce County talks of investing in ‘dumping ground.' Would forming a city there be better?” by Josephine Peterson from The News Tribune: https://www.thenewstribune.com/news/local/article258752158.html#storylink=mainstage_card7    Transcript [00:00:00] Crystal Fincher: Welcome to Hacks & Wonks. I'm Crystal Fincher, and I'm a political consultant and your host. On this show, we talk with policy wonks and political hacks to gather insight into local politics and policy in Washington State through the lens of those doing the work with behind-the-scenes perspectives on what's happening, why it's happening, and what you can do about it. Full transcripts and resources referenced in the show are always available at officialhacksandwonks.com and in our episode notes. Today, we're continuing our Friday almost-live shows where we review the news of the week with a co-host. Welcome back to the program today's co-host, Pierce County Council Chair, Derek Young. Welcome. [00:00:51] Derek Young: Thank you, Crystal. I've always, since I was a kid, wanted to be on almost-live and so I'm super thrilled to be here. [00:00:59] Crystal Fincher: Well, we are almost-live each Friday, and well today is the morning after the end of the legislative session which concluded late last night. So just starting off with recognizing what happened late yesterday - the flurry of activity - what is most notable to you about this legislative session overall? [00:01:20] Derek Young: So, I think two things. One, they've managed to pass what I consider a transformative transportation package - that's probably a play on words there that I didn't intend. And also, on the flip side, the failure to pass House Bill 1099, which was a bill basically telling local governments to deal with climate change in our comprehensive planning. There was obviously a lot of other good legislation that got passed, but those for me were the yin and the yang of the really, really great and the disappointments. [00:02:06] Crystal Fincher: Yeah, so there in the transportation package, what made it so transformative? [00:02:12] Derek Young: For me, it's two things. One is that it focused more on maintenance and restoration which is important, rather than building lots of new highways. I know there are advocates that will say that it still builds too many highway miles, but compared to previous packages, this is more tightly focused. But the bigger thing to me, and this is a critical issue, is that it invests in local transit for the first time in decades. And that's a big deal for communities like mine that have really struggled to rebuild our local transit networks. And I just couldn't be happier because it just hasn't happened in a long time. Part of that was because of, frankly, years of work by Representative Fey - who I'm super proud because he's from South Sound, so well done Jake. But also Marko Liias, who was new to the role in the Senate. So, grateful for their hard work. [00:03:22] Crystal Fincher: Yeah, certainly. And Marko Liias, now the Senate Transportation Committee Chair after Steve Hobbs, the previous chair, was appointed to be Secretary of State after Kim Wyman left to serve in the federal government. So, I think you're absolutely right. A huge increase in the amount of funding for everyone who gets around in ways in addition to or aside from cars. A big increase, the biggest investment in that that we've seen so far. And in highway projects, I think there is broad agreement and understanding that maintenance is absolutely necessary and we're behind the ball on that and are moving, making progress. There is some expansion, which in some ways is frustrating and just the urgency with which we need to move in the opposite direction is notable. But I'm hoping that with this understanding and concluding this expansion that we have in this package - moving forward, we focus much more on maintaining the road infrastructure that we have as opposed to expanding it. In there, you talked about local, transit investments. What kind of a difference will this make within local communities? [00:04:45] Derek Young: So, this'll make sense to people on South Sound, but just to put a real bus wheels to the ground kind of thing - this will mean our four main trunk routes, literally Routes 1, 2, 3, and 4, we're clever that way. We literally named our top routes 1, 2, 3, and 4. And those will all now go to 15-minute headways. For folks in King County, that may sound like not such a big deal, but for those of us down here, that is a huge deal. And why it matters is that frequency is king when it comes to whether or not people choose to use transit or not. And so our major routes will now be able to move to that standard. The rest of our routes will not, so let's not get too carried away in terms of what this means, but that's a big step compared to - right now, we have one single route and that's Route 1 that is on 15-minute headways. And so that's a huge deal. The other thing it does is invest in some capacity projects. So, for example, it puts $10 million towards our bus rapid transit project. We're slowly closing the remaining gap to finishing that and that'll be our first non-rail high-capacity transit route and that replaces Route 1 in Pierce County, most of Route 1. So, that will serve tens of thousands of people and it's also where we're planning lots and lots of high-density growth. So, this is going to be transit-oriented development for miles and miles in South Pierce County and I couldn't be happier. [00:06:46] Crystal Fincher: Well, and you bring up growth - there were certainly a number of bills introduced to help effectively manage growth within the state and within our cities. One of those, the middle housing bill was not successful - we've talked about that before in this program - to better allow cities to absorb density within existing built areas and to help reduce the amount of sprawl. Another bill that was not successful, that you mentioned, HB 1099 failing - is really foundational in how we plan our communities. What was HB 1099 and what kind of difference would it have made? [00:07:26] Derek Young: So the essence of the bill was basically that we add climate change as a required planning principle or planning element to our local comprehensive plans. For those that don't know about what comprehensive planning is about, this is all part of the Growth Management Act, and basically local governments have to plan for housing, transportation, infrastructure. And then from there, our schools plan from what they receive from those documents, same with fire departments, you name it. Everyone figures out how to build their local services based on that. So, adding climate change to one of those documents makes it not only a requirement that we reduce our carbon footprint as a region as growth develops, but it also says that it's now a challengeable requirement. Basically that a third party could say, "You're not meeting your climate change goals. You're not planning for enough housing. You're not planning for enough transit. You're not planning for correct transportation, infrastructure, whatever." And that would make it basically incumbent on local governments to plan for denser, higher quality, more sustainable development. I thought we were there, to be honest with you. It was one of those things where everyone's saying, "Yes, I support this." And somehow it still didn't pass in the end. [00:09:10] Crystal Fincher: Yeah, it was a big challenge. And you talk about how important the Growth Management Act and the comprehensive planning process is. It really is the guide by which local communities build and grow, and provides the bounds within which people have to operate and setting those bounds is really important. And as decisions are made, to your point, if something falls outside of those bounds, it can be challenged and potentially stopped. It's the lens through which all of the local planning decisions are made. I think a lot of times people underestimate how foundational this is, and how much planning determines just about everything about how our communities grow and look and change - to how our just basic services are provided, water and sewer and all of that, how the road and transportation network develops, how schools and services are sited within communities. How your community looks is really shaped and dictated by this. So, we're all facing the challenges of climate change. The effects we're already feeling and cities are faced with the responsibility for mitigating extreme heat, extreme cold, dealing with wildfire smoke, pollution and the effects of that, everything that we're dealing with. And so, to have this as a consideration in planning makes complete sense since this is a factor that we have to contend with. We know these cities are growing, cities have to plan for that growth. We have revenue projections, people have to plan within those revenue projections. We have climate change and people have to plan in consideration and in response to climate change. And yeah, it did seem like we were here. It took a bit of a path coming out of the House. It did look like everyone was on board. Initially, when it came out, the word was it was weakened, led by Rep van de Wege to take out some of those references in climate change. Went over to the Senate, those were put back in. Gave people the feeling that there was a consensus and it could be done, went back to the House, indications were that it was going to pass. It seemed like there were the votes there to do it and it didn't. Very disappointing. And this is not something where you can kick the can down the road. What happens, I guess, what's the consequence of this happening this year, and for folks being like, "Well, it seems like we can get to this next year." Is that going to be helpful? [00:12:03] Derek Young: Yeah. And this is the part - I wonder if legislators understand the consequences of this, because the largest counties in Washington are due to have our comprehensive plan updates - basically due by the end of 2023. We are starting our planning process right now, or excuse me, 2024, but we're starting that process now because the updates are a big deal. It takes a lot of work. These documents are hundreds of pages. And if we don't