2023 Legislative session underway

The 2023 Legislative session has begun! This 105-day session started on January 9^th and will end on April 23^rd, 2023. This week, Western testified in favor of the Governor’s proposed operating and capital budgets as well as several bills in the House Postsecondary Education & Workforce Committee and the Senate Higher Education & Workforce Committee.

The following bills are some of the high priority bills that are being closely tracked and received public hearings this week:

• House Bill 1030 – Concerning applied doctorate degrees
  • WWU along with CWU and EWU requested this legislation to allow for blanket legislative approval of applied doctorate offerings. It had a public hearing on 1/11 and is scheduled for executive session on 1/17.
• House Bill 1142 – Increasing tenure track faculty
  • WWU testified in support of this measure at a public hearing on 1/11 and the bill is now scheduled for executive session on 1/18.
• House Bill 1156 – Extending eligibility for the Washington college grant program
  • At the request of the Washington Student Achievement Council, this bill aligns Washington college grant eligibility with the federal PELL grant program, extending the amount of time that students can utilize the grant. The bill had a public hearing on 1/11 and is schedule for executive session on 1/18.
• Senate Bill 5079 – Concerning the date by which tuition is established
  • The public four-year sector requested this technical change to allow for more timely communication of tuition costs to students. This bill had a public hearing on 1/11 and is not yet scheduled for executive action.
• SGA 9240 – Student Trustee Keara Ryan
  • Western’s student trustee for the 2022-23 academic year joined the Senate Higher Education committee to provide sworn testimony as the first step in the confirmation process. Trustee Ryan spoke to experiences as a transfer student and getting involved on campus. The committee took executive action and next the confirmation will go to the Senate floor for a full vote of the Senate.

Other updates:

Western Lobby Day will take place on Monday, January 16^th. This annual tradition brings dozens of WWU students to the Capitol to advocate for their priorities.

In this early stage of session, many bills are introduced each day. This blog will provide updates on legislation and budget priorities that Western is working on this session.

The first major cutoff of this session is policy committee cutoff is Friday, February 17^th. This is the day by which bills must be passed out of the committee they were referred to in order to remain viable this session.