Year in Review: 42nd Legislative District, House Position 2

We often think of politics as a fight, but our state government is much more functional than the federal government, and I was impressed with how hard everyone worked to reach across the aisle. In my first session, the House and the Senate jointly passed 481 bills to move Washington forward.

I fought for Whatcom in my first budget negotiation. Back in January, Blaine asked for a solution to congestion on Bell Road. I helped secure $1 million during budget negotiations to start the engineering process. Because of the passage of I-976, I will soon be working to protect that money from the chopping block.

I wrote my first budget proviso, wrangling two years’ worth of state funding to staff Whatcom County’s new crisis stabilization facility. The facility will provide much needed help for those in crisis by providing an alternative to the current choices of ER or jail, both of which are expensive and often not what is needed. We’ll save lives and save money.

I passed my first bills. We worked to make electricity more transparent, increase access to education for student-parents and make sure the dairy industry can continue to thrive in Washington state.

It was also my first time being dunked for a good cause – I let community members dunk their state representative as a fundraiser for the beautiful new county library we’re building on Birch Bay Drive! I helped secure $2 million in the state budget to pay for half of the construction, but it’s going to take a grassroots community effort to get us the rest of the way – including dunk tanks.

In 2020, I’ll introduce bills to fix leaky natural gas infrastructure, collect better data in our jails and encourage more bike riding! Here’s to progress and even more firsts in 2020.