have that requirement in place before next year, it's not going to happen. So, for the bulk of the population of Washington, it will be another eight years before we have to respond to those requirements. Now, some of us are going to try to do it on our own - we're going to try to do the right thing, but it's a lot easier if we're all doing it as a collective effort. And the example I'll give you is this - let's say you have a city that has decided to site tens of thousands of new jobs, but doesn't provide the housing for it. Well, all those people have to live somewhere, right? So they're going to move somewhere else. Well, that means they have to drive far out of their homes, back into the city, to get to their jobs. How many vehicle miles are we adding to our list? Transportation is our largest source of carbon emissions in Washington. How many hours does that take out of their lives, away from their communities, away from their families? And then on the other side of that as well is what are we doing to our local environment? The rubber on the road is literally our biggest source of pollution into Puget Sound. So, in terms of sustainability, there is nothing we could do more than to start planning with that climate model in mind. I just think there's nothing that we could do more for future generations than to begin to plan with climate change in mind as a guiding principle because the worst thing that happens - let's say Derek is nuts, climate change isn't real, we're not causing it from carbon emissions, whatever. The worst thing that happens is that we improve public health, make Puget Sound cleaner, and we all save a lot of time to spend more time with our families and improve our quality of life. Okay, so that's good planning, right? So, even if we aren't worried about saving the world, we can at least make our lives a little bit better. [00:15:06] Crystal Fincher: We certainly can. Big missed opportunity - to your point, especially with larger counties, the planning process has started. This involves every department, touches every element of local government, and is a thorough and comprehensive review from the bottom all the way to the top, which takes time and a lot of effort, a lot of employee time. This is not a short process where you're just editing an existing document and calling it a day, updating some dates. This is essentially a review and an evaluation of how every element of government operates and incorporating climate has an impact on how every element of government operates. And really being forced to contend with every decision that you make has an impact, positive or negative, on the climate. Having to take that into consideration and mitigate any negative consequences or avoid negative consequences is a big deal. Big missed opportunity. There are several other things that happened. We'll be talking about them in shows to come, certainly. Melissa Santos wrote probably the first of many just recaps of what happened following the session last night. Some of the big headlines from the session - our ban on selling large capacity magazines for firearms, a big step forward in terms of gun safety and regulation that a lot of organizations have been lobbying for, for years. Certainly as we are facing increasing gun violence and the need to address that, this is viewed as a step in the right direction. There are people who are enthusiastically opposing it and saying it violates their Second Amendment rights, but I am certainly a person who, while not opposing firearm ownership, overall thinks that these kinds of regulations just make sense. And even if it doesn't solve every single one of the issues possible in this, reducing the amount and opportunity for gun violence is certainly a positive thing in my estimation. There was a delay and a restructuring of Washington Cares, our long term care program. We've talked about that previously in the show, but they're looking at making some fixes to that, helping more people become eligible for that - some people who may have been left out. They said that they're exploring portability of the program for people who may leave the state, so certainly getting that in better condition. There are some public safety measures that were changed. There were police accountability laws that were revisited. And so, last year the legislature approved new limits on police uses of force. There was vociferous, enthusiastic objections by many in the public safety community. Some of that was viewed to be not exactly relevant, but some was considered to be necessary and made in good faith and they said that they took steps to help clarify that. So, one bill helped to clarify that police are still allowed to use physical force to help transport people to mental health treatment, if they're in a mental health crisis. Another one allowed police to use physical force against people who tried to flee when they were stopped for questioning. And, again, the necessity of those changes was certainly up for debate, but the legislature decided to move forward with those. One that did not change was a bill that would have impacted how police are allowed to engage in chases. And so that law was not changed. Lots of advocates were heavily in favor of that and feeling that it didn't just revise or fix things, that it actually moved things backwards and expanded the situations where police could engage in police chases and basically lowered the threshold to engage in those situations. Worker - staff collective bargaining bill passed. Started with - there was an original bill that died, another bill introduced that started with major issues, but changes were made to it that seemed to have addressed many of the changes that advocates felt were necessary and many wound up being in favor of that bill and considering that a success. Lots of stuff around there. Was there anything else in particular that you found notable this session? [00:20:06] Derek Young: Yeah, I think it was important to clarify the use of force issue. And I use the term clarify intentionally because it turns out that when the legislature passed the reforms, there actually was no definition of force. So, what the legislature and what most people on the street would consider force, they're thinking violence, right? They're thinking, "I'm in a struggle with this person. I'm using some physical kind of act." Our local prosecutors and city attorneys interpreted that as anything that is literally touching and even going so far as the threat of restraint, ordering someone to stop. That went too far because when you are beginning to try to understand a criminal scene, it is very rare that they have probable cause. Probable causes is basically, "I have evidence you've committed a crime." Usually you need a little time to sort something out. And I'm talking like I'm a law enforcement officer here, but that's the way things go. And so being able to detain someone and say, "Look, I need you to stay." And keep them from leaving the scene - that is an important thing. On the flip side, that doesn't mean that you should be using excessive force. And so, differentiating between those two, I think is really important. So, that to me was an important clarification. I get the impression that that's not - when the legislature passed the reforms that it did last year, I got the impression that that's not what they intended, and what we heard from them was, "We disagree, basically, on these interpretations." So it seemed to me that it was, "If this isn't your intention, please clarify it." And so they did. So, I thought that was critical. Speaking as a former legislative staffer, I just want to say congratulations to them for finally gaining their rights and honestly never giving up. Because it was - how difficult must it be to demand your bosses, while they're in session, give you your rights while you're at your busiest, right? So, I was incredibly impressed by that. It's actually important for our democracy that we not have people that are paid poverty wages and treated unfairly doing the hard work that guides legislation. So, this is one of those things that most people in the public will never notice, but it turns out treating employees fairly and treating your staff fairly are good things. And so out of the things you mentioned, that was the one that I think will fly by most people and I just wanted to point it out as something that was a good, good thing. And I was happy to see them claw it back. [00:23:46] Crystal Fincher: Very good thing. Very excited about it. We've talked about it on this program before. And to me, it was also an issue of, "Are Democrats living their values?" Lots of rhetoric about how important unions are to workers, how important workers' rights are. I sincerely believe that and it seems like if one does sincerely believe that, then they don't object to that when it comes to their own staff and their own circumstance. And saying, "Well, it's good for all those other workers, but not for mine." That's a really bad look. And it seemed like that was the message being conveyed when the legislation initially died, before it was brought back. And, absolutely, kudos to those workers for taking collective action. They had a sickout. The legislature absolutely relies on those staffers. They are the ones doing the work and keeping everything running and nothing would progress or proceed without the very hard work of the staff there who are dedicated, who are making less money than they would be in many other circumstances - many of whom do want to contribute to our community and our democracy and to be in a position where they want the opportunity to have their grievances fairly addressed, especially in the context of previous grievances not necessarily being fairly addressed. This was something that they felt was necessary to keep people safe and healthy and protected in their work environment, and it did seem to be absolutely necessary. So, congratulations to Rep Riccelli, who is certainly a leader in getting this through and resurrecting it after it died, working to make the positive changes, listening to feedback to amend the bill and get it in the right place. So, very gratified to see that collective bargaining rights will be extended to legislative