Per-Pupil expenditures 1992-2011 not adjusted for inflation

Dick Davis at the The Washington Research Council posted about new Census data recently released on school funding.

Washington ranks 30th in total school spending per pupil in 2011

A new report from the U.S. Census provides a wealth of data on public school spending. (Links to all the data can be found here.)

A look at state revenues and spending per pupil can be found in this spreadsheet, Table 11 from the report. It shows that Washington spent $9,483 per pupil, ranking the state 30th, slightly below the U.S. average of $10,560.The table also shows that Washington ranks 30th in total revenues per pupil, $11,329. And, as we noted in our comparative analysis of education funding, we rank relatively high in state spending, No. 15, and lower in local funding, No. 36. (Read entire article here...)

The census data is the raw data on school funding. Typically it’s more interesting to look at some nuanced analysis. For example, the costs of hiring professional staff (teachers) varies by state, with highly urban states having higher costs not just for teachers, but for all college-educated workers, so the same dollar buys less education. This kind of analysis will come in over time.

Dick makes a couple of interesting points that are worth thinking (and talking) about:

1. Washington ranks high in state spending and low in local spending compared to other states.
2. Many states are dealing with increasing costs of paying off underfunded pension systems.

Washington ranks high in state support because our constitution requires us to do so. The Supreme Court pointed this out quite painfully in the McCleary decision. Depending on local resources for basic education makes it difficult for taxpayers in low-property value areas of the state to give their children a comparable education to those in more affluent areas, a problem that plagues states that mostly depend on local revenue.

Dick is correct to be concerned about the rising costs of paying for unfunded retirement system liabilities. Washington is also in good shape here compared to many states, but these costs are increasing as we pay for decisions made in the 1970s. It’s important to recognize that these costs are real and must be paid, but that they do not increase educational outcomes for children today. (Essentially we’re paying for educational costs incurred 20-30-40 years ago that should have been paid then but were not.) Ensuring that we adequately fund BOTH the actual educational needs of our children and the constitutionally required costs of paying for decisions made 40 years ago is the task in front of the Legislature today.

The constitutional language in question is in Article IX, Section 3

There is hereby established the common school construction fund to be used exclusively for the purpose of financing the construction of facilities for the common schools. The sources of said fund shall be: (1) Those proceeds derived from the sale or appropriation of timber and other crops from school and state lands subsequent to June 30, 1965, other than those granted for specific purposes; (2) the interest accruing on said permanent common school fund from and after July 1, 1967, together with all rentals and other revenues derived therefrom and from lands and other property devoted to the permanent common school fund from and after July 1, 1967; and (3) such other sources as the legislature may direct. That portion of the common school construction fund derived from interest on the permanent common school fund may be used to retire such bonds as may be authorized by law for the purpose of financing the construction of facilities for the common schools.

There is other language later in the constitution that the advocates argue makes it possible to shift this money around. Their argument hinges on declaring that the amount of money for school construction is adequate and that these funds are “excess.” Since they have to borrow money to replace the funds this seems a hard argument to make successfully. I have three pages of a list of local school district construction bonds that have failed in the last 5 years, totaling $1,865,605,845.

So

1. They have to borrow money to replace the funds they are shifting to the operating budget, and
2. Local taxpayers are trying, and failing, to pass bonds to fund school construction locally. Presumably they need these funds. I can get you a count of portables in the state, but it’ll take a few days.
3. The McCleary decision requires us to add full-day kindergarten, reduce class size, and pay for more instructional hours, all of which require additional classroom space. The money we have isn’t adequate today – how will it be adequate in the future?

The Senate Republicans are reduced to doing this because they have an ideological aversion to taxes – they’d rather borrow this money for construction – paying increased debt service on it for the next 30 years – instead of recognizing that it is not feasible to write a budget that both complies with the McCleary decision and does not raise revenue.

Again, I’m not a lawyer. There may be some interpretation of the language that allows this to happen, but it’s a crazy thing to do. If you add $166 million of bonds every year for school construction when you could have been paying cash you get a growing crescendo of debt service to pay, in addition to paying the same costs. The plain language of the constitution leads you to believe that this money should actually be spent on school construction, not on operations.

The Governor’s Leadership Academy is a unique internship program for college and graduate students to gain a hands-on learning experience in the Governor’s office.

