The Washington State Senate on Tuesday passed Senate Bill 6843, which would suspend a key provision of the taxpayer protection law created by Initiative 960. SB 6843 would repeal the two-thirds legislative vote requirement for final passage of any tax increase bill until July 1, 2011, which covers the 2010 and 2011 legislative sessions.
Sen. Curtis King, R-Yakima, said the bill is a slap in the face to taxpayers. Continue reading
The Senate today took a break from voting on the 99th day of its scheduled 105-day session to unanimously approve a resolution recognizing the career of Ben Soria, who is stepping down June 30 after nine years as Yakima School District superintendent and 21 years of service as a school administrator in Washington.
Sen. Curtis King, R-Yakima, who introduced Senate Resolution 8661, recalled Soria’s arrival in Yakima from Tacoma, saying he was “the right man at the right time for all the right reasons.” Continue reading
Sen. Curtis King says the Valley Mall Boulevard/Interstate 82 interchange project, which was at risk of being delayed to 2016, will remain on schedule now that the Legislature has passed a bill to appropriate about $340 million in federal transportation stimulus money.
“Representatives Johnson and Ross helped move the bill out of the House of Representatives, the Senate caught it at mid-afternoon and now it’s off to the governor’s desk. It’s been a joint effort that I appreciate very much,” said King, R-Yakima. “One of my three goals for this legislative session was to keep the Valley Mall interchange on track. The votes today mean the project will stay on schedule to go out for bid in October.” Continue reading
Legislation purporting to help child care centers by allowing collective bargaining is likely to have the opposite effect, taking money from centers while raising costs for parents, say Sen. Janéa Holmquist, R-Moses Lake and Sen. Curtis King, R-Yakima. They serve on the Senate Labor, Commerce and Consumer Protection Committee, which heard Senate Bill 5572 today.
If the goal is to increase public subsidies for child care centers and fund a child care wage ladder, you don’t need this bill to accomplish that,” said Holmquist, the committee’s ranking Republican member. “If Democrat supermajorities in the House and Senate all support this idea, what’s stopping them from increasing subsidies and funding the child care wage ladder?” Continue reading
Sen. Curtis King and Rep. Charles Ross have scheduled a pair of town hall meetings for Saturday, March 29. The meetings will be in southeast Yakima from 10 to 11 a.m. and in West Valley from 1:30 to 3:30 p.m.
Ross, R-Naches, and King, R-Yakima, will report to residents of the 14th Legislative District on the just-concluded 2008 legislative session, discuss other issues of concern, and take questions. Continue reading
The Legislature should be willing to reopen the two-year state operating budget approved in 2007 if that’s what it takes to bring spending more in line with revenue, said Sen. Curtis King, R-Yakima.
The state’s quarterly revenue forecast was released this afternoon. It predicts the state treasury will take in $423 million less in revenue during the 2007-09 biennium than expected in the previous quarterly forecast, from November. Continue reading
Sen. Curtis King this morning told the Senate Agriculture and Rural Economic Development Committee that Washington would benefit if the state’s beleaguered beekeepers could take the money they pay in state taxes and invest it in the health of their hives instead.
King, R-Yakima, is the prime sponsor of Senate Bill 6468, which received a public hearing before the agriculture committee. The bipartisan measure would exempt pollination services, sales of bees and use of bees from the applicable state taxes – which amount to about a dollar per hive – and lift state restrictions on farm diesel used by beekeepers. Continue reading
In his first voting session as a lawmaker, Sen. Curtis King, R-Yakima, joined a majority of Republicans and Democrats in the Senate to approve a bill reinstating the state’s 1 percent property tax levy limit.
King and other legislators met in special session today at the Capitol to reenact the tax increase cap created by Initiative 747, which had been overturned by the state Supreme Court on a technicality earlier this month. Continue reading