staffers. As we move forward - just talking about it, it's so great to have you on. [00:26:01] Derek Young: Sorry. I was just going to call out one thing you mentioned just real quickly. It's not just the collective bargaining - that protection for the workers is so critical because how many times have we heard in the past where legislative employees have not been properly protected? That to me is one of the most critical aspects of this. Having basically a grievance process - that to me is super critical. So, it's overlooked as a part of this, everyone tends to think about salary and benefits, but having a process to protect those employees - that's huge. [00:26:36] Crystal Fincher: Very huge. And I mean, we see examples throughout the state and a herd of examples with legislative staffers, where without a clear and effective grievance process, that mistreatment was allowed to flourish. And that people who were found to have treated their employees poorly or created a poor, unhealthy or toxic work environment are not meaningfully punished, dealt with, and employees were not meaningfully protected throughout the process. Many ended up in situations where there was high staff turnover, where there was no remedy, and so it basically forced employees out. Just really negative situations that now, hopefully, there will be a meaningful process to rectify those situations, keep employees protected, and help people who are spending a ton of time and effort and energy there to just be protected in all of those ways, and to have the opportunity to have a voice in their own work environment and in their own situation. I did also want to talk about, and excited because you are the Pierce County Council Chair. And sometimes we are very King County focused here, but it is really important to understand what's happening throughout the state and in other counties. There's been lots of conversation in Pierce County and the Tacoma area, areas south, about how, especially unincorporated areas, are invested in. Looking at projections for growth, both jobs and population occurring in many of those unincorporated areas and conversations about, does it make sense to incorporate some of those areas into cities? How are investments going to be made to help prepare and absorb that growth? What is that situation currently in Pierce County? [00:28:42] Derek Young: So, glad you asked because I will just start it by saying, we want these neighborhoods and communities to incorporate. It's actually something that we would encourage. It's actually unusual to have such a large, urban, unincorporated area. And it's certainly not what is intended by the Growth Management Act under the state. The Growth Management Act wants growth to happen in cities and not necessarily in counties. But for those of your listeners that are in King County, they may not be aware that if the urban unincorporated part of Pierce County south of Tacoma were to incorporate, it would be the second largest city in the entire state. It is a huge number of people, a couple 100,000, and we've been planning for a significant amount of growth that continue to happen there. It's already denser in most places than the city of Bellevue. So, these are large areas. It also happened, I would say, rather haphazardly. There are historic decisions that were made, and this is the thing about local government and land use and transportation planning - the decisions you make today will echo for decades. And that's certainly the case in Pierce County. There were lots of mistakes where basically growth was just allowed to happen in a haphazard way. It looked, at one point, like we were going to pave our way to Mount Rainier, and that was not the best idea in the world. And if you look at how you lay out a transportation grid, get resources - water, sewer, so on, so forth - just not a great idea. But that's what happened and we have to deal with it now. So, there is a fair amount of frustration as a result and the thing is that counties are not greatly equipped to handle that. We actually have very different tax structures than cities. We're only allowed to do certain things compared to cities. Just this one example, and this has been a constant frustration of mine, the multifamily tax exemption that basically encourages quality apartment building, so on, so forth, to get more housing - counties are prohibited from using that whereas cities have it. So, your community can look exactly like any other city, except the fact that you are living in an unincorporated area means that you're not eligible for that. Same is true of utility tax. We can't do business licensing the same way. We can't even require garbage collection. I'm not kidding. We can't - [00:31:47] Crystal Fincher: I did not know that. [00:31:48] Derek Young: Yeah, it's a weird, weird state rule. So, the point being that most of these areas belong in cities and whether or not they incorporate on their own - in each smaller community, most of them identify separately. There's a push by Representative Morgan to try to think about maybe incorporating one larger city and we're open to all ideas. There's been a few different efforts and they've each failed. Many years ago, there was a push to incorporate lots of cities. And so in the mid '90s, University Place, the city of Lakewood, Edgewood - they all incorporated at the same time. And since then, there's been a pretty big hole. We haven't seen any communities incorporate. So, the other option is annexing to a city, and that's an even slower process because the existing city residents - they may not think the same way as the new residents. So, for example, in terms of city services, will it be a net benefit in terms of tax revenue or will it be a net drain on your existing revenue? So, that's something that they have to consider, but it's definitely something that we want to encourage, which sounds odd as the county - we want to be the local government. But counties are always going to be the regional government. If you look at King County, for example, nearly all the urban area is incorporated into a city. There are a couple pockets that are not. There are a couple areas that are on the fringe of the urban area, but for the most part, it's incorporated. And, by the way, City of Seattle - incorporate White Center, for God's sake. I mean, it's a little crazy that that hasn't happened yet. Or Burien. One of the two. Someone do it. [00:33:54] Crystal Fincher: Yeah, yeah. It certainly makes sense. And to your point, county governments are usually viewed as the regional layer and are not the ideal body to handle just those day-to-day, on-the-ground things like cities do. Which creates the conversation like we're having in Parkway, Spanaway and Frederickson. Certainly in King County, talking about areas like Skyway and White Center being neglected, really feeling underinvested in because the typical investments that are made by cities and in the overwhelming amount of places in the county that are handled by cities, it just makes those kinds of issues fall to the back burner, oftentimes. Or just on the scale that the county operates, dedicating resources to one pocket or to areas that are very small in comparison to the county, but very meaningful to the people who are living there, is a tension that continues to exist. So, I will definitely be following this carefully. In this package, it looks like there's $200,000 that Representative Morgan had dedicated to studying the feasibility of incorporating into a city for those areas. Whether or not the city solution is right, I do not know. Probably best for the people who are there to decide, and the feasibility study is probably going to be very helpful and useful for that, but there has to be a solution for how to manage these local areas that, to your point, are large areas, are dense and highly populated areas, are some of the most populated areas in the state, but are and have been historically underinvested. And now we're expecting them to absorb a lot of growth, which is not being absorbed into other incorporated areas and cities because we are enforcing that and we keep not moving forward on policies that would encourage that. But if this is not managed effectively, then again, we fall into the trap of making housing more expensive, of siting jobs further and further away from where people live, making traffic worse, putting a strain and demand on our utilities and resources. Building housing where it doesn't currently exist is a very expensive thing for cities and communities to do - not just having to extend city infrastructure out there to serve it, but also to then have to maintain that for it's lifetime - is incredibly expensive and costs that are typically not captured anywhere within development. We're very bad at capturing those costs and really reflecting the true cost of building outside of areas that are already populated and that have housing, and that's what we're looking at and we better manage that better than we have before. The state may have not taken big steps in making that possible, but hopefully local communities will use the initiative to do that. And with that, thank you so much for joining us today on March 11th - time is flying and now we're past the legislative session - March 11th, 2022. The producer of Hacks & Wonks is Lisl Stadler and assistant producer is Shannon Cheng, helped out by Emma Mudd. Our wonderful co-host today is Pierce County Council Chair, Derek Young. You can find Derek on Twitter and you should follow Derek on Twitter @DerekMYoung, D-E-R-E-K- M- Young. You can find me on Twitter @finchfrii. Now you can follow Hacks & Wonks on iTunes, Spotify, wherever else you get your podcast - I listen on the Overcast app - just type Hacks, I may not listen to Hacks & Wonks, but other podcasts. Anyway, just type "Hacks and Wonks" into the search bar, be sure to subscribe to get our Friday almost-live shows and our midweek show delivered to your podcast feed. If you like us, leave us a review wherever you listen to Hacks & Wonks. You can also get a full transcript of this episode and links to the resources referenced in the show at officialhacksandwonks.com and in the episode notes. Thanks for tuning in and we'll talk to you next time.