The Inslee Administration is looking for innovative, forward-thinking individuals who are committed to public service and who want to develop their leadership and public policy skills in a dynamic environment.

Qualifications

• Outstanding verbal, written and leadership skills
• Ability to handle multiple priorities and meet established deadlines
• Ability to work well and creatively, in a team environment and independently
• Good judgment, ability to manage sensitive situations, and highly personable
• Passion for public service

Internship Opportunities:

Boards and Commissions

Boards and commissions are designed to give citizens a voice in their government and provide a means of influencing decisions that shape the quality of life for the residents of our state. Washington State has 200+ boards and commissions to which Gov. Inslee appoints citizen members. Interns will assist the Director of Boards and Commissions in the fulfillment of office responsibilities including, but not limited to: soliciting, receiving, organizing, processing and responding to applications, assisting in outreach to board and commission members and researching board functions.

Office of the Chief of Staff

The office of the Chief of Staff is a fast-paced environment that offers interns the unique opportunity to interact directly with the Governor’s Executive Team, Cabinet members, agency staff and constituents. Interns are required to assist with briefings for the Chief of Staff, prepare agendas for Cabinet-level meetings, and administrative duties as assigned by the Executive Assistant to the Chief of Staff.

Communications Office

The Communications office works with the media to inform the public of the Governor’s actions, goals and ideas. An intern in the Communications office would assist with the assembling of daily news clips, drafting press releases, assisting with media events, assisting with Social Media and other administrative duties as assigned.

Constituent Services

The office of Constituent Services receives and processes 80,000 to 100,000 contacts each year. Interns will respond to constituent comments and concerns via email and letters, but also face to face and by phone as necessary. Interns will assist in drafting and processing official correspondence for publication, opening the mail, scanning correspondence, data entry work and filing. Constituent Services interns are expected to have a high level of interpersonal, writing and research skills.

Internal Relations Office

The office of Internal Relations oversees the Governor’s Small Agency Cabinet, the Boards and Commissions office, the Governor’s International Relations office and the Executive Residence. An intern for the Internal Relations office will have a unique opportunity to interact with the Governor’s Executive Team, The First Lady, small agency cabinet members and constituents. Responsibilities include but are not limited to: preparing briefing material for the Executive Director of Internal Relations and First Lady, preparing meeting agendas, research, special projects, event coordination and other administrative duties as assigned.

External Relations Office

The Governor’s office of External Relations is responsible for statewide outreach on behalf of the Governor to a diverse set of stakeholders and constituency groups. The External Relations office provides staffing and briefing for the Governor’s public events and are the eyes and ears on the ground for the office of the Governor. Interns in the External Relations office will work closely with Regional Outreach Representatives to assist with briefing materials, research, event coordination and other duties as assigned.

Office of General Counsel

The Governor’s General Counsel provides a variety of legal advice to the Governor and the Governor’s Executive Team, including advice on judicial appointments; clemency or pardon petitions; executive orders; legislation; and ethics. Interns and externs will assist with legal research, writing and other duties as assigned. Internships in this office are intended for second and third year law students.

Legislative Affairs and Policy

The Legislative Affairs and Policy Office (LAPO) are comprised of approximately 20 professionals who manage the Governor’s legislative agenda. They work closely with legislators, stakeholders, governmental entities and numerous constituent groups in their work to develop and/or guide policy initiatives in support of the Governor’s agenda. LAPO advisors are assigned to specific issue area(s) such as Education, Health Care, Aerospace, Energy and Environment and more. This staffs ensure the Governor’s policy interests are represented at all levels of government, including in Washington, D.C. Interns in LAPO will have the unique opportunity to be indirectly involved in the legislative process by assisting in responsibilities which may include policy and issue research, development of briefing documents, tracking high priority bills, analyzing bills, coordinating bill signing and various administrative duties.

Scheduling and Reception

The first point of contact for many constituents is often the Governor’s executive receptionist. Interns who work with the Executive Receptionist are responsible for taking calls, directing guests and meeting attendees and other duties as assigned. Interns who work with the Governor’s scheduler will have an opportunity to help with special projects for the Governor.

International Relations and Protocol

The Governor’s office meets and hosts numerous international dignitaries every year. Interns who work with the International Relations Director will assist with preparing briefings, correspondence, protocol, event coordination and other duties as assigned.

