You may not be aware that the HOUSE is still hard at work over the weekend of Feb 10-11. One of the favorite tactics of the current Democrat leadership is to hold the house members in town all weekend, and then to be “at ease” for most of the day.
I would not be at all surprised it the Representatives were called to the floor later today for a marathon session. We’ll see what happens. There is also a “possible session” scheduled for Sunday afternoon, too.
The senate leadership has sensibly adjourned for the weekend.
Whats going on for week six?
Just as a reminder, when the legislators are “In Session” or “On the Floor” there are no public hearings! This is a bit of a nail biting time as we watch legislation being debated and brought (or not brought) to the floor.
For example, due to an intense letter writing camping to the legislature, the Democrats finally set aside 5770, which would have raised the property tax increase limit from 1% to 3%. Read about it here: Washington lawmakers won't move forward with proposal to raise property tax cap.
However, it’s VERY difficult to stop bad bills with a letter writing campaign! That’s why it’s so important to stop bills in their public hearings, which resume on this week Wednesday (Valentines Day).
As usual, I’ll be building a public hearing schedule on the master spreadsheet over the weekend, and we’ll be back on providing public testimony on Wednesday.
What’s Crossover?
When the public hearings resume on Wednesday, legislators will be considering ONLY bills that passed the other chamber. Bills that passed the senate will have public hearings in the house, and vice versa. This is crossover.
Bills that did not pass their house of origin are considered zombie bills. They’re mostly dead, but not entirely dead, because rules can always be suspended.
Bills of Concern
Start making a list of your bills of concern that crossover to the opposite house.
I can’t catch them all, so Join our private facebook, and drop your top bills into the group. You can also reply to this email.
How long will public hearings last? Only a few days…
February 21st is the next deadline on our cutoff calendar.
Be sure to join Influencing Olympia Effectively, and get access to our wonderful “Master Spreadsheet”. Only our Influencers have access to the sheet of bill research and the daily tab which helps you find the bills that you care about day-by-day during the session.
Influencers, to login click here —> Courses.influencingolympia.com
If you’re not a member, visit InfluencingOlympia.com and “Start Today”!