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Dear Friends and Neighbors,
I hope you are having a wonderful new year so far. The 2024 legislative session kicked off on Monday, Jan. 8 and, as always, there is much work to be done. Lawmakers from all over the state have been filing, considering, and voting on numerous bills. There are many ongoing issues we must address, and I will keep you update throughout this session. I’m excited to be back in Olympia working for the good people of the 17th District.
Bills I’m Working on This Session
It’s always my goal to find common ground so we can provide real solutions to the people of Washington. That’s why I continue to work on bipartisan legislation whenever possible. These are some of the bipartisan bills I’m working on this session.
House Bill 1982 Expanding Rural Broadband Access – This would codify the Community Economic Revitalization Board (CERB) Rural Broadband program. I am a proud CERB board member and champion their efforts to expand their lending and grant services to help strengthen our state broadband. Since 2018, CERB has operated a Rural Broadband Program with funding from the capital budget, which provides grants and loans to local governments and federally recognized tribes.
The program finances the cost to build infrastructure to provide high-speed, open-access broadband service to rural and underserved communities for the purposes of economic development or community development. By codifying the bill, it would formalize and make permanent the authority for CERB to have a loan and grant program for broadband to rural communities. CERB is a trusted partner for economic development within rural communities and it has done great work over the last five years with this loan and grant program, including infusing $38 million into broadband through other revenues.
House Bill 2204 Emergency Liquor Permit – In my last email update, I promised I would be running a bill to help beverage producers throughout the state when emergency situations occur. HB 2204 would allow beverage producers a temporary emergency permit – with no fees – to move their place of business to another beverage producing company in the event a natural disaster forces them to close.
Last summer, the Tunnel Five Fire forced several wineries to shut down production. The remaining wineries offered to open their facilities to five other companies. However, current law would not allow that to happen. We need to do what we can to help these businesses continue operating during emergency situations.
House Bill 2045 Creating an “Adopt a Fish Barrier” Program – Fish barriers continue to be a serious impediment to salmon and steelhead recovery in Washington. Part of the problem is that the state has limited financial resources to address all the challenges that come with this problem. The good news is there are some community member and businesses that want to help by partnering with the state for the removal of fish barriers that are on lands owned by local governments.
This bill would facilitate the removal of fish barriers on lands owned by local governments by creating the “Adopt a Fish Barrier” program through which local governments may receive such donations. The donors’ contributions would be acknowledged through appropriate public signage much like the “Adopt a Highway” program.
In addition to these bills, I’m sponsoring House Bills 2181, 2255, and 2260 this session.
Interstate 5 Bridge Tolling
I’m also co-sponsoring numerous bills this session, including House Bill 2268, which would restrict toll collection on the Interstate 5 bridge over the Columbia River until a new bridge is open for travel. We all recognize that this bridge is not going to pay for itself, and that tolling is likely going to be a part of the funding mechanism. However, we should not arbitrarily start tolling drivers before they have a bridge to drive on, let alone years before construction begins.
I will keep you posted on all these bills as the session progresses, as well as many other important issues we’ll be working on in Olympia over the next eight weeks.
Thank You for Your Support and Please Stay in Touch
Thank you for your trust and for allowing me to serve you. I’m humbled and honored to be your voice in the Legislature and will do everything in my power to represent you and our great district. I want you to know my door is truly always open and I hope you will reach out to me. I need your input to be the best legislator I can be.
It’s an honor to serve,
Kevin Waters