Washington state transportation package close to passing in final days of legislative session. https://loom.ly/w7W1Rn4 #CRC #InterstateBridge #InterstateBridgeReplacement #ColumbiaRiver #PortlandOr #VancouverWa #CurtisKing AnnetteCleveland #JakeFey #MarkoLiias #SusanMcLain #gastax #WALeg #I5 #FuelExportTax #GregJohnson #BiStateBridgeCommittee #PublicWorksBoard #ODOT #WSDOT #ClarkCountyWa #MAX #Lightrail #BusRapidTransit #ClarkCountyNews #ClarkCountyToday

Oregon lawmakers adjourned their 2022 legislative session on Friday after making massive investments in programs tackling homelessness, workforce development and education. Legislators spent more than $2.5 billion dollars in all. That includes programs to help low-income families buy homes, as well as one-time payments to people struggling to recover from the pandemic. Over 130 bills will be sent to Governor Brown to sign. OPB Political Reporter Dirk VanderHart joins us to summarize the session. The Washington Legislature is set to wrap up their session this week. Political reporter Austin Jenkins walks us through what's likely from Olympia this year.

Majority Democrats in the Washington Legislature on Tuesday narrowly beat back a third attempt to squelch a new tax they proposed on gasoline and diesel exported to neighboring states from Washington refineries.