Washington DC Office

Interns in the Washington, DC office will have a unique opportunity to assist the Director of the Washington, DC Office with projects related to the Governor’s federal agenda, and that will promote Washington State interests in the nation’s capital. Interns will assist with research, preparing briefing memos, scheduling and other administrative duties as assigned.

How to Apply

To be considered, you must apply at www.careers.wa.gov. As part of the application, interested applicants must submit (attach) the following: (1) a letter of interest describing your specific qualifications, (2) a current resume detailing experience and education. Please indicate up to two (2) categories below that best match the area of work which the experience and knowledge of state government you wish to gain.

Please Note: Application review begins immediately and will continue on an ongoing basis until an adequate pool of candidates is established. Therefore, it will be to the applicant’s advantage to submit materials as soon as possible.

• The internship is unpaid but reimbursements for travel may be available on a case by case basis.

• Interns must be available for at least 10 hours a week for 12 weeks – minimum.

• College course credit may be applicable, depending on school program. We will work with your individual academic institution in obtaining college course credit for academic internships.

• Location: The program is based in Olympia, WA and Washington DC.

Supplemental Information:

For more information about this position, please contact Unjin Lee at (360) 902.4111 or by email unjin.lee@gov.wa.gov.

For information regarding the system and application process, please contact Don Chavez at (360) 407.8407 or by email don.chavez@des.wa.gov.

The State of Washington is an equal opportunity employer. Persons of color, women, veterans, and disabled individuals are encouraged to apply. Persons with a disability who need assistance with their application or that need this announcement in an alternative format, may call (360) 664-1960 or toll free (877) 664-1960. TTY users should first call 711 to access the Washington Relay Service.

Edward O. Prince

Executive Director

WA State Commission on African American Affairs

(360) 725-5663 Direct

(360) 725-5664

(360) 529-1434 Mobile

eprince@caa.wa.gov

www.caa.wa.gov|www.facebook.com/WashingtonStateCAAA

Executive Assistant

Bailey J. Stober

WA State Commission on African American Affairs

(360) 725-5664

bstober@caa.wa.gov

Another town hall meeting. I should go back on the calendar and count how many we’ve done. These have been fun over the years and we keep fiddling with the formula. This time we had a full room so we took questions on index card. I read the cards exactly, and I think I read most of the questions. We get to more questions this way with fewer repeats, and some people like this. (We hear from them afterwards.) Some people would prefer to ask their question directly, and I think we’ll try to allocate more time for that as well. To do this we would have to be less long-winded.

We got questions on a variety of topics. I’d say the top were Education funding, and why are we even considering changing anything about how the system works, Healthcare, particularly the Medicaid expansion, overall budget/tax questions, including the 2/3 vote threshold issue on which Rodney and I disagree. Cyrus seems to be on my side of this. I gave the speech on super-majorities that I’ve done a number of times – referencing the founders of both the US and Washington State, the Federalist Papers, and other historical arguments about why the system outlined in the constitution actually works pretty well and we should stick with it. It’s available to read in the last newsletter I sent out.

You’ll hear more from me on education funding when we roll out our budget in a few weeks. (Secret knowledge: I think the that making “steady and measurable progress” on McCleary as the court has called for will require an additional $1.4 billion in new funds this year. If I can make this work in a budget I will do so.)

We are absolutely doing the Medicaid expansion as well. It saves hundreds of millions and covers hundreds of thousands of new people, most of them the working poor. My favorite example of why people don’t really understand how this impacts people was a moment at my drycleaners a few years ago. I was discussing the bill with one of the owners. She talked clearly about how hard it was to get medical care. They had coverage for the kids through Apple Health, but not for the parents. Another customer was there at the same time and I don’t think she realized until that moment that people can work hard, run a successful small business, and not be able to afford care. The Affordable Care Act will make care available to everyone at reasonable cost, and we’re working hard to bring it to Washington this year.

My most disappointing thing this year is our failure to get the votes to pass HB 1588, the bill requiring background checks for firearms sales. The bill is reasonably written, with exceptions for concealed pistol license holders, etc. I spent an entire day counting votes and came up 1 short to pass a bill that would not have had crippling amendments. This would have required a vote of the people before it was adopted. This policy is supported by over 80% of my constituents. I’ve been buried in mail on the issue – on both sides. I apologize for sending a form response. There are too many emails to address individually.

