LEGISLATIVE SESSION 2024: MID-SESSION RECAP
We are midway through the 2024 legislative session and many of our priority bills are still making progress through the Legislature!
Early Learning
The Legislature is cleaning up state law to improve clarity surrounding who qualifies for child care subsidies. With nearly all members voting in favor, House Bill (HB) 2111 successfully passed the House with bipartisan support on January 29! Among other things, this bill will help to clarify and streamline requirements for subsidized child care, making it easier to confirm eligibility and help families access child care at a lower cost. HB 2111 has been referred to the Senate Early Learning and K-12 Education Committee.
Several other bills passed out of the House Appropriations Committee on February 5, just in time to meet a legislative cutoff deadline.
HB 1945 helps families demonstrate that they are eligible for low- or no-cost child care without needing to reproduce proof of income. If a family with a young child is already eligible for or receiving SNAP or Basic Food assistance, this bill would make it so that the family would automatically be eligible for child care assistance through the Early Childhood Education and Assistance Program (ECEAP), early ECEAP, and Working Connections Child Care (WCCC). In doing so, more children will have meaningful access to high-quality early learning by removing the red tape. HB 1945 was voted favorably out of committee with slightly amended language and now moves to the Rules Committee, which will determine if, and when, the bill is heard by the House.
HB 2124 is often discussed alongside HB 1945, as it helps to streamline access to, and eligibility for, the WCCC program. Among other things, HB 2124 would allow a family’s participation in early learning programs like ECEAP, early ECEAP, Head Start, and early Head Start to count as “approved work activity” to be eligible for low-cost child care through WCCC. Similarly, it ensures that providers working in these programs are also eligible for the WCCC benefit. Together, these changes improve avenues for families to establish their eligibility for child care subsidies, which will help allow more families to access high-quality child care. HB 2124 passed out of the House Appropriations Committee with a second substitute bill.
HB 1479 limits student restraint and phases out isolation in public school and educational settings for elementary students. Children with disabilities experience these practices at severely disproportionate rates, accounting for over 90% of both restraint and isolation instances but making up only 15% of the student population (Disability Rights Washington and ACLU, 2023). Children in foster care and children of color, especially Black boys, also experience isolation and restraint at school at disproportionate rates.
On the Senate side, Senate Bill (SB) 5774 was voted favorably out of the Senate Ways and Means Committee by the February 5 cutoff deadline. This bill mandates that the Department of Children, Youth, and Families provide access to fingerprinting in at least ten of its facilities. Fingerprinting is required as part of the background checks that child care providers must pass to be cleared to work with children. As a result, increasing access to fingerprinting will help increase the number of providers.
Several additional early learning bills that we support are making good progress as well and moved far enough along in the legislative process before the February 5 cutoff to still have a chance at passing this session.
HB 1916 will help to ensure that Early Support for Infants and Toddlers (ESIT) services are accurately counted and funded, which is an important step in recognizing the intensive and foundational work involved in evaluation and development of services that are customized to a specific child’s needs.
HB 1991 (and its companion bill SB 5793) expands the definition of “family” as it relates to paid sick leave to help ensure that all families can access paid medical leave for their loved ones.
HB 2102 requires that health care personnel provide certification in a timely manner in the event of a serious medical condition to protect meaningful access to approved paid family or medical leave . Health care providers play an important role in providing needed medical documentation that allows families to access paid leave when they need it. The updated language for this bill allows seven calendar days from a patient’s authorized request.
HB 2195 allows Early Learning Facilities (ELF) program applications to be prioritized and removes limits on ELF project grants and loans. The ELF program through the Department of Commerce provides grants and loans to providers in low- or no-cost child care and early learning programs like WCCC and ECEAP to purchase, build, and renovate early learning facilities.
HB 2331 modifies guidelines for determining instructional materials in classrooms and prevents school boards from banning materials because they study the role and/or contributions of people or groups that are part of a protected class (like race, religion, nationality, sexuality, etc.).
Unfortunately, some early learning bills are no longer progressing as we move into the second half of session. These include HB 2101, which would permanently eliminate licensing fees for providers, and HB 2243, which would establish the Children’s Social Equity Land Trust through the Department of Natural Resources. Although these bills do not have a likely path forward this session, we expect there may be renewed discussion in 2025.
