2023 Legislative Update: Week 14
Weekly Update
The beginning of the week focused on getting bills passed by the opposite house floor cutoff on Wednesday. All bills except those deemed necessary to implement the budget had to pass off the floor of the opposite chamber by 5pm that day or they are considered dead. Legislators worked long hours with some floor debates going late into the night and early morning.
The House concluded their business after 10pm once the debate on SB 5599, which supports youth and young adults seeking protected health care services. The “5 o’clock” in the Senate was HB 1724, which increases the trained behavioral health workforce.
For those that like to keep track of the number of bills moving through the legislative process, the chart below details the number of bills introduced and the bills currently alive and moving thru the process.
- Bills Introduced so far in the 2023 session: 1,655
- Bills Passed House of Origin Policy Cutoff: 1,108
- Bills Passed House of Origin Fiscal Cutoff: 818
- Bills Passed House of Origin Floor Cutoff: 611
- Bills Passed Opposite House Policy Cutoff: 569
- Bills Passed Opposite House Fiscal Cutoff: 531
- *New: Bills Passed Opposite House Floor Cutoff: 456
After Wednesday’s opposite house of origin cutoff, the focus shifted towards concurrence, dispute, or conference on bill amended by the opposite chamber. This weekend the budget leads in each chamber will finish the work of working through the differences in the respective budget proposals as they work towards final operating, capital, and transportation budgets before the last day of session on Sunday, April 23.
TVW’s Legislative Review does clips each day highlighting some of the hot topics of the day. You can find links to the Legislative Review videos here.
There are several bills that are still alive that may be of interest to the Bellevue Chamber:
- SB 5536: concerning controlled substances, counterfeit substances, and legend drug possession and treatment
- SB 5352: Concerning vehicular pursuits
- HB 1110: Increasing middle housing in areas traditionally dedicated to single-family detached housing
- HB 1337: Expanding housing options by easing barriers to the construction and use of ADUs
- HB 1042: Concerning the use of existing building for residential purposes
- SB 5491: Allowing for residential building of a certain heigh to be served by a single exit under certain conditions
- SB 5058: Exempting buildings with 12 or fewer units that are no more than two stories from the definition of multiunit residential building
- HB 1474: Creating the covenant homeownership account and program to address the history of housing discrimination due to racially restrictive real estate covenants in WA
- HB 1628: Increasing the supply of affordable housing by modifying the state and local real estate excise tax
- SB 5290: Concerning consolidating local permit review processes
- HB 1181: Improving the state's response to climate change by updating the state's planning framework
- SB 5082: Abolishing advisory votes on the ballot
- SB 5770: Providing state and local property tax reform
The bills below did not survive and are considered dead for this session:
- SB 5334: Providing a local government option for the funding of essential affordable housing programs
- SB 5466: Promoting transit-oriented development
- HB 1367: Eliminating unnecessary homeless funding budget and auditing requirements
- HB 1589: Supporting Washington’s clean energy economy and transitioning to a clean, affordable, and reliable energy future.