Tri-Cities legislators part of push to put a check on WA governor’s emergency powers

A public hearing is planned Monday in Olympia on one of the more restrictive of the dozen bills proposed to limit the Washington state governor’s emergency powers.

The House Committee of State Government and Tribal Relations is holding a public hearing on House Bill 1029, starting at 1:30 p.m. Monday.

Reps. Brad Klippert and Matt Boehnke, both of Kennewick are among the nine Republican sponsors of the bill, that among other things, puts a 14-day cap on the governor’s ability to issue emergency proclamations before getting approval from the Legislature.

The governor’s indefinite power to issue an emergency proclamation is largely unchecked, argues Jason Mercier, the Washington Policy Center’s Kennewick-based director of the conservative think tank, Center for Government Reform.

When the governor waives laws, such as the Open Public Meetings Act, he is required to get approval from the Legislature after 30 days.

If the Legislature isn’t in session, he needs the approval of the majority and minority leaders of the state House and Senate, which is happened in the case of the coronavirus pandemic.

The bill in front of the committee on Monday would add more restrictions, including:

• Each emergency proclamation is limited to a single county. Multiple declarations would have to be filed.
• Each declaration would need to spell out the “specific facts giving rise to the emergency.”
• The Legislature would need to sign off on every proclamation after 14 days.

Mercier was surprised the committee would pick this bill for a hearing. Another option, House Bill 1020 contains only the requirement that legislators sign off on a emergency order after 30 days.

In addition to Kippert and Boehnke and other Republicans, that bill also has two Democrats co-sponsoring it. A partner bill in the Senate also is unlikely to be heard in committee before a Feb. 15 deadline.

“It looks like House Bill 1029 will be the only opportunity this session for Washingtonians to testify on emergency powers reform,” Mercier said.

You can go to app.leg.wa/csiremote/house and register to testify remotely or to provide written testimony.

Legislature involved

Klippert has been pushing for a change in how much power the governor has to issue emergency proclamations and has signed onto and sponsored multiple bills.

He also wants deadlines to be extended to the emergency rules power of health districts and state agencies.

“A ton of my constituents are tired of it,” Klippert told the Herald in December about Gov. Jay Inslee’s COVID-19 restrictions. “They want to live their individual lives in freedom.”

Boehnke said he can understand the need to react quickly, but the framers of the state constitution imagined having a balance between the branches of government. The change is necessary regardless of the governor’s political party or the emergency, he said.

“Fourteen days is where we want to go. Thirty days may be too much,” he said. “We need to have that line in the sand.”

Washington, along with Vermont, Ohio and Hawaii are among the states that give the broadest power to their governors for emergency declarations, according to a study from the Maine Policy Institute.

Mercier has pointed out that other states require their governor to call a session of the Legislature to approve the emergency proclamations.

“One person should not have indefinite power to make decisions affecting every aspect of our lives. This is precisely why the people’s legislative branch of government exists,” he said in a blog post.

The Inslee’s office has stood behind the necessity of the orders to prevent the spread of COVID. Mike Fault, Inslee’s deputy communications director, has said appropriate use of the emergency powers has saved lives.

“These kinds of efforts to change the law around states of emergency are misguided,” he said. “They do not include any substantive analysis of how these changes would better serve Washingtonians, nor do they mull the potential for unintended consequences from such changes while we are still very much in the midst of an emergency.”

This story was originally published February 6, 2021 at 1:37 PM.