The Capitol Building is seen on the night of Monday, Jan. 8, 2018 in Olympia.
Gov. Jay Inslee continues to sign bills following the end of the 2020 legislative session, approving a handful from North County lawmakers last week.
Of North County lawmakers, Sen. Ann Rivers had the most bills land on Inslee’s desk, though not all made it off with his signature.
Rivers’ Engrossed Substitute Senate Bill 6300 deals with a number of components of animal cruelty laws ranging from cosmetic modifications to animal cruelty defenses.
The law requires a licensed veterinarian to be the one to administer procedures to “devocalize” a dog or crop their ears or tail, using accepted veterinary practices during the procedure. This removes the exception for others to perform cropping, making it a misdemeanor.
The law also removes the use of economic distress as an affirmative defense for second-degree animal cruelty, a gross misdemeanor. Other changes center around animal sexual abuse and procedures when dealing with abandoned animals.
When the law passed the House in early March, Rivers, R-La Center, hailed ESSB 6300 as “the first comprehensive update of animal-welfare laws in years,” specifically referencing the economic distress defense as an “unfortunate” sign of the status quo.
“Some of these changes are overdue, and none is coming too soon,” Rivers said in a news release after the House’s passing.
Rivers’ Substitute Senate Bill 6206 also received a signature. The bill regards licensing for marijuana businesses, basing a buffer zone restriction necessary for a license off of the time an application was received.
Currently the state Liquor and Cannabis Board generally requires a marijuana business to be at least 1,000 feet from places such as K-12 schools, playgrounds, child care centers, public parks and libraries, among others. The law would allow for a license for such a business as long as that restriction was met at the time of the application, preventing such a business to be blocked should something within the restrictive buffer come in after the time of application.
Rivers didn’t have as much luck with Senate Bill 6038, which dealt with clarifying the role of Eastern medicine practitioners. According to a House bill report, the legislation involves “acupuncture and Eastern medicine,” which deals from a list of practices ranging from acupuncture to breathing techniques, and has been codified in state law for at least a decade.
According to Inslee’s veto statement, the governor expressed concern over a “technical bill drafting mistake” that would limit the ability for Eastern medicine practitioners to diagnose medical issues, limiting their scope of practice to therapeutic means. Currently those practitioners have been able to diagnose, and the omission of that ability in the proposed legislation could result in insurance companies denying claims, the statement read.
State Rep. Ed Orcutt also had some legislation successfully signed this week. The Kalama Republican’s House Bill 2858 regards property tax assessment rolls, extending the deadline for county assessors to certify tax rolls to their jurisdiction’s board of equalization to Aug. 15.
Proponents of the bill call it a “cleanup bill” that allows for the deadlines for appealing assessed values and ones for an assessor to certify tax rolls to be more in line with each other, following a change a few years ago allowing counties to extend their appeal timeframe.
Orcutt also put his support behind legislation from Vancouver Democrat Sharon Wylie, whose House Bill 2242 deals with travel trailer operations. The legislation brings a restriction for those trailers to 46 feet, up from 40 feet and in line with length restrictions on motorhomes and school buses.
Still hope for Tiffany Hill Act
Though it wasn’t on the agendas for last week’s signings, Sen. Lynda Wilson’s “Tiffany Hill Act” has a couple of ways to become law. Second Substitute Senate Bill 5149 has had widespread support in the Legislature, never receiving “no” votes, and would implement electronic monitoring with victim notification technology, allowing for domestic violence victims or individuals granted a protection order to be notified either directly or through a monitoring agency when the subject of the order is at or near a location they were required to stay away from.
In a news release, Wilson, R-Vancouver, explained that if the governor doesn’t sign the bill by April 4 it would become law. The governor could also sign the bill next week, but he could veto the bill, though the senator said “there's no reason to think he will.”
Wilson brought up the unprecedented nature of bill signings this year given response to the novel coronavirus outbreak, noting that even she could not be present for the ceremony.
“If the Tiffany Hill Act becomes law on its own and we can request a signing ceremony with photographs at a later date (which I'll do), it's all good,” Wilson said.