In an act of labor solidarity, scores of Democratic staffers in the Washington Legislature staged a “sick-out” Wednesday after a bill that would have allowed them to unionize failed to advance before a key cutoff deadline.

Democrats in charge of the Washington Legislature are proposing a new tax on gasoline and diesel fuel destined for Oregon, Idaho and Alaska to partially pay for a cornucopia of highway, transit, rail, bike trail and ferry construction across Washington state. The "exported fuel tax" was included in a transportation spending and revenue package unveiled Tuesday in Olympia.

Planning for additional bridge across Columbia River proposed. https://loom.ly/BdvFxrw #Thirdbridge #ColumbiaRiverCrossing #InterstateBridgeReplacementProgram #BrandonVick #LyndaWilson #VickiKraft #GaryMedvigy #MattRansom #ShawnDonaghy #AnnRivers #JohnBraun #LarryHoff #KarenBowerman #ClarkCountyCouncil #RTC #ChuckGreen #JakeFey #KeithBoehner #HB2084 #SB5934 #WashingtonLegislature #I5 #1205 #GlennJacksonBridge #InterstateBridge #trafficcongestion #freightmobility #CTRAN #Oregon #Portlandmetroarea #CamasWa #GreshamOr #KevinPeterson #WillametteRiver #VancouverWa #ClarkCountyWa #ClarkCountyNews #ClarkCountyToday

Will 10 shot .22 rifles become illegal in Washington...watch the legislature it could happen. --- This episode is sponsored by · Anchor: The easiest way to make a podcast. https://anchor.fm/app

