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April 6, 2018 | NORTHWEST LABOR PRESS
NORTHWEST
WASHINGTON
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For working people, best legislative session in years
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new law, the state Department of Social and Health
Services will contract with a private entity to manage the
homecare workforce. That would make it possible in the
future for the homecare bargaining unit to once again
become a union shop, where all workers contribute to the
union’s costs, as was the case before 2014. That was the
year, in the case Harris v. Quinn, that an anti-union 5-4
majority of the U.S. Supreme Court issued an “right-to-
work” decision saying that state-paid homecare workers
can’t be required to pay union fees because they have too
tenuous a connection with the state.
For the first time in five years, Democrats
were in charge of both chambers of the
Washington Legislature, holding narrow
majorities in both the Senate and House.
As a result, union-backed bills that were
blocked when Republicans ran the state
Senate had a fighting chance in the 2018
legislative session, which began Jan. 8 and
ended March 8. Among bills backed by the
state’s labor organizations, here are some
highlights:
BILLS THAT PASSED
■ Jobs in capital construction Lawmakers approved
$4.2 billion in capital construction spending, including
schools, mental health facilities and other infrastructure
projects that will employ workers in the building trades.
■ School funding After years of delay, lawmakers
approved more than $776 million for school employee
salary increases to satisfy a 2012 state supreme court
ruling that found the legislature had failed to adequately
fund K-12 schools in accord with a voter mandate.
■ Justice for Hanford workers For years, workers
exposed to radiation at the Hanford Nuclear Reservation
failed to get workers compensation benefits if they
couldn’t show that their cancer or respiratory illness was
caused by radiation, which can be tricky to prove. From
now on, the state will presume that a set of illnesses
contracted by clean-up workers at Hanford are
occupational in nature.
■ A step toward equal pay for women A new law
prohibits nondisclosure agreements that forbid discussion
of wages, and bars employers from retaliating against
employees for asking about their wages or the salary of
BILLS THAT FAILED
other employees. It also prohibits discrimination in career
advancement opportunities based on gender. The House
passed a version of this four years in a row; now, with the
Democrats in charge of the Senate, it’s law.
■ Ban the box Washington is now the 11th state to
prohibit questions about criminal record at the first stage
of an employment application. Under the new law,
employers must also give applicants a chance to present
their qualifications for the job before running criminal
background checks and inquiring about their conviction
records.
■ Privatized homecare overseer Unions for
privatization? Sounds strange, but there are times when it
makes sense. In Washington, SEIU Local 775 represents
about 37,000 homecare workers who are paid by
Medicaid to care for the disabled and elderly in their
homes. Though they’re hired by the people they serve, the
state has been their employer of record for the purposes
of collectively bargaining improvements. Now, under a
■ Carbon tax Governor Jay Inslee pushed hard for a $20
per ton carbon tax to curb greenhouse gas emissions and
generate $800 million a year for investments in
renewable energy and conservation. The Senate chopped
that in half, but even then it died without a vote on the
Senate floor.
■ Capital gains tax Tax the rich, anyone? House
Democrats proposed a 7 percent tax on earnings from the
sale of stocks, bonds and other assets above $25,000 for
individuals and $50,000 for those who file jointly. But the
bill never got a vote before the full House, much less the
Senate.
■ Accountability in outsourcing A bill backed by the
Washington Federation of State Employees (WFSE-
AFSCME) would have required state agencies to analyze
costs, itemize performance standards and document
decision-making before contracting out work historically
provided by public employees. Isn’t it curious: This bill
passed the House 69-28 in 2017 when lawmakers knew
the Senate would kill it. Now that it could actually pass, it
didn’t even make it out of its House committee.