State Budget Update: Nothing Happening Here (with Dire Consequences Coming)

These tweets say it all:

McCleary Crime Scene‏ @McClearyCrime 17h17 hours ago

McCleary Crime Scene Retweeted Crosscut

Great @waleg & their enabler @GovInslee get to hold the 4th of July hostage, as the political brinkmanship over #FundMcCleary continues.

@Crosscut

If the #WAleg can't pass a budget by June 30, the state's 125 parks will be closed for Fourth of July.

If the Washington Legislature cannot pass a 2017-2019 by June 30 — a Friday — then the state’s 125 parks will start closing that same day and be totally shut down on July 1. “We’re still hopeful that a deal will happen, but we have to plan for the worst,” said parks commission spokesperson Virginia Painter.

The closure on a peak recreational weekend would be just the start of the gut punches for the public from even a partial shutdown. Officials are also preparing to cut off meal services for 50,000 of the state’s older residents, child-care assistance for 52,000 children of working low-income families, and payments for health services for nearly 2 million people covered by Medicaid. And that’s just the surface of the cuts in services and support.

Inslee has said he won’t approve any extension of the 2015-2017 budget as a stopgap measure so budget negations can go beyond June 30, the constitutional deadline for a new budget. 

So what else isn't happening?

The big differences include how much money to put into education, what if any new taxes or tax increases are needed, and whether to make tax increases dependent on voter approval in November. No one is saying what concessions the two parties may have made so far in budget negotiations.

A bill to create carve out a separate Department of Children, Youth & Families from the Department of Social & Health Services easily passed the House with bipartisan support, but has stalled in the Senate. “We don’t want it to be trade bait,” Inslee said earlier this week. A bill to stop internet service providers from selling customers’ personal information without their consent also overwhelmingly passed the House and is supported by the majority of the Senate. But Senate GOP leaders have so far stopped that bill from going to a floor vote.

On the other side, the Democratic-controlled House has stalled a Senate bills to deal with a 2016 state Supreme Court decision on digging new wells. While this issue is below the radar in urban Seattle, it is a hot topic across the rest of the state because it has largely brought rural home construction to a halt. The so-called Hirst ruling says that a landowner must prove a new well won’t threaten nearby stream levels needed for fish. This has sparked intense negotiations between development and environmentalist interests. This bill is on the GOP’s “must pass” list.