Crystal is joined by Doug Trumm, Executive Director of The Urbanist, for today's jam-packed show that covers successful tactics used in the Sawant recall election, Durkan veto of the Council vote to end the hazard pay they enacted, the Starbucks unionization movement coming to Seattle, a City Hall Park land swap without park preservation guarantees, new leadership ahead for SDOT in the Harrell administration, the Legislature suing Inslee over vetoes, and the potential for a white Christmas posing risks to those left out in the cold. As always, a full text transcript of the show is available below and at officialhacksandwonks.com. Find the host, Crystal Fincher on Twitter at @finchfrii and find today's co-host, Doug Trumm, at @dmtrumm. More info is available at officialhacksandwonks.com. Resources “What Sawant's Close 310-Vote Recall Victory Means for Seattle Politics” by Doug Trumm from The Urbanist: https://www.theurbanist.org/2021/12/18/what-sawants-close-310-vote-recall-victory-means-for-seattle-politics/ “Sawant's Recall Maps Show Familiar Path to Victory Through Capitol Hill and Central District” by Doug Trumm from The Urbanist: https://www.theurbanist.org/2021/12/22/sawants-recall-maps-show-familiar-path-to-victory-through-capitol-hill-and-central-district/ “City Council Votes to End Hazard Pay. Grocery Workers Say They Feel ‘Abandoned'” by Hannah Krieg from The Stranger:  https://www.thestranger.com/slog/2021/12/15/63863317/city-council-votes-to-end-hazard-pay-grocery-workers-say-they-feel-abandoned “Mayor Jenny Durkan will use veto to keep hazard pay in place for Seattle grocery workers” by David Gutman from The Seattle Times: https://www.seattletimes.com/seattle-news/politics/mayor-jenny-durkan-will-use-veto-to-keep-hazard-pay-in-place-for-seattle-grocery-workers/ City of Seattle - Councilmember Teresa Mosqueda Statement in Support of Continuing Grocery Store Worker Hazard Pay: https://council.seattle.gov/2021/12/22/councilmember-teresa-mosqueda-statement-in-support-of-continuing-grocery-store-worker-hazard-pay/ “Starbucks Workers United says Broadway shop wants to unionize” from Capitol Hill Seattle Blog: https://www.capitolhillseattle.com/2021/12/starbucks-workers-united-says-broadway-shop-wants-to-unionize/ “Controversial City Hall Park Land Swap Moves Ahead” by Natalie Bicknell Argerious from The Urbanist: https://www.theurbanist.org/2021/12/21/controversial-city-hall-park-land-swap-moves-ahead/ “SDOT Director Zimbabwe is Out, What Does This Mean for Seattle Transportation?” by Natalie Bicknell Argerious from The Urbanist: https://www.theurbanist.org/2021/12/17/sdot-director-zimbabwe-is-out-what-does-this-mean-for-seattle-transportation/ “Washington Legislature sues Inslee over vetoes, setting up another clash over powers” by Joseph O'Sullivan from The Seattle Times: https://www.seattletimes.com/seattle-news/politics/washington-legislature-sues-inslee-over-vetoes-setting-up-another-clash-over-powers/ “Seattle area to see some snow Christmas weekend” by Christine Clarridge from The Seattle Times: https://www.seattletimes.com/seattle-news/weather/seattle-area-in-for-a-cold-snowy-weekend/ King County Regional Homelessness Authority - Cold Weather Shelter Dec. 25-29: https://kcrha.org/2021/12/22/cold-weather-shelter-dec-25-29/ City of Seattle - Severe Weather Flyer: https://www.seattle.gov/Documents/Departments/HumanServices/Severe-Weather-Flyer_2021-12-22.pdf “Warming shelters to open during cold weather” from KIRO7: https://www.kiro7.com/news/local/warming-shelters-open-during-cold-weather/AJGQT4FRZRANTAGCWY5GS2K3BI/   Transcript:  Transcript will be uploaded as soon as possible.

This week on the show Crystal is joined by Senator Karen Keiser, Washington State Senate President Pro Tempore and one of the busiest women in the Washington State legislature. They discuss what happened in the past legislative session this year, as well as changes that will be worked toward next year. Highlights include more than a dozen public safety bills passed, protection of essential workers during the pandemic, attempts to rectify Washington State's upside-down tax code, worker protections in the unprecedentedly hot conditions we've experienced due to climate change, passage of the Working Families Tax Credit, supporting childcare workers as we face a massive childcare shortage, and more. This was indeed a busy legislative session! As always, a full text transcript of the show is available below and at officialhacksandwonks.com. Find the host, Crystal Fincher on Twitter at @finchfrii and find Senator Karen Keiser at @karenkeiser1. More info is available at officialhacksandwonks.com.   Resources  "What would it cost to house and provide treatment for Seattle's homeless?" by Scott Greenstone at The Seattle Times: https://www.seattletimes.com/seattle-news/homeless/what-is-the-cost-to-house-and-provide-treatment-for-seattles-homeless/  "With 12 New Laws, Washington State Joins Movement to Overhaul Policing" by Austin Jenkins from NPR: https://www.npr.org/2021/05/18/997974519/a-dozen-police-reform-bills-signed-into-law-in-washington-state  "A year after George Floyd's murder, what's changed in Washington state?" by Melissa Santos from Crosscut: https://crosscut.com/news/2021/05/year-after-george-floyds-murder-whats-changed-washington-state  "With the Washington Legislature halfway through its session, here's where policing bill stand" by Joseph O'Sullivan from The Seattle Times: https://www.seattletimes.com/seattle-news/politics/washington-legislature-passes-bill-requiring-police-officers-to-intervene-if-they-witness-excessive-force/  "Washington Legislature charts 'new beginning' in climate change fight" by Levi Pulkkinen from Investigate West via Crosscut: https://crosscut.com/politics/2021/05/washington-legislature-charts-new-beginning-climate-change-fight  "Inslee signs off on capital gains tax for wealthy and tax rebate for lower-income workers in Washington" by Jim Brunner from The Seattle Times: https://www.seattletimes.com/seattle-news/politics/inslee-signs-capital-gains-tax-for-wealthy-and-tax-rebate-for-lower-income-workers-in-washington/  "Return to Work? Now With Child Care Still in Limbo, Some Parents Say." by Claire Cain Miller from The New York Times: https://www.nytimes.com/2021/08/05/upshot/covid-child-care-schools.html  "2021 heat wave is now the deadliest weather-related event in Washington history" by John Ryan from KUOW: https://www.kuow.org/stories/heat-wave-death-toll-in-washington-state-jumps-to-112-people  "Washington Joins Oregon, California, British Columbia In Passing Low-Carbon Fuel Standard" by Courtney Flatt from KUOW: https://www.kuow.org/stories/washington-joins-oregon-california-british-columbia-in-passing-low-carbon-fuel-standard  "The HEAL Act gives WA a path to environmental justice" by Jennifer Calkins from Crosscut: https://crosscut.com/opinion/2021/03/heal-act-gives-wa-path-environmental-justice  The Front and Centered Coalition: https://frontandcentered.org/  "Relief slow to reach King County renters as evictions set to resume" by David Kroman from Crosscut: https://crosscut.com/news/2021/06/relief-slow-reach-king-county-renters-evictions-set-resume  Hacks & Wonks interview with Pierce County Councilmember Derek Young: https://www.officialhacksandwonks.com/listenpodcast/episode/32ca17ec/seattle-pay-attention-to-pierce-county-a-conversation-with-pierce-county-council-chair-derek-young  Hacks & Wonks interview with Senator and King County Executive Candidate Joe Nguyen: https://www.officialhacksandwonks.com/listenpodcast/episode/1e38d0ac/meet-senator-and-kc-exec-candidate-joe-nguyen-again 