As always, please feel free to contact me if you have any questions we didn’t address. Thank you for coming and for keeping these civil experiences for 10 years.

MEDIA ADVISORY

Who: State Sen. Rodney Tom and state Reps. Cyrus Habib and Ross Hunter (48th Legislative District)

What: Town hall meeting

When: 10 a.m. – noon, Saturday, March 16

Where: Redmond City Hall, 15670 NE 85^th St., Redmond

Why: To meet with constituents to discuss issues and answer their questions about the current legislative session.

###

For interviews or more information:

Sen. Rodney Tom 360-786-7694 or Rodney.Tom@leg.wa.gov

Rep. Cyrus Habib 360-786-7848 or Cyrus.Habib@leg.wa.gov

Rep. Ross Hunter 360-786-7936 Ross.Hunter@leg.wa.gov

All of us were willing to make substantial investments in K12 education funding, though we all had weird conditions and our numbers were all over the map, ranging from $900 million for the House Republicans to $1.4 billion from me, the amount specified by the Joint Legislative Task Force on Education Funding this summer. I take this as a hopeful sign – they’ve all figured out that we have to invest in a quality system in order to get the results that we want.

Both Republicans wanted to ensure that there were “changes” to the education system that would make it more effective before they invested the money. I agree that there should be changes, but we should have some humility about our ability to change the system rapidly. There are 1 million children in our K12 system, and about 100,000 adults. This is not a ship that changes direction on a dime. There are a handful of long-term changes we’re engaged in that you will see bills about this year:

Graduation Requirements: We are in the process of upgrading our graduation requirements to something that looks more like Bellevue or Lake Washington’s than like the rest of the state. We’ll require 24 credits, not the 20 required now. Most students will take a course of study that will prepare them for education after high school, either college, community college, or some technical alternative that gets them a credential. Without this preparation it will be very difficult for our young people to make a living, and consequently to move out of our basements, something greatly to be desired. To read about this you can look at the State School Board’s document on it.

It’s important to not change these all the time or families can’t keep track of it, but we are working on phasing in stronger requirements. I unequivocally support this effort.

Testing: We are moving away from writing Washington-specific tests. Two national consortia have developed coordinated sets of tests based around the “Common Core” standards. Led by the National Governor’s Association the states got together and developed these standards. Washington signed on several years ago. We have adopted a set of tests from the “Smarter Balanced” group, one of two groups developing tests for this set of knowledge. Most first-world countries have a national curriculum, and this is a pretty reasonable attempt at it. There is lots of grumbling that we should have state-specific standards, as if algebra is different in Wisconsin than it is in Washington.

Being part of a consortia saves us tons of money (I’m expecting to save about $35 million on test development alone) and builds better tests that get affected less by individual strong personalities and fads sweeping through the education world. We have not worked out exactly what the changes will be, but you should expect to see less time spent testing, and tests that are more aligned with what college requirements are.

The tests will be delivered on computers, allowing faster scoring and tests that adjust to the level of the student. We’ll have work to do to ensure that each district has enough computers to do this, but I don’t expect this to be a big problem.

Teacher and Principal Evaluations: Washington has adopted a program to provide much stronger teacher and principal evaluations that are partly dependent on student learning data. We’re in the first few years of implementing this and should stay the course. There is some blow-back, as you might expect. (Seattle teachers are not administering a pretty routine test solely because (IMHO) it is a component of their evaluations.) We can’t depend totally on student learning data or everyone would want to teach in Medina and nobody in Yakima – that’s why it’s important to look at student growth instead of absolute values. This requires some subtle statistical work, and is one of the reasons we don’t turn teachers into salespeople on commission – the student learning data should be part of the eval, but not all.

There will be lots of push to change this system, but we should let it go through the adoption phase without screwing with it too much. It takes a long time to change the direction of large ships, and this is a really big one. It will require some money to train principals and teachers on how to work with the new system.

Bills in the System

The Senate passed out a block of education bills last week, and the House did about half their bills on Friday. Short list, cribbed liberally from the analysis of Stand for Children, the League of Education Voters, the Washington State PTA, and our internal staff.

SB 5243 - Academic Acceleration, automatically enrolls every student who is qualified into more rigorous advanced classes. The House passed a weaker version. There’s lots of data that shows that students who are in challenging courses do better afterwards, even if they don’t get a passing grade on the AP exam.  Kids that get college credit via running start, AP, IB or other rigorous systems do better in college, and save money for themselves and for the state. This can be critical for a middle-class family, and we want to encourage it as much as possible.

