2006 – A Session of Breakthroughs

March 9, 2006

EDUCATION ~ HEALTH CARE ~ JOBS ~ SECURE FAMILIES AND SAFE COMMUNITIES

This session resulted in an astounding number of historic agreements:

·         Energy Freedom – We established a grant and loan program for funding alternative energy projects that will help us make a dent in our addiction to foreign oil, and create jobs for workers and opportunities for our farmers. Read more »

·         Medical malpractice – Following the defeat of two competing ballot measures last November, the legislature approved the House Democrats’ ground-breaking compromise that saves lives by reducing medical errors, lowers premiums for doctors, and reforms our civil liability system. Read more »

·         Civil rights – We added sexual orientation to Washington’s discrimination laws, making it illegal to deny housing, employment, or credit based on a person’s sexuality, thirty years after the idea was first introduced. Read more »

·         Columbia River Basin – Decades of haggling came to an end with a breakthrough compromise agreement that will preserve the Columbia River for farmers, commerce, and fish. Read more »

·         Unemployment insurance – We finalized a reform that will result in workers getting better benefits and employers getting a system that is affordable and sustainable – an historic and balanced compromise. Read more »

·         Election reform – Washington’s long-standing late summer primary date was moved up a full month in order to assure adequate time for soldiers’ and other overseas ballots to be sent and returned on time.

·         Sex offenders – We passed the sex-offender legislation that prosecutors say will result in more convictions that any law in the nation. Read more »

But those breakthroughs are only part of the story of the 2006 session.

House Democrats continued to set the legislative agenda, focusing on our traditional issues of investing in education, increasing access to health care, improving our state’s economy, and maintaining our quality of life.

TO THE TOP

Education:  House Democrats invested in quality education at all levels, taking big steps to provide the tools needed to assure every student has the chance to succeed.

·         To give children educational opportunities well before kindergarten, we:

o        Consolidated many early learning projects scattered through several state agencies into a newly created Department of Early Learning. Read more »

o        Provided early special education intervention for children with disabilities.

·         To help students meet the WASL standards, we:

o        Gave schools new funding to provide remediation opportunities for 10^th graders who are struggling to pass the WASL.

o        Established alternate graduation paths for students who have failed the WASL twice. Read more »

o        Ordered a study to identify barriers to academic success.

·         To assure our own kids have a shot at the high-skilled jobs our economy is attracting, we:

o        Provided Opportunity Grants for lower-income students to receive training in high-demand fields. Read more »

o        Increased enrollment slots in math and engineering programs. Read more »

o        Improved outreach for apprenticeship programs, and created a skills-based pilot project for high school students – Running Start for the Trades. Read more »

Health Care:  Washington residents, especially our children, elderly, and vulnerable adults, deserve access to affordable, safe health care.

·         To continue toward our goal of assuring every Washington child has health care coverage by 2010, we:

o        Eliminated Medicaid premiums for low-income children. Read more »

o        Increased opportunities for part-time workers to access health care through their employers. Read more »

o        Added 6500 new slots in the Basic Health Plan. Read more »

·         To further fulfill our commitment to quality long-term care for the elderly and disabled, we:

o        Ensured parity in compensation and benefits between individual home care providers and providers who work for home care agencies.

o        Eliminated the nursing home bed tax.

o        Increased the reimbursement rate for nursing homes to help address the critical shortages in long-term care. ($10.1 million in budget)

·         To increase patient safety and help reduce medical errors, we:

o        Passed the landmark medical malpractice act. Read more »

o        Help consumers make informed insurance choices by requiring health insurers to provide easily understandable information to the Insurance Commissioner about profits, recent premium increases and other relevant financial matters.

o        Required hospitals to use federal guidelines to develop programs to reduce hospital-acquired infections and report them when they occur. Nearly 100,000 people die each year from hospital-acquired infections.

o        Passed the first bill in the nation that requires safe patient handling at all public hospitals.

Jobs:  Improving the economy for everybody – businesses, farmers, and workers.

·         To help Washington lead the nation in the alternative-fuels industry, we:

o        Created the Energy Freedom Program with low-interest loans and grants for development of the biofuels industry. Read more »

o        Established a minimum fuel content standard. Read more »

o        Required the state to use 20% biodiesel in their public vehicles. Read more »

·         To help Washington farmers stay competitive in the world market, we:

o        Removed the sales and use taxes from farm fuel. Read more »

o        Establish tax exemptions for replacement parts for farm machinery and equipment. Read more »

o        Helped facilitate the Columbia River Basin agreement which will coordinate water resource management.
Read more »

·         To help local governments invest in economic development and attract businesses, we:

o        Extended temporary B&O tax reduction to help the aluminum industry. Read more »

o        Raised the small business personal-property tax exemption from $3000 to $15,000. Read more »

o        Eliminated the penalty on small business, rolling back the reporting date and removing penalties. Read more »

o        Expanded the apprenticeship program to the Department of Transportation.

Secure families and Safe Communities:  From relief from winter heating bills to protecting our kids from sex offenders, we are committed to improving our quality of life.

·         We improved the safety net for our military, veteran, and National Guard families. Read more »

·         We toughened sex offender sentences, passing the most effective laws in the country. Read more »

·         We increased penalties for identity theft. Read more »

·         We sent an extra $7.6 million to the low-income home energy program (LIHEAP) to help families pay their winter heating bills. Read more »

·         We established the Home Security Fund to help make the American Dream of home-ownership a reality for more families.
Read more »

·         We eliminated the parking fees at our state parks. Read more »

·         We extended foster care benefits to age 21 for kids in college.

·         We set up a recycling program for electronic waste, keeping toxic material out of our landfills and water. Read more »

·         We reduced the amounts of phosphates entering our rivers and streams and destroying aquatic life. Read more »

·         We began cleaning up a key waterway through a plan to fix failing septic systems in the most sensitive areas of Puget Sound.  Read more »