The Good, the Interesting, and the Controversial

Dear Friends and Neighbors,

I know from talking with constituents how they are sometimes surprised by the sheer number and range of ideas that become legislation, for better or worse. Even when people don’t pay close attention to what happens in Olympia, a few sentences about what a particular bill would do are all it takes to help them decide whether that legislation is good, interesting, or controversial.

Nearly 2,000 bills have been introduced by Senate and House members since the 2025 legislative session began 39 days ago. Many will come to the end of their road tomorrow, when the policy committees hit their first deadline for taking action on legislation. Bills that don’t get the support needed to move forward will be considered “dead” for the rest of the session.

Here are a few examples of bills I would consider to be good, interesting, or controversial, and their status as of today.

Good

This doesn’t include any of the 18 bills I’ve introduced – because if they weren’t good, I would not be the prime sponsor!

Rare-disease advisory council: A “rare disease” is defined in federal law as any condition that affects fewer than 200,000 people in the nation. I have constituents with such conditions – which can include certain infections, some rare cancers, autoimmune diseases and genetic conditions. That’s why I’m co-sponsoring Senate Bill 5064, which was filed by a Democratic senator from Snohomish County.This bill would create an advisory council on rare diseases within the University of Washington’s School of Medicine to advise the Secretary of Health on research, diagnosis, treatment, and education related to rare diseases. It’s cleared the health-care committee in the Senate and already had a public hearing in our Ways and Means committee.
Protect kids from fentanyl exposure: In 2002, when “meth labs” began popping up in homes and rural areas, one of Pierce County’s Democratic legislators successfully introduced a bill that basically made it a crime for adults to endanger children by exposing them to the poisons associated with the cooking of methamphetamine.If you have seen news reports about infants and young children being injured – sometimes fatally – by exposure to fentanyl, then you can understand the desire to pass SB 5071, which would add fentanyl and synthetic opioids to the child-endangerment law. I’m a co-sponsor of this bipartisan bill, which was passed by the Senate on Feb. 5 by a 42-7 vote and is awaiting action in the House.
Incentive to build multi-family housing: SB 5679 would allow more of our state’s cities and counties to encourage the construction of affordable housing by offering a multi-family property-tax exemption. The exemption is already available in counties with larger populations (Pierce and four of the counties bordering it qualify, for example, but neighboring counties like Mason and Lewis do not).I’m a co-sponsor of this bill, filed by the senator from Walla Walla County, and as a member of the housing committee I took part in the public hearing it received Feb. 19. Unfortunately, opposition from an environmental-activist group may end up derailing this practical proposal.

Interesting

Restrict mobile device use by public-school students: SB 5346 would require the superintendent of public instruction to produce recommendations that go to the state school directors’ association, which would develop a model policy and procedures for school districts to consider. By the start of the 2026-27 school year, each of Washington’s 295 school districts would have to have a policy and procedures in place that are “consistent” with what the state school directors’ association produces.The bill was referred to the Senate committee on K-12 education more than a month ago but hasn’t budged since.
Ban flavored vapes: To quote from the bill, SB 5183 is about reducing youth usage of flavored tobacco and nicotine products and what it calls “entertainment vapor products” (which are defined as “any vapor product that has interactive gaming or entertainment features including, but not limited to, allowing a user to play music or audio, display photos or video, play virtual games, or display other animations on the device.) It would accomplish this goal by completely prohibiting the sales of such products in Washington.The bill received a public hearing from the Senate health-care committee on Feb. 14, but at the moment, a committee vote has not been scheduled. However, an identical version (House Bill 1203) was approved Wednesday by the House Consumer Protection and Business Committee.
Special “Smokey Bear” license plates: This bill was requested by the state Department of Natural Resources, to generate money to benefit the agency’s wildfire prevention programs. SB 5320 was referred to the Senate transportation committee but hasn’t received a public hearing. That might be because this year seems to be a big one for proposing new special license plates.Besides the Smokey Bear plate, I see bills that would create license plates for “donate life” (to promote organ donation), Mount St. Helens, the Seattle Reign FC, the United States Naval Academy, working forests, pollinator research and education, and “nautical Northwest.”
Considering our state offers 44 special license plates already, it will be interesting to see what happens with any or all of these proposals.

Controversial

The “initiative killer”: SB 5382 would have a chilling effect on the ability of people to exercise their constitutional right to make or overturn laws through voter initiatives. For instance, it would require those gathering signatures on petitions to attest, to the best of their knowledge, that signers provided correct names and addresses, even though gatherers have no way to verify that information.I don’t think it’s a coincidence that this bill was introduced at the first opportunity since a record seven initiatives were qualified in 2024 – all of which challenged policies adopted by the majority party. The Senate committee on elections passed it with a party-line vote Wednesday, and now it has come to our Ways and Means Committee.
Save money by shortening prison sentences: This bill would allow a court to significantly shorten certain prison sentences, contending it would be in the interests of justice and “result in significant cost savings to the state.” But there’s a very good reason criminals receive lengthy prison sentences, and it’s an affront to their victims for anyone to advocate reducing those sentences as a way to reduce government spending. What price do the sponsors of this bill put on public safety?Thankfully, it appears SB 5269 is not going to advance this year – but for those who seem more concerned about the criminals than the victims, there is always next year.
Government checks for striking workers: Just as there’s a difference between being laid off and quitting, there’s a difference between being let go and choosing to go out on strike. I understand why SB 5041 is a high priority for leaders of organized labor in our state, because if striking workers can collect unemployment benefits, they have less incentive to stay at or return to the bargaining table. That would give them a distinct advantage over the employer, but it hardly seems like a good use of taxpayer dollars.This bill came out of the Senate labor committee on a partisan vote and is before our Ways and Means committee.