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News & Updates

This Week in Olympia: Legislative Assembly Days

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Legislators return to Olympia this week for committee assembly days. Director of State Relations Margaret Shepherd will be presenting before the Higher Education Committee to give an update on the impact of tuition increases and financial aid.

The regular session of the State Legislature is scheduled to begin on January 14, 2013 and end on April 28, 2013.

To see what committees are meeting this week and watch the proceedings, visit TVW’s programming guide:

Earlier this week, Senate Democrats released their leadership team and committee chair proposal. Some observers still predict that a “philosophical coalition,” could emerge around budget and government reform issues, changing the dynamics of Senate control.

In that scenario, Sens. Rodney Tom (D-Medina) and Tim Sheldon (D-Potlach) might decide to buck their caucus, and opt to work with Senate Republicans to broker an alternative governance proposal.

More reporting on that from The Olympian:

Democrats will have a slim 26-23 majority if preliminary election results hold up, giving major leverage to Republicans and middle-of-the-road Democrats.

 

But Democrats made several overtures to their more conservative wing and to the GOP. They offered to create a new bipartisan committee to deal with school-funding issues, to give Republicans their strongest hand in other committees that the minority party might ever have seen, and to give maverick Sen. Tim Sheldon, D-Potlatch, a plum post as president pro tem.

 

Seattle Sen. Ed Murray, newly elected by Democrats as majority leader to replace retiring Sen. Lisa Brown, has asked Republicans to negotiate ahead of the session that starts in January.

Senate Republicans meet today to select their new leaders. We’ll keep you posted if any noteworthy developments occur on this front.

Finally, Gov.-Elect Jay Inslee’s transition team continues to ramp up. A roster of key leadership was released this week:

http://twitter.com/Herald_Politics/status/273849557509627905

A repository for resumes has also been established for those interested in serving in the Inslee Administration:

This Week in Olympia: Caucuses Elect Leaders

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Washington Senate Floor

Leaves falling on Red Square. And stirrings in Olympia. Fall has arrived in Washington State!

So when does the legislative action actually begin? Session doesn’t officially start until the second Monday in January. Our state has a two year legislative cycle – and since 2013 is an odd-year, we’ll have 105 days of regular session.

Next week, however, the legislative “season” gets kicked off with Committee “Assembly Days” in Olympia. The week long series of meetings allow legislators to regroup and receive updates on issues before the Legislature.

For Olympia watchers on campus, below are just a few of the stories driving buzz in Olympia this month.

House and Senate members met last week to elect their caucus leaders. House Democrats returned State Rep. Frank Chopp (D-Seattle) to his position as Speaker of the House, and House Republicans re-elected State Rep. Richard DeBolt (R-Chehalis) as Minority Leader.

On the Democratic-side in the Senate, State Senator Ed Murray (D-Seattle) replaced retiring Majority Leader Lisa Brown (D-Spokane).

The only shakeup happened in the Senate Republican caucus. Minority Leader Mike Hewitt (R-Walla Walla) announced he would be giving up his post. A number of GOP Senators have expressed interest in leading that caucus. Some have also speculated that a coalition approach might become a possibility. That could hinge on one Southwest Washington Senate seat — more on that below.

Nearly two weeks after Election Day, and the ballot counting continues in Vancouver:

The outcome of the unusually close 17th District Senate race between Republican incumbent Don Benton and his Democratic challenger, state Rep. Tim Probst, D-Vancouver, is being followed avidly by political parties at the state level, because it could impact the power balance in the Legislature.

Currently, Democrats hold a 27-22 majority in the Senate. If Benton wins, that Democratic majority would be knocked down to 26-23. There are also a couple of philosophically conservative Democrats in the Senate who could tip that balance by siding with Republicans on certain political issues.

In budget news, an updated four-year outlook released by the Washington State Economic and Revenue Forecast Council shows Washington faces a projected $900 million state budget shortfall for the 2013–15 biennium and an even larger shortfall of nearly $1.1 billion for the following biennium (2015–17). Read the Office of Planning and Budgeting’s initial take on what the new numbers mean here.

Stay tuned to the State Relations Blog for more updates, as we get set to kick off the legislative season and session!

