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March 19, 2025

Dear Friends and Neighbors,

We are closing in on the final month of the 2025 legislative session, which is scheduled to end on April 27. Last week, was House of Origin cutoff, when all bills had to be passed out of their original chamber to stay alive, except for bills considered necessary to implement the budget.

Good and Bad Bills Still Alive

The House and Senate have passed 535 bills combined, and for the next several weeks, committees in both chambers will be hearing and voting on policies from the opposite chamber. There was some good legislation passed, but unfortunately, several bad bills are still alive. Here are a few examples of both.

Good Republican Bills That Advanced

• House Bill 1414 – Directs the CTE task force to identify employment barriers for 16- and 17-year-old students while proposing better job training, certification, and hiring rules.
• House Bill 1648 – Tackles Washington’s child care crisis by extending provider qualification timelines, recognizing experience-based competency, and removing unnecessary barriers pushing skilled professionals out of the workforce.
• House Bill 1108 – Tackles the housing crisis head-on by uniting industry experts and community voices in a task force to pinpoint why homes and rentals are so expensive.
• House Bill 1457 – Requires tamper-resistant electronic monitoring for sexually violent predators on conditional release, giving communities greater safety and security while providing clear evidence of compliance or violations.
• House Bill 1285 – Requires all high school students, beginning with the class of 2031, to meet state financial education standards to graduate, equipping them with essential life skills like budgeting, taxes, and managing debt.
• House Bill 1096 – Authorizes lot splitting—dividing a single property into smaller lots—enabling homeowners to build affordable homes, boosting housing supply.

Good Democrat Bills with Republican Support

• House Bill 1271 – Allows the chief of the Washington State Patrol to mobilize jurisdictions and request resources to prepare for an emergency or disaster situation or when an emergency or disaster is predicted to exceed local resource capabilities.
• House Bill 1605 – Requires a longevity bonus be paid to Washington State Patrol employees that achieved 26 or more years of commissioned service before July 1, 2024.
• House Bill 1273 – Extends a pilot program to increase career and technical education dual credit participation and credit attainment by covering certain expenses of secondary and postsecondary schools. Taking dual credit courses is an incentive to students because it exposes them to higher education and gives them a head start towards a postsecondary credential.
• House Bill 1757 – Extends allowances for existing buildings to be used for residential purposes in commercial and mixed-use zones to existing buildings in residential zones.
• House Bill 1633 – Requires certain subcontractors to be licensed at the time they are named by prime contract bidders on public works projects estimated to cost $1 million or more.

Bad Democrat Bills Still Alive

• House Bill 1163 – Forces law-abiding citizens to purchase a permit to buy a firearm, creating additional barriers to gun ownership, and infringing upon individual freedoms.
• House Bill 1386 – Imposes an additional 11% excise tax on firearms and ammunition, unfairly burdening law-abiding citizens while doing nothing to address the root causes of crime.
• House Bill 1531 – Requires state and local health officials’ response to public health to abide by the “best available science” and voids any statutes, ordinances, rules, or policies that prohibit the implementation and promotion of such measures.
• House Bill 1319– Imposes a 1% annual tax on worldwide financial assets over $100 million, driving wealthy residents and their investments out of Washington, creating costly administrative burdens, inviting legal challenges, and destabilizing the state’s economy, all while failing to address the root causes of wealth inequality.
• House Bill 1296– Undermines the Parent’s Rights Initiative passed by the Legislature last year, erodes the trust between parents and schools, jeopardizes federal funding, and dishonors the will of hundreds of thousands who fought for Initiative 2081.
• House Bill 1217– Imposes rent control, which will discourage investment, slow down new construction, and worsen Washington’s housing crisis by driving capital to neighboring states with more flexible policies, while imposing arbitrary caps that don’t account for rising operational costs, ultimately hurting both housing providers and tenants.

Bad Bills That Died

On the other hand, many good bills did not advance, but House Republicans also managed to stop numerous bad bills from moving forward, including:

• House Bill 1339 – Creates a chaotic nightmare for county auditors, leads to voter confusion, increases ballot fatigue, and unfairly benefits incumbents while overshadowing local issues, all at the cost of election integrity and effective voter engagement. Democratic Secretary of State Hobbs is opposed.
• House Bill 1380 – Strips cities of their ability to clear dangerous encampments, opens the floodgates to costly lawsuits, overrides local voters, and makes communities less safe—without offering real solutions to homelessness.
• House Bill 1448 – Increases costs, causes logistical nightmares, and confuses voters while disenfranchising those who struggle to understand it and undermining trust in our electoral system.
• House Bill 1146 – Forces cash-strapped counties to divert resources from law enforcement and public safety to create voting plans for jails and state hospitals and allows the Attorney General to sue them for noncompliance.
• House Bill 1128 – Sets up an unelected Childcare Workforce Standards Board to require minimum standards for compensation, working conditions, training, and other standards that will drastically increase the cost of childcare.
• House Bill 1178 – Weakens sentencing for drug offenses in school zones, reduces accountability for gang-related crimes involving minors, and makes it easier for criminals with firearms and deadly weapons to get early release, ultimately putting communities at greater risk and undermining public safety.
• House Bill 1125 – Undermines accountability by empowering activist judges to resentence convicted criminals, potentially jeopardizing public safety and retraumatizing victims.
• House Bill 1189 – Allows individuals with criminal convictions to volunteer in schools with regular, unsupervised access to children, exposing students to preventable risks.

More Work Still to Be Done – Please Stay Involved

With so much work still to do, including finalizing the state’s three budgets – operating, transportation, and capital — the last five weeks of this session promise to be eventful. House Republicans continue to work on real solutions to fix our state’s many crises and still need your help. Here are some ways to help you stay engaged with your state government.

The Week Ahead provides a rundown of key bills scheduled for public hearings and committee work sessions, along with easy ways to engage—whether that means testifying in person or remotely, submitting your position, or adding written testimony.

Our Stop Bad Bills website contains detailed information, news articles, and videos explaining why these policies would harm Washington. Please visit this website and make your voice heard by taking the survey or sharing your story about how bad bills have impacted you or your family. This allows you to get involved and express your concerns.

Be a Part of The House Page Program

I want to make you aware of the Washington State House of Representatives Page Program, which is now open for applications. Being a page can add a meaningful and unforgettable chapter to a student’s education and life experience.

Student pages spend a week helping House members with all sorts of tasks—from hanging out on the chamber floor to making deliveries across campus, supporting member offices, and diving into Page School.

Students should be 14-16 years old, have parent or guardian permission, and receive a recommendation from a teacher and your principal. Pages get a stipend of $65 per day and can rack up to 20 hours of community service.

If you know a student in the 17th District who would benefit from this experience, please let them know about this program. It’s a great way to learn and make a positive impact.

Thank You

Thank you for your continued support as I represent you in Olympia. Please don’t hesitate to contact me. It’s an honor to serve you.

Sincerely,

David Stuebe