SB 5491 - State Education Goals, establishes statewide goals for students at key milestones, such as 4th grade reading, 8th grade math, and high school graduation. This is boring, but having some agreed-upon goals can really help folks get focused on what really matters.

SB 5329 – Transforming Persistently Failing Schools, allows the State Superintendent (OSPI) to bring in new leadership, innovation and resources to help persistently struggling schools improve. This is a very controversial bill that creates a requirement that the bottom ten lowest performing schools in the state must be actually changed or something will happen. The process is tortuous, but we don’t really want the state taking over very many schools as we are unlikely to be able to do it at scale. I would tend to agree that at some point if a school remains in the bottom ten state-wide for many years that something needs to be done. This seems like a reasonable process, but it still needs some work.

SB 5237 - 3rd Grade Reading, provides early intervention and support to make sure every student is reading at grade level. Originally this required that 3^rd graders who couldn’t read be held back. The new bill has a lot of funding for intervention – required summer school, extra help during the school year, etc. It’s critical that kids learn how to read proficiently in the 3^rd or 4^th grade. They tend to fall behind catastrophically if they do not. Again, this will be a contentious bill.

SB 5242 - Mutual Consent, ends forced placements by requiring a teacher and a principal to agree before a teacher is assigned to work in a specific school. Again – very controversial. Teachers who aren’t hired go into a temporary position for a year, then can be let go. I do not yet have an opinion on the details of this bill, and the devil will be in the details.

SB 5328 – Letter Grades for Schools, provides parents with clear information by assigning schools a letter grade A-F for their performance based on the state Achievement Index. I’m not sure about the value of this, but allows parents to have a simpler way to evaluate how well their local school is doing. The key is getting the achievement index right – you don’t want to penalize schools that have a lot of at-risk students show up in the first years, but do great work with them, and conversely, you don’t want to reward schools with lots of well-prepared kids who do nothing to advance them.

SB 5244 - Student Suspensions, limits the length of time a student can be suspended from school and improves data collection on school discipline. There is a growing body of research that says that kids who are expelled don’t do well. This makes sense – they aren’t in school learning.

SB 5587 - State Assessments, establishes a transition schedule to move from existing state exams to the new Common Core college- and career-ready exams as graduation requirements for the class of 2018. The House bill is stuck in committee for reasons I don’t understand.

HB 1723 – Early Start, Helps build an integrated early learning system, including preschool, child care, and services for at-risk infants.  Details of the system would be left up to a taskforce with the overall goal of building a comprehensive system for children zero to 5 years old.

HB 1671 – Child Care. Improves the child care system for low-income children and increases the quality of child care these children receive by improving the Working Connections Child Care program, a program that provides child care to low-income parents who are working or in school.

HB 1872 –  Science, Technology, Engineering and Math. Gov. Inslee request bill improving outcomes for STEM. My guess is that this bill will have a lot of changes before we are done.

HB 1692 –  Career and College Ready Graduation Requirements. Rep. Pat Sullivan’s bill to implement the supports necessary for the career and college-ready graduation requirements I referenced above. This is profoundly expensive, adding additional instructional time called for in the bill the McCleary decision calls out as the framework for our constitutional requirements for funding.

HB 1680 – Strategies to Close the Opportunity Gap.  A collection of policies recommended by the educational opportunity gap oversight and accountability committee. This bill points out a fundamental discussion point in how we look at K12 funding. Do we fund specific programs that worked in one district statewide, or do we drive funding out to districts based on an allocation formula and make sure that they have opportunities available to them to select evidence-based programs that will work in their community? As you can tell from the language, I’m in the latter camp. What will work in Yakima may or may not work in Bellevue or Redmond.

HB 1424 – Dropout prevention and Retention. Similar to 1680, this lays out a set of programs that have worked and tries to create funding streams for them. I’m not a fan of all these little funding streams – I think we do better by providing funds to districts and letting them pick the programs that will work.

HB 1177 Accountability. This bill sets up a financial scenario that allows state funding to be used to assist schools that are not meeting their student learning goals, much as SB 5329 does, but it does not provide the intervention strategies needed to transform the schools.