Today Representative Debra Entenman (District 47) joins Crystal to discuss triumphs of police accountability legislation in the most recent legislative session, how much public safety work still needs to be done, and the strong and immediate need for privacy protections. Additionally, Rep. Entenman discusses how you can best support legislation to protect your communities and your privacy, and reminds you to get your Covid vaccine, because “the Delta variant is not playing!” As always, a full text transcript of the show is available below and at officialhacksandwonks.com. Find the host, Crystal Fincher on Twitter at @finchfrii and find today's guest, Representative Debra Entenman at @DebraEntenman. More info is available at officialhacksandwonks.com.   Resources “Bill to create civilian office to investigate lethal force, serious injuries by police advances in Washington Legislature” by Maya Lesikar from The Seattle Times: https://www.seattletimes.com/seattle-news/politics/bill-to-create-civilian-office-to-investigate-lethal-force-serious-injuries-by-police-advances-in-washington-legislature/  “New Law Demands De-escalation, Not Abandoning People in Crisis” by Kim Mosolf from Disability Rights Washington and Enoka Herat from ACLU-WA: https://www.aclu-wa.org/story/new-law-demands-de-escalation-not-abandoning-people-crisis  “Washington Legislature bans police chokeholds and neck restraints and sets limits on tear gas and use of force” by Joseph O'Sullivan from The Seattle Times: https://www.seattletimes.com/seattle-news/politics/washington-legislature-bans-police-chokeholds-neck-restraints-and-sets-limits-on-tear-gas-and-use-of-force/  “What new WA police accountability laws do and don't do” by Melissa Santos from Crosscut: https://crosscut.com/politics/2021/07/what-new-wa-police-accountability-laws-do-and-dont-do  “‘The Computer Got It Wrong': How Facial Recognition Led To False Arrest of Black Man” by Bobby Allyn from NPR:  https://www.npr.org/2020/06/24/882683463/the-computer-got-it-wrong-how-facial-recognition-led-to-a-false-arrest-in-michig  “The WIRED Guide to Your Personal Data (and Who Is Using It)” by Louise Matsakis from WIRED: https://www.wired.com/story/wired-guide-personal-data-collection/  “Google Says It Doesn't ‘Sell' Your Data. Here's How the Company Shares, Monetizes, and Exploits It.” by Bennett Cyphers from the Electronic Frontiers Foundation: https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2020/03/google-says-it-doesnt-sell-your-data-heres-how-company-shares-monetizes-and  “King County rent relief still slow to reach tenants” by David Kroman from Crosscut: https://crosscut.com/news/2021/08/king-county-rent-relief-still-slow-reach-tenants    Transcript

Since George Floyd's murder this past summer, dozens of bills have been introduced at the Washington Legislature intending to increase accountability and transparency among police forces. ACLU of Washington attorney Enoka Herat has worked on many of them, including two landmark pieces of legislation that address police tactics and use of force. On this episode, she talks about the ways in which activism shaped the state's current legislative agenda, and she discusses roles lawyers play in abolishing police violence through work at the legislative level.