Health Equity
It has been a very eventful few weeks for the health equity bills we prioritized this session. HB 2058, which would establish universal free school meals, was successfully voted out of the House Education Committee. However, it stalled after that and did not pass out of the fiscal committee by the February 5 fiscal committee cutoff deadline. This is unfortunate but by no means a failure. The bill’s companion, SB 5964, experienced some movement as well, including a public hearing in the Senate Early Learning & K-12 Education Committee on January 29th. We submitted written testimony in support of the bill, as did many of our community and organizational partners. However, with the arrival of the first round of legislative cut-off dates, SB 5964 is effectively dormant. The Legislature has shown that there is certainly an appetite for ambitious anti-hunger legislation, which we will continue to push for in 2025.
Another high-activity bill is HB 1455, which would eliminate child marriage. This bill nearly passed the Legislature last year but unfortunately stalled before the finish line. This time around, the bill is moving very quickly, passing out of the House unanimously on January 8 and getting a public hearing in the Senate Law & Justice Committee on January 30. With such wide-reaching support, we have high expectations for this bill and hope to see it signed into law this year.
Regarding youth behavioral health, a flagship health policy issue for us, we saw movement for several bills of interest.
HB 1946 will help address the behavioral health provider shortage. The bill will provide scholarships for aspiring behavioral health providers, on the condition that they commit to serving in underserved and high-need communities. HB 1946 had a successful public hearing in the House Appropriations Committee on January 22 and was voted out favorably in an executive session on February 1, taking it one step closer to a House floor vote.
HB 2256 was successfully voted out of committee. This bill will extend and modify the Children and Youth Behavioral Health Work Group, continuing the excellent work the group is doing to advise the state government on youth behavioral health issues.
SB 6216 was successfully passed out of the Senate Early Learning & K-12 Education Committee on January 31, but it unfortunately did not make it out of the Senate Ways & Means Committee before the February 5 deadline. Had it passed, this bill would have drastically improved the behavioral health services available to students across the state by coordinating school-based care and providing grant funding for school districts to develop behavioral health response plans. In addition to the above bills, we are also tracking the progress of bills to expand crisis relief services to minors (SB 5853) and increase the number of behavioral health providers (HB 2247). As of February 5, these bills both passed out of their respective fiscal committees and moved on to the next step of the legislative process.
To round out our current slate of health equity legislation here are a few more bills we are tracking:
These bills aim to improve maternal and perinatal health outcomes by increasing access to care and services and collecting and reporting data on several quality-of-care metrics.
These bills aim to improve sexual and reproductive health by improving coverage of preventative services and improving screening requirements for stillbirths, hopefully leading to better care for pregnant persons and newborns in the future.
Economic Justice
Bills that would improve the Working Families Tax Credit (WFTC) are making good progress. HB 1895 saw broad support as lawmakers attempt to clean up and clarify language in the WFTC. Most notably, the bill would allow the Department of Revenue to calculate an applicant’s eligibility based on their provided income information, instead of solely based on their federal tax filing.
SB 6196, which would establish the Guaranteed Basic Income pilot program, one of our primary agenda items, had a hearing in the Senate Human Services Committee on January 30. Unfortunately, the bill did not progress any further. We testified in favor of this bill, and are hopeful that the 2025 session will bring about the budgetary and legislative appetite for this progressive economic solution to addressing the financial insecurity facing many across our state.
One economic issue that has seen quite a bit of movement recently is the effort to repeal the capital gains tax. A petition was filed recently that, after being certified by the Secretary of State’s Office, will likely appear on the November ballot this year. The capital gains tax, which raised nearly $1 billion in its first year, directly funds crucial education and early learning services and programs, such as Fair Start for Kids. The revenue from the tax will also result in hundreds of millions of dollars being spent on school renovation and construction. In a time when so many families struggle to afford child care, repealing the capital gains tax is nothing short of a direct attack on families and the wellness and education of our children and youth. Children’s Alliance played a considerable role in getting Fair Start for Kids passed and in defending the capital gains tax up to this point. We will continue to work tirelessly to defend and uphold the tax because we know how important it is to child and family wellbeing.
Stay updated on the progress of our policy priorities
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Would you like to get more involved? Please reach out to our mobilization manager Debbie Carlsen for more information: debbie.carlsen@childrensalliance.org.