Washington School Directors’ Association
2100 Legislative Conference
February 27-28
Olympia, Washington
Kathy White
Kennewick School Director, Position 3
Dave Bond and I flew to Seattle on Sunday morning, picked up a rental car and drove to Olympia. Wendy London met us at the conference center.
The conference speakers were Jonelle Adams, Executive Director WSSDA, Paul Rosier, Executive Director WASA, Randy Dorn, Superintendent of Public Instruction, Jim Justin, Legislative Director of the Governor’s Office, Judy Hartmann, Executive Police Director of the Governor’s Office, Arun Raha, Executive Director and Chief Economist, Washington State Economic and Revenue Forecast Council, a panel of Senate and House Educational Leadership, Patty Wood, Kelso School Director and WSSDA Chair of the Federal Relations Network, Dan Steele, Assistant Executive Director WASA and Marie Sullivan, Governmental Relations WSSDA.
The information we gained from this group of policy makers seems old as I write this at the end of March. Legislation is volatile while the session is ongoing. The scope of the deficit was not known at the time of the meeting. It was evident that there was not going to be enough money to fund all entities at their current level. Everyone expressed an appreciation for the value of all education, especially K-12.
Monday we visited our legislators. Rick Jansons, School Director from Richland and Legislative Committee member, had arranged for all three legislators from the eighth district to meet us at 7:45 in the morning. Larry Haler was there and we waited awhile then started when no one else showed up. Later, we received a voice mail from Brad Klippert that he was in his office and thought the meeting was supposed to be there. An email from Jerome Delvin put him on the other side of Snoqualmie Pass, unable to get to Olympia because of the weather. Larry, as usual, blamed the Democrats for all the problems in the state. The economic outlook is not good and he will try to protect levy equalization for school districts. We talked about what was important for our schools and Larry listened. I left the meeting feeling gloomy about the future.
Mike Hewitt was able to fit all of us into his office. This is the 16th legislative district and a different group of school districts. Mike also is supporting levy equalization. Everyone is waiting for the economic outlook report on March 17th but it is certain that there will not be money to cover everything. Cuts seem to be inevitable but we reminded Mike that education already has taken loses and it is the “paramount duty” of the state to fund education.
Terry Nealy’s office was a lot smaller but we all fit in, standing against the walls. Terry seemed the most interested in learning about what was happening in our districts. One person spoke of the teacher union contract being a problem but that was negated by comments from all the others. The pilot of the teacher/principal evaluation in Kennewick was of particular interest to Terry.
The appointment with Maureen Walsh was in the afternoon and Dave Bond needed to be in the TriCities for an afternoon meeting. So we left to take a 1:30 flight to Pasco.
1443 is of great concern to me, but being out oftown I am having trouble keeping up with the rapid changes Kathy alludes to. My understanding is that the most egregious elements have been negated, but I urge you to stay in touch and call legislators if need be.