The process of coordinating and reducing the number of bills is likely to take us a while this year. These bills all go through multiple steps and often change substantially before they are finally released. I would expect that we will create additional policy around assessments, around intervention in failing schools, and around early learning, the most powerful investment we can make.

Date: Saturday, March 16, 2013 Time: 10 a.m – noon Place: Redmond City Hall, Council Chamber (15670 NE 85th St Redmond, WA 98052)

Cupola of the Legislative Building

Each Legislative session has a rythym all its own. This one is waiting expectantly for something to happen. I think you’ll see a flurry of activity towards the end of the month as budgets start to get released.

At the beginning of the session I said we had three priorities this year: balancing the budget for both 2013-15 and 2015-17, funding the education improvements required by the McClary decision from the Supreme Court, and implementing the expansion of Medicaid made possible under the federal Affordable Care Act (ACA) also known as “Obamacare.” I still believe these are the correct items to focus on, though a stretch goal would be to implement a reasonable package of road and transit improvements.

We’re making progress on all three fronts, though I think some new items have raised their heads and required attention.

• Gun safety, for obvious reasons. Advocates came in with an expansive agenda, but seem to have focused for this year on finally closing the “gun show loophole” that allows people to purchase guns from private sellers without undergoing background checks. HB 1588 is a reasonable response, creating a way for background checks to take place on almost all sales without creating a centralized database of gun ownership, something very concerning to some people. I support the bill and am a co-sponsor.
• Mental health treatment improvements. We trail the nation in the number of community mental health hospital beds, and don’t have a very strong system of providing support for people who have dangerous mental health issues. The ACA will change some of this, giving many more people access to care in reasonable ways, but we are going to need to strengthen both our civil involuntary committment procedures and our forensic system, closing some awkward gaps. More below.

I’ve also had a lot of questions about the Supreme Court’s ruling the Eyman initiatives requiring a 2/3 vote for tax increases unconstitutional. The ruling was pretty unequivocal – all bills pass with a simple majority in the Legislature, as the constitution intended. I’ve written a response to the many emails on this topic that I include below.

I’m going to write about the education bills in a different post because otherwise this one will get too long.

Higher Education

Higher education is one of the areas at greatest risk in our budget process this year. There are a couple of issues to address to have a rational plan.

First, we have to get a handle on tuition. Our colleges and universities face real inflation in the goods and services they need to purchase, including salaries they have to bargain with their staff. Both tuition and state funding need to keep up with inflation to make sense, but we can’t depend on increased tuition to make up for a lack of state support for the long run. Over time tuition growth should not exceed inflation, and we have greatly exceeded that in the last several years.

Second, the liability we created in the GET program by raising tuition so fast has to be addressed. Some lawmakers are pushing to end the program, which I think is a terrible idea. It’s an important way for middle class families to save for their children’s future. Less aspirationally, a recent actuarial analysis shows that if we eliminate the ability for universities to charge extra “differential” tuition and hold general tuition increases to zero this year and track inflation after that we practically eliminate the unfunded liability. If we do this and don’t provide the funds to the higher ed system to protect them against inflation we are effectively cutting them by hundreds of millions. I voted for house bill 1043 that eliminated the differential tuition idea, our first step on this journey.

Making an investment in the future to ensure that all Washington kids can get the education and credentials that allow them to participate in the modern economy and move out of our basements will require an infusion of funds we do not know how to provide. I’m working on this, but am struggling to find a great solution that works for the rest of the state as well.

Budget

We’re in a quiet period for the budget. Later this month we recieve critical updates on both the “caseloads” and on the amount of revenue we can expect. Caseloads are estimates of the number of people who will qualify for services we are requried to offer them. For example, there will be more children than we had planned for enrolling in our K12 system for reasons that are not yet clear. We have to adjust our budgets to account for this. We think these costs could be $300 to $400 million higher than expected last year – a serious problem.

The revenue forecast is affected by a number of factors and is harder to predict, which is why we hire a PhD economist and a staff of 4 or 5 to do forecasts. While ours were wildly off during the recession, they were better than all the other states. The sequester affects this number, and could reduce GDP by half a percent or so, which affects our revenue projects. We get this number on the 21st, and are waiting expectantly. There may even be some pools as to what the number will be…

Once the forecasts are out the two chambers release their budgets. We alternate who releases first and it’s the Senate’s turn this year. Typically they would come out on the first Monday following the forecast, and we would follow about a week later. Since neither chamber releases a budget until they believe they have the votes to pass it, sometimes these releases are delayed… This may be a difficult year.

