Category Archives: Transportation 2022

HB2119

HB2119 – 2022 Transportation Package.
Prime Sponsor – Representative Fey (D; 27th District; Tacoma (Co-Sponsors Wylie & Riccelli – Ds)
Current status – Had a hearing in the House Committee on Transportation February 17th. Amended and passed out of committee February 22nd; referred to Rules February 24th.
Next step would be – Action by the Rules Committee.
Legislative tracking page for the bill.
SB5974 is a companion bill in the Senate.

Comments –
The Washington State Wire has a summary of the anticipated budget allocations plus a little political commentary.

Summary –

Amendments in House Transportation –
Amended to synchronize with the current Senate version by declaring the State’s intention to fully fund the ferry vessel and terminal electrification program in accordance with the 2040 Long Range Plan  (but not the need to replace vessels on a biennial basis); by creating a Department of Transportation program focused on safety improvements to prevent lane departures in dangerous areas; by delaying the imposition of the tax on imported fuel for five months, reducing expected revenues by $51.2 million; and by depositing revenues from the tax on exported fuel into the Move Ahead WA account, rather than the motor vehicle fund. Other amendments would exempt biofuels exported to other states from the fuel tax; drop the provision allowing cities and towns to impose an additional tax of up to 2% on natural gas, steam energy, or telephone businesses with a vote of the people; and make other minor changes.

Original bill –
The bill would specify that transportation appropriations from the carbon emissions reduction account which is funded by revenue from the cap and invest program can only by used for active transportation, transit programs and projects, alternative fuel and electrification, ferries, and rail. It would declare the Legislature’s intention to use this money for the activities identified in the LEAP Transportation Document. 24% of that money would be dedicated to active transportation and 56% to transit. The bill would expand the cap and invest program’s requirement for environmental justice assessments, for reporting to the Environmental Justice Council, and for directing specified percentages of funding to vulnerable populations to include these investments.

It replaces the section of the Clean Fuels Act about Commerce’s creation of implementation rules with a new section, which simply deletes the subsection of the original act that the Governor vetoed.

The bill would apply the fuel tax to direct deliveries and bulk transfers to any destination with the United States, including tribal lands, but then it would provide credits against that, resulting in a tax of 6¢ a gallon, and no tax if the state to which the fuel went imposed a higher tax on it than Washington’s. (It would extend the current provisions that allow claiming a credit against the tax for fuel used in particular activities like urban transit to those uses of fuel exported to other parts of the country.) It would raise the tax on aircraft fuel sold, delivered or used in the state from 11¢/gallon to 18¢/gallon.

The bill would create a Move Ahead Washington account and a Move Ahead Washington flexible account which could only be spent on projects, programs, or activities assigned to those accounts in an omnibus transportation appropriations act. The bill would raise the basic license plate fee from $10 to $50, raise the motorcycle fee from $4 to $20, raise the dealer permit fee from $15 to $40, and raise license replacement fees; most of that additional revenue, the 25¢ license plate technology fee, and the 50¢ license service fee would be directed to the Move Ahead Washington account. It would raise the enhanced license fee from $32 to $56; add $2 to the fee for abstracts of driving records (and $4 after July 1st 2029); raise the fee for replacing driving identification to change or correct material information from $10 to $20; and deposit the additional revenue in the Move Ahead Washington flexible account. It would raise the documentary service fee that dealers can charge to cover their administrative costs in concluding sales and leases, which include licensing and registration fees and other agency fees, from $150 to $200.

The bill would direct $31 million a year from the general fund to the Move Ahead Washington flexible account from 2026 through 2038. (The bill says this represents the estimated state sales and use tax generated from the new transportation projects and activities it would fund.)

It would fund the sales and use tax reductions for the sale or lease of plug-in and fuel cell vehicles from the general fund rather than the electric vehicle account. It would fund the credits against the B&O tax and the public utility tax for purchases of alternative fuel vehicles over 14,000 pounds, for alternative fuel infrastructure, and for employers’ investments in financial commute trip reduction incentives from the general fund rather than the multimodal transportation account. It would fund the exemptions from the sales and use taxes for the sales of batteries and fuel cells for vehicles, and for work on them, from the general fund, and not the multimodal account.

The bill would raise the maximum amount of the excise tax voters in border area jurisdictions could decide to impose on the retail sale of fuel for the purpose of street maintenance and construction from 1¢/gallon to 2¢/gallon, adjusted for inflation going forward. It would allow cities and towns to impose an additional tax of up to 2% on natural gas, steam energy, or telephone businesses. (This would not require a vote of the people as I read the bill). The revenue would have to be used for improvements in the transportation plan of the state, a regional transportation planning organization, the city, or the county, but might include public transportation and transportation demand management projects. It would allow transportation benefit districts to increase an existing sales or use tax for special transportation needs from 2/10 of one percent to up a maximum of 3/10 of one percent. It would allow the governing board of a district that included all the territory of the jurisdiction establishing it to impose a new local sales and use tax of up to 1/10 of one percent, and to vote to extend it for up to ten years.

The bill would make having all new vehicles sold, purchased, or registered in Washington be electric beginning with the 2030 models a target for the State, and would require the Department of Commerce to create “a scoping plan” for achieving that.

It would have Commerce establish a competitive bus and bus facilities grant program to provide funds to transit authorities for the replacement, expansion, rehabilitation, and purchase of transit rolling stock (including ferries and vans); the construction, modification, or rehabilitation of facilities; and the retrofitting of rolling stock and facilities to adapt to technological change or innovation. It would be required to incorporate environmental justice principles and geographic diversity into the selection process, to exclude fuel type as a factor, to limit any single grantee to a maximum of 35% of the funding in a biennium, and to establish an advisory committee to carry out the requirements for the program, including assisting with establishing the grant criteria.

The bill would establish a Connecting Communities program at Commerce to improve active transportation connectivity in communities by providing safe, continuous routes for pedestrians, bicyclists, and other nonvehicle users carrying out daily activities; mitigating for the health, safety, and access impacts of transportation infrastructure that bisects communities and creates obstacles in the local active transportation network; investing in greenways providing protected routes for nonvehicular users; and facilitating the planning, development, and implementation of projects and activities to improve the connectivity and safety of that network. The program would propose projects to the Legislature considering
(a) Access to a transit facility, community facility, commercial center, or community-identified assets;
(b) The use of minority and women-owned businesses and community-based organizations in planning, community engagement, design, and construction of projects;
(c) Whether they will serve overburdened communities, vulnerable populations, low income households, and people with disabilities;
(d) Environmental health disparities;
(e) Location on or adjacent to tribal lands or locations providing essential services to tribal members;
(f) Crash experience involving pedestrians and bicyclists; and
(g) Identified need by a community.
Commerce would report to the transportation committees of the Legislature in December of each year for five years on selected projects for funding and on the status of previously funded projects.

The bill would require state transportation projects starting design on or after July 1, 2022, and costing $500,000 or more to identify locations on State rights-of-way that don’t have a complete Americans with Disabilities Act accessible sidewalk or shared-use path, that don’t have a bike lane or adjacent parallel trail or shared-use path, that have such facilities on a state route within a population center with a posted speed over 30 mph and no buffer or physical separation from vehicular traffic for pