During the Renton City Council’s Dec. 11 meeting, city staff presented Renton’s legislative priorities ahead of the 2024 legislative session in Olympia.
The 60-day session of the Washington Legislature will begin on Jan. 8 and conclude on March 7.
According to presenters in Renton, some of the Equity Commission’s feedback from a meeting back in November included notes about supporting “anything involving equity” when it comes to legislation; keeping state money that may have been previously allocated to Renton schools or transportation projects in Renton; and getting the commission more involved in the legislative process in Olympia.
City staff projected that state lawmakers would be working toward policies to address housing, homelessness and behavioral health as they have been in recent years. But they also expect a policy push toward allowing new avenues of local revenue for communities.
Here are some key priorities in Renton’s 2024 State Legislative Agenda.
Transportation infrastructure
According to the agenda, the city wants to ensure that some of the $16.9 billion made available in 2022 by the Legislature’s “Move Ahead Washington” transportation investment will be allocated toward Renton-area projects such as Eastrail corridor investments, which includes a $6 million allocation to extend the multi-use trail to the Gene Coulon Park/Southport entrance in Renton.
The agenda also prioritized a request that funding already committed by Legislature to WSDOT projects benefiting the Renton community are not reallocated due to funding shortfalls on other I-405 related projects.
According to the city, the cost of construction has increased substantially in the past couple of years, and funding shortfalls on the Brickyard to SR-527 Project and SR-167 Corridor Improvement Project are more than $250 million. According to the agenda, city staff are concerned that this could be seen as a reason to reallocate funding from other projects scheduled out in future years.
The agenda also prioritized requesting funding for infrastructure to address traffic and speeding in the community. According to the agenda, the increase in driver speed and increased number of collisions have gone up since the pandemic. The city reports that law enforcement has tried to address these issues, but has limited resources and leverage to do so. The city intends to ask the Legislature to fund infrastructure for physical improvements that have been shown to reduce a driver’s speed, such as speed warning signs, speed humps, bulb-outs, chicanes and other roadway options.
Health and safety
According to the city’s agenda, staff and administrators support enhanced funding for community-based behavioral health facilities. The city also supports legislation to crack down on catalytic converter thefts, in addition to increased funding for courts, especially to offset a “sharp spike in interpreter costs.” The agenda also calls for legislation to refine statutes on police vehicle pursuits.
A staff presenter of the legislative agenda clarified that the note in support of legislation to refine statutes on police vehicle pursuits serves as a “placeholder in case there is legislation moved forward to provide additional flexibility for local jurisdictions and not be, perhaps, constrained to only what the state is putting forward.”
The agenda also noted opposition to “efforts to place unnecessary limitations or remove current authority to utilize traffic safety cameras.”
Budget
The agenda expressed support for fiscal policies that include:
“State-shared” and other revenue streams for local governments.
The continuation of a $20 million funding allocation in the 2021-23 Operating Budget that helped offset costs of new police reform and public safety bills enacted by the Legislature. The city says those costs are still a major factor for local governments.
Efforts to revise a 3 percent property tax cap that is arbitrary in nature and leaves local governments unable to keep pace with inflationary cost increases: “Renton supports legislation to instead institute a cap that can be based on inflationary indexes and population growth.”
Additional local option sales tax for public safety or criminal justice support, including hiring and retaining law enforcement personnel.
The city’s agenda opposes initiatives which would undermine local Business and Occupation (B&O) tax revenues and authority, and expressed “strong concerns” over the redefining of B&O tax treatment of royalties.
For more information about the city’s legislative agenda and administrative priorities as related to environmental sustainability, land use and growth management, transportation and local government read the agenda report here.