As we get past the forecasts I’ll write more about this. I know the Senate is trying to write a no-new-revenue budget that meets our obligations under the McCleary decision. While this may be technically possible I don’t believe they will be able to do a budget that is a reasonable reflection of the values of Washingtonians. We will see.

Supermajority Requirement Unconstitutional

I had a handful of voters write in suggesting we approve a constitutional amendment establishing the 2/3 voting requirement, and almost 100 suggesting that this would be a bad idea. Here’s what I’ve been sending out in response to these emails. (I use the same response for both sides – I’m not smart enough to say different things to different people and remember what I said to them the next time. It’s easier to have one opinion.)

Thanks for your note about amending the Washington State Constitution. I’m quite happy with our constitution as it is and don’t see a lot of need to change it. Almost 125 years ago (in 1889) the framers of our state constitution met to hammer out the basic working structure of how Washington would be governed. They based their work on a document exactly 100 years old at the time, the US Constitution. The framers of the US document spent months working through voting requirements and balance of power issues and came out with a document that has really worked well for the entire life of our great country. The Washington document looks very similar in key measures, and voting requirements are one of those.

After writing the US Constitution the country was absorbed in the process of ratification. Every state had to adopt it, and the politicking was fierce. Three of the original drafters (Hamilton, Madison, and Jay) wrote a series of long articles they published as pamphlets to help convince the public that the document would work. These have been collected into the “Federalist Papers,” an important part of American history.

In Number 22, Alexander Hamilton speaks passionately about super-majority voting requirements and why they are a bad thing. He was reacting to the requirement in the Articles of Confederation that required super-majorities for almost any action of the national government.

But this is not all: what at first sight may seem a remedy, is, in reality, a poison. To give a minority a negative upon the majority (which is always the case where more than a majority is requisite to a decision), is, in its tendency, to subject the sense of the greater number to that of the lesser. …

This is one of those refinements which, in practice, has an effect the reverse of what is expected from it in theory. The necessity of unanimity in public bodies, or of something approaching towards it, has been founded upon a supposition that it would contribute to security. But its real operation is to embarrass the administration, to destroy the energy of the government, and to substitute the pleasure, caprice, or artifices of an insignificant, turbulent, or corrupt junto, to the regular deliberations and decisions of a respectable majority. In those emergencies of a nation, in which the goodness or badness, the weakness or strength of its government, is of the greatest importance, there is commonly a necessity for action. The public business must, in some way or other, go forward. If a pertinacious minority can control the opinion of a majority, respecting the best mode of conducting it, the majority, in order that something may be done, must conform to the views of the minority; and thus the sense of the smaller number will overrule that of the greater, and give a tone to the national proceedings. Hence, tedious delays; continual negotiation and intrigue; contemptible compromises of the public good. And yet, in such a system, it is even happy when such compromises can take place: for upon some occasions things will not admit of accommodation; and then the measures of government must be injuriously suspended, or fatally defeated. It is often, by the impracticability of obtaining the concurrence of the necessary number of votes, kept in a state of inaction. Its situation must always savor of weakness, sometimes border upon anarchy.

It is not difficult to discover, that a principle of this kind gives greater scope to foreign corruption, as well as to domestic faction, than that which permits the sense of the majority to decide; though the contrary of this has been presumed. The mistake has proceeded from not attending with due care to the mischiefs that may be occasioned by obstructing the progress of government at certain critical seasons. When the concurrence of a large number is required by the Constitution to the doing of any national act, we are apt to rest satisfied that all is safe, because nothing improper will be likely TO BE DONE, but we forget how much good may be prevented, and how much ill may be produced, by the power of hindering the doing what may be necessary, and of keeping affairs in the same unfavorable posture in which they may happen to stand at particular periods.

Super-majority requirements allow special interests to buy off small numbers of legislators and block action by the “respectable majority.” I’m happy to stand as part of the respectable majority, and I wish I could write as well as those guys did.

Mental Health

Unfortunately some fraction of the population will acquire a mental health issue a some point in their life. For most people they will get some help from their medical provider, will see a therapist, pastor, or some other professional and resolve the issue. Washington is a mental health parity state, so if you have medical insurance it will cover mental health issues as a normal part of your coverage.