We start with some COVID crazies in the states, and the news bomb shell that was quietly rolled back this week. Then my live commentary on Joe Biden's first congressional address. Video: 360: Biden Buys American LIVE - UnfilterTube (https://unfilter.tube/videos/watch/99b58d70-9290-4e99-b6f7-ce3e67176692) 360: Overtime - UnfilterTube (https://unfilter.tube/videos/watch/b26e7993-16a3-46ad-82e2-09b4d9917a36) Links: (1) Vitamin D deficiency in India - YouTube (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1Q_mhJRFtxg) Private school in Miami warns teachers against taking COVID-19 vaccine - YouTube (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3CaTtP07o00) Private Florida school won't employ vaccinated teachers - ABC News (https://abcnews.go.com/Health/wireStory/private-florida-school-employ-vaccinated-teachers-77347282) Miami private school won't employ teachers who get the Covid-19 vaccine (https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/miami-private-school-won-t-employ-teachers-who-get-covid-n1265462) Women report more side effects from the Covid vaccines than men (https://news.yahoo.com/women-report-more-side-effects-225548520.html) John Kerry denies sharing secret intelligence with Iran as calls for resignation grow - Washington Times (https://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2021/apr/27/john-kerry-denies-sharing-secret-intelligence-with/) Rudy Giuliani's home, office searched by federal agents as part of lobbying probe, sources tell ABC News - ABC News (https://abcnews.go.com/US/rudy-giulianis-home-office-searched-federal-agents-part/story?id=77368884) Rudy Giuliani’s Apartment Searched in Federal Investigation (https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/us/federal-investigators/ar-BB1g9gWn?li=BBnb7Kz) Counties with Oregon's biggest cities moved to extreme risk (https://apnews.com/article/health-lifestyle-business-coronavirus-oregon-3563078bcbaad4397ea432111264065e) Biden celebrates an America 'on the move again' (https://news.yahoo.com/biden-celebrate-covid-gains-urge-020243306.html) Biden Creating Commission to Study Expanding the Supreme Court - The New York Times (https://www.nytimes.com/2021/04/09/us/politics/biden-supreme-court-packing.html) Bitcoin is a fraud that will blow up, says JP Morgan boss | Bitcoin | The Guardian (https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2017/sep/13/bitcoin-fraud-jp-morgan-cryptocurrency-drug-dealers) Google Promised Its Contact Tracing App Was Completely Private—But It Wasn’t – The Markup (https://themarkup.org/privacy/2021/04/27/google-promised-its-contact-tracing-app-was-completely-private-but-it-wasnt) Census Shows South and Mountain West Gain Political Power From Population Growth - WSJ (https://www.wsj.com/articles/south-and-mountain-west-gain-political-power-from-population-growth-11619465263) Census Shows U.S. Population Grew at Slowest Rate Since 1930s (https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/us/census-shows-us-population-grew-at-slowest-rate-since-1930s/ar-BB1g4YPN) US population rises to 331,449,281, Census Bureau says (https://apnews.com/article/census-2020-population-ce81fbc89a17223b6e3f52f1f62eef25) 2021 Oscars TV Ratings: How Were the Academy Awards? – Deadline (https://deadline.com/2021/04/2021-0scars-tv-ratings-academy-awards-low-abc-disney-1234744135/) Washington Legislature passes carbon pricing measure (https://apnews.com/article/business-government-and-politics-washington-legislature-1da0a978342ad9787552f8e7926cee0a) Israel Examines Heart Inflammation Cases After Pfizer Covid Shot (https://www.bloombergquint.com/onweb/israel-examines-heart-inflammation-cases-after-pfizer-covid-shot) SpaceX astronauts had TWO near-misses with 'space debris' and they braced for CRASH on way to space station (https://www.the-sun.com/news/2770635/spacex-rocket-near-miss-ufo/) Pentagon blames Russia for mystery illness affecting US troops | The Independent (https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/us-politics/pentagon-blames-russia-mystery-illness-b1836104.html)

Just days after the Washington Legislature gave final approval to a new capital gains tax aimed at the state's wealthiest residents, the conservative Freedom Foundation has filed a lawsuit on behalf of five individuals and one couple to overturn the tax.

Fifteen weeks ago, majority Democrats in the Washington Legislature convened a 105-day session vowing to address the fallout from COVID-19, police accountability, greenhouse gas emissions and issues of racial justice. On Sunday, Democrats adjourned the session having accomplished much of what they set out to do, including passage of a number of sweeping bills that Gov. Jay Inslee, in a statement, called “historic” in nature. "This session's accomplishments are as important to the long-term well-being of our state as any session I've seen," Inslee said.

Fifteen weeks ago, majority Democrats in the Washington Legislature convened a 105-day session vowing to address the fallout from COVID-19, police...

The momentous George Floyd guilty verdict is still weighing heavily on people’s minds this Friday. At the same time, the Washington Legislature is wrapping up an action-packed session during which lawmakers passed several bills that will significantly change the way police departments operate in this state - and the way our state handles protests.

Nearly a year after the Washington Legislature voted to legalize sports betting, terms have been agreed for the first sportsbook to open.

First-term state Sen. Joe Nguyen, D-Seattle, talks about facing down lobbyists and other eye-opening experiences as one of the first two Vietnamese Americans - and few people of color - in the Washington Legislature.

The Sightline Institute's climate-change expert, Kristin Eberhard, joins The Overcast to break down the carbon-tax proposal heating up the Washington Legislature and the initiative campaign waiting to pounce if lawmakers don't act.

The November 7 special election will decide the balance of power in the Washington Legislature. It will also determine if Portland Community College gets $185 million for expansion. We talk about the important issues before voters on both sides of the Columbia. Host Geoff Norcross talks with OPB political reporters Jeff Mapes and Lauren Dake, and OPB's SW Washington reporter Molly Solomon.

This week, Dameon Pesanti and Jake Thomas talk about the Supreme Court case behind the Washington Legislature's failure to pass a capital budget and what that means for Clark County. Next Pesanti talks with Columbian intern Will Campbell about the city of Vancouver's plans to prevent animal hoarding, bring futsal to town and one local bar's struggle for outdoor seating. Finally, Pesanti and Ashley Swanson give you a two-week primer on local events.

This week, the Portland Water Bureau and the Washington Legislature were told to stop lollygagging on critical issues. The Oregon Health Authority ordered the City of Portland to treat its water for cryptosporidium, which it has refused to do for over a decade. And Washington Governor Jay Inslee called lawmakers back to Olympia for another special session to fix its infamous school funding problem.Host Geoff Norcross and OPB news director Anna Griffin will talk with Olympia correspondent Austin Jenkins and Portland Mercury reporter Dirk Vanderhart.