Legislature approves Padden bill to accommodate the hearing-impaired
April 14, 2021
Today the Senate voted 48-0 to accept simple changes made by the House of Representatives to Sen. Mike Padden’s measure to help people with hearing impairments by increasing the availability of closed captioning on televisions in public places. The bill, which passed the House unanimously earlier this month, now heads... Read More...
A victory for the culture of life!
April 13, 2021
Sometimes, the bills that survive the deadlines are not the best indicator of our state’s values – instead, you look at what fails to gain enough support to move forward. An example is the life-affirming defeat of legislation that would have expanded access to assisted suicide in our state. Due... Read More...
House passes Padden Anti-SLAPP legislation
April 10, 2021
Uniform Public Expression Protection Act would restore critical free-speech protections The House of Representatives voted 97-1 on Friday to approve Sen. Mike Padden’s measure to help protect citizens, whistleblowers and members of the news media from frivolous lawsuits aimed at stifling freedom of speech and the discussion of legitimate public... Read More...
Padden condo-construction bill unanimously approved by House
April 08, 2021
Measure would reduce barriers to affordable home ownership Today the House of Representatives unanimously passed Sen. Mike Padden’s measure to help increase the supply of affordable housing by removing barriers to condominium construction. “This is tremendous news for both homebuilders and those looking for more affordable homeownership,” said Padden, R-Spokane... Read More...
Government on steroids
April 05, 2021
State government has never seemed to grow so much, so quickly. Last week, the House and Senate majorities adopted budgets that would spend record amounts of money. Besides draining the rainy-day fund, burning through billions in federal relief dollars, and exhausting enormous budget surpluses, they STILL raise taxes! This is... Read More...
Enough is never enough for tax-and-spend crowd
March 29, 2021
Because state government operates on a two-year budget cycle, new operating, transportation and capital budgets must be approved during the 2021 session. Last week, the majority released its three budget proposals, and to the surprise of few the operating-budget proposal relied on unnecessary tax hikes – even though the state... Read More...
Making the American Dream affordable
March 23, 2021
Today is Day 72 of the 2021 regular session, which is scheduled to last 105 days and end on April 25. The pace of the session has picked up, with Senate bills moving (or dying) in the House, and vice versa. This week, we will see the majority propose its... Read More...
$15 billion from Uncle Sam
March 18, 2021
One of the most baffling things in this session is the majority’s insistence on raising and creating new taxes. Despite predictions to the contrary, we have continued to see additional revenue come into the state. In the largest positive quarterly forecast change on record, the March forecast released yesterday increased... Read More...