Session update

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The state legislature began a 30-day special session last Monday.  Legislators continue to work on a budget compromise—currently, neither proposal makes further cuts to higher education.  However, many decisions are still in flux.  Check out the the P&B blog for up-to-date budget information.

Three priority bills passed during the regular session.

  • House Bill 2585 provides colleges and universities more operational flexibility in order to improve efficiency.  It would give the UW administrative and operational flexibility for purchasing, procurement, human resources and reporting.  It is estimated the UW could save over $1 million annually.  HB 2585 awaits Governor Gregoire’s signature.
  • SJR8223 and SB 6468 would allow investment diversification of UW and WSU operating investments. These measures could eventually generate $10-20M additional revenue annually for the UW without raising taxes.  The State Investment Board, which currently manages the state’s pension system, would have management and oversight authority over new investments.  SB 6468 awaits Governor Gregoire’s signature, while SJR 8223 will appear on the November ballot.

President Young’s statement on the Senate budget

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UW President Michael Young released this statement regarding the Senate’s budget proposal:

“The Senate budget proposal released today puts a halt to four years of public disinvestment in higher education.  The Senate is to be commended to taking this bold stance.  Investing in students and their futures charts a course towards sustainable economic recovery and is the best possible form of securing our economic future.  Higher education sets people on the path that provides a lifetime of benefits for themselves, their families, and our communities.  The Legislature needs to adopt this budget for higher education.”

State revenue forecast shows improvement

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The February revenue forecast shows a turn upward for the next biennium.  The forecast for expected revenue for 2011-13 is up by $95.7 million with a total expected revenue of about $30.3 billion.  While this revenue increase of 0.3 percent represents a modest boost for the current biennium, this is the first positive forecast since June 2010.

The forecast for the 2013-15 biennium is predicted to be about $32.3 billion, an increase of about 6.6 percent from the current biennium.  This is the first forecast adopted by the Washington State Economic and Revenue Forecast Council for the next biennium.

Read more analysis from the Office of Planning and Budgeting.

Flexibility measures move forward

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The operational flexibility proposals introduced in Olympia this session moved forward on Tuesday. February 14 was the cutoff for non-budget legislation to pass out the chamber of origin.

HB 2585 passed in the House with 98 yea votes to move to the Senate.  The bill amends contract rules for institutions of higher learning in order to improve efficiency.  It would provide the University of Washington administrative and operational flexibility in areas of purchasing and procurement, capital projects, human resources and information technology.  As a result, the university would save over $1 million annually.

SB 6468 and SJR 8223 were passed out of the Senate on Monday. These bills will allow diversification of the University of Washington and Washington State University operating investments.  Since 1889, UW operating fund investments have been restricted to government-backed securities.  This restriction limits the ability to diversify university assets and reduce risk.  Annual returns have been negatively impacted by 0.8% annually over the last twenty years – approximately $11 million per year (at the current fund level).  Investment diversification would reduce the concentration of risk in a single investment instrument and allow the UW to react in a more timely way to opportunity and risk in the global economy.  It would also provide the university with an opportunity to raise additional revenue overtime, which would make available additional funding for UW’s education mission without raising taxes.  SB 6468 and SJR 8223 were referred to the House Higher Education committee and are scheduled for a hearing on Thursday.

SB 5576 would permit local management of capital fee resources – building fees, timber revenues and the metro tract – which are currently appropriated by the legislature for maintenance projects.  The current management system creates inefficiencies in the UW’s maintenance programs.  This affects the university’s ability to leverage its own bond capacity in a strategic way.  Allowing local management would create a more nimble, cost-effective maintenance program, provide the UW with additional local bonding authority to improve our credit worthiness, reduce the state’s cost of borrowing and complete capital projects.  SB 5576 passed the Senate on Saturday.

Washington presidents discuss higher education funding at public forum

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On Wednesday night presidents of Washington’s six public colleges and universities gathered to discuss funding for higher education.  Among the concerns expressed by the presidents was the ability to retain faculty and providing access to low and middle-income students.  Business leaders from REI, Boeing and Microsoft also spoke about their concern about the future of Washington’s workforce – if the state does not have the capacity to educate its citizens, companies may be forced to search elsewhere for educated workers.

Video of the forum is available from TVW.