After 165 days of negotiating and bickering and posturing, state lawmakers finally have arrived at a compromise over state spending for the next two years. And while both Republicans and Democrats are pointing to their preferred talking points from the $38.2 billion biennial budget, it was Gov. Jay Inslee who best summarized the process.
“The only major complaint I have with this budget is we’re talking about it on June 29,” the governor said Monday. “This should have happened two months ago.”
Indeed. But lawmakers in the Republican-led Senate and the Democrat-controlled House extended their game of “chicken” to the brink. They wavered through the regular legislative session, through a special session, through a second special session, and into a third special session before finding a compromise and earning praise from Inslee for their ability “to find the middle ground.” Among the notable points, that middle ground includes:
• No new taxes for the operating budget, although it should be mentioned that a separate transportation funding package will include a gas-tax increase of 11.9 cents per gallon phased in over the next two years.
• Expected revenue of $185 million from the closing of some tax exemptions and an increase in penalties for those who file late business tax returns.
• Full funding for labor contracts negotiated with state workers.
• Compliance with court orders to improve the state’s mental health services.
• Two years of tuition cuts at state colleges and universities, starting with a 5 percent reduction for the coming school year.
• Cost-of-living salary increases for public school teachers.
• And an additional $1.3 billion in spending for K-12 public schools in an effort to meet requirements mandated by the state Supreme Court’s ruling in McCleary v. Washington.
“It makes great investments in education, it restores our safety net that took cuts during the recession, and it really focuses on the priorities of the state,” said Sen. Andy Hill, R-Redmond, the lead Republican budget writer. His counterpart in the House of Representatives, Rep. Ross Hunter, D-Medina, added, “The public should be happy with what’s in this package.”
Certainly, the public will be happy with a lack of tax increases (save for the gas tax, which presents a discussion for another time). And while there is a bit of purple in the final agreement — a little blue and a little red — in the end the Legislature hammered out a mostly red budget in a blue state. Republicans were adamant in their “no new taxes” mantra and, with an improving economy providing increasing tax revenue, they managed to hold that line while fending off Inslee’s desires for a capital gains tax and a cap-and-trade tax on carbon emissions — topics that likely will again be at the forefront for 2017 budget discussions.
At the same time, the final product represents a 13 percent increase in spending compared with the two-year budget approved by lawmakers in 2013. Much of that is due to the mandates for spending on K-12 education and mental health care, reflecting the reality that for all the talk about tax cuts these days, government has a duty to provide services that enhance citizens’ quality of life.
In the end, lawmakers did their job well. Even if they took their sweet time.
