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March 12 Town Hall
The 2011 legislative session is now halfway through. State Sen. Rodney Tom (D-Bellevue) and Reps. Ross Hunter (D-Medina) and Deb Eddy (D-Kirkland) invite Eastside residents to a Town Hall on Saturday, March 12 for an update and discussion on the budget and other legislation of interest. When: Saturday, March 12 at 10:30 a.m. Where: Redmond…
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State Employee Compensation and Benefits
There was a great article in the Sunday Seattle Times about state worker compensation that lays out some of the issues we face in doing the budget this year. Wisconsin’s state capital is in flames (not really, but figuratively) because the governor proposes requiring employees to contribute 12.8% of the cost of the premiums for…
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Cougars, Wolves and other bills
There are a number of bills this year from rural legislators that propose to allow hunting of wolves and cougars. In particular three bills about wolves: 1107: Preparing for the epidemiological consequences of diseases related to wolf populations 1108: Concerning the state’s management of wolves. 1109: Concerning legislative review of gray wolf conservation and management.…
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Supplemental Budget Action
Today the House and Senate passed a bipartisan supplemental budget bill that sets us up to finish the 2010 fiscal year (ending in June 2011) in the black. In December we faced a $1.2 billion shortfall between expected revenue and expected expenses and solved $588 million of the problem. We solved another $367 million today,…
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HB1668 – Paid Signature Gatherer Registration
Those of you who wrote to me from all over the state asking me to not support HB 1668 (which required paid signature gatherers to register with the Secretary of State) will be happy to know that it never came up for a vote and consequently didn’t pass out of committee. This happens every year…
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Education Bills
Many PTA parents have written in about a number of bills and I’m consolidating my responses in one post. The critical decisions we make about education this year will be how we decide to move forward with a long-term budget strategy. We need to decide as a state if we are going to live up…
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Best new news service: Undead Olympia
At last someone is analyzing Olympia news with a sense of humor. I only get gashed a little in their article on the budget we put out last week. http://www.undeadolympia.com/2011/01/18/ross-hunters-budget-proposal-you-win-some-you-ooze-some/ A good quote: Though vampires, zombies, and werewolves are glad to see his budget proposal eliminate the Basic Health program, reduce care for the elderly,…
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Answering Email
I’m sitting at my desk in Olympia answering email, mostly about the budget. Lots of people are writing in about different subjects, but all have the same theme – protect MY program. This is pretty interesting and useful data, but it’s hard to make decisions based on it. For example, I get a lot of…
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Ross Elected chairman of Ways and Means
Earlier this week the House Democrats voted to make me chairman of the Ways and Means committee in the House, responsible for tax policy and crafting the biennial budget. I’m pleased that my co-workers believe I am capable of leading the process of creating a budget in these difficult times. The Finance committee that I…
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Special Session Budget Report
This weekend the Legislature met in a special session to address the budget shortfall. Unlike what you’ve heard in the press, we can’t all arrive in Olympia, figure out what we’re going to do, get agreement from 147 legislators, write it down on scraps of paper and call it a day. Turning all the decisions…