Some people and issues don’t fit neatly into this description. They either need more significant care thn their insurance will provide, they need to be secured in an institution to ensure either their own or society’s safety, or they commit crimes because they are ill and need to be incarcerated in a facility that can give them some treatment.

We provide a system of care for the indigent and those who have been judged mentally incompetent, or a risk to themselves or others through a set of mental hosptials (Western and Eastern State Hospitals) and a collection of resources in the community that provide outpatient, or sometimes inpatient care. Our system has been ravaged by cuts over the past 4 years as we tried to balance our budget in times of decreasing resources and increasing need.

In 2015 we are expanding the situations where someone can be involuntarily committed to a mental instititution because they are a danger to themselves or others. We have tried to reduce utilization as part of balancing the budget and this may have turned out to be a bad decision. We are looking at speeding this up, but it’s expensive.

There is concern about a category of patients called “felony flips.” These folks are arrested for a significant crime and send to a mental hospital for evaluation. THey are found to be so ill that they cannot stand trial because the law views them as not competent to make decisions and don’t know right from wrong. They are then sent to the “civil” side of the hospital to be evaluated for long-term residence under the involuntary committment act, but aren’t quite sick enough for this. They get released and some of them tend to commit additional felonies and the cycle repeats. We’re looking at synchronizing the tests so that someone who is not competent to stand trial would be much more likely to be committed if they commit a felony. This is expensive, and may require us to open a new ward at bost Western and Eastern State.

Transportation

Rep. Judy Clibborn, Chairwoman of the House Transportation Committee, released a plan for a transportation package funded through a gas tax increase.  There is a lot of interest in funding improvements to our transportation infrastructure.  I share this interest and will be happy to support a package that does the following:

1. Funds completion of the west end of 520. We’ve always assumed that this would require imposing tolls on I-90, but I’m open to other solutions. I can’t see how we would pass a state-wide program that didn’t finish this project key to our economy.
2. Balances our need for investment in roads, bridges, etc. with allowing counties and transit agencies to adequately fund the transit options we increasingly need in our more urban district. A larger and larger fraction of commuters are coming to Microsoft and downtown Bellevue on the bus and we need to make sure we don’t lose this due to Metro’s revenue problem.
3. Invests in several key projects in the district, or that affect our district in deep ways – the 405 expansion project and several interchange upgrades in Bellevue and Redmond.

I’m not willing to approve new revenue for transportation before we finish work on the operating budget and have mapped out and approved funding for public education and the McCleary expansion as I think it’s a distraction from our paramount duty.

I have other thoughts here as well – the $25 bike fee seems a little silly and hard to implement for a variety of reasons. One of my fellow legislators went viral this week with an email comment to a constitutent that bikers contributed to global warming because they breathed harder while riding and created a lot of carbon dioxide. Despite being ridiculous it probably killed the fee politically. We bikers need to contribute to the construction of infrastructure we use, but I’m not sure this is the best way to do it.

Other Bills of Interest

Constituents have written in about a large number of bills. Those that have gotten substantial interest are:

• 1229 – Spay Neuter Assistance. The bill collects a fee per bag of animal food in order to pay for spaying and neutering pets for low-income owners. This would help to reduce the feral populations, but didn’t make it out of the agriculture and natural resources committee.
• 4001 – A resolution to Congress asking them to pass a constitutional amendment to overturn the Citizen’s United case and restrict campaign contributions. I agree that the decision allowed a flood of money into campaings in often unsavory ways, but I’m not sure that sending Congress a letter is going to do much. They can’t even pass a budget, let alone compromise over how elections should be run in a civilzed manner. I’d probably suport it if it came up, but I don’t see it getting them to act.
• 1404 – the Reproductive Parity Act. I received a lot of mail about this bill that enusres that women in Washington will continue to be able to receive reproductive care after the implementation of the ACA.  It passed the House a few weeks ago and is in the Senate. I beleive the votes exist to pass the bill but the odd political power arrangement over there may hinder its passage.

Yesterday we passed a bill (HB 1302) out of Appropriations that continues to work on extending our foster care supports in the 18-21 year old range if the young people are involved in positive behaviors, an incentive that helps these kids, kids who are totally dependent on the state, get the education and stability they need to do something productive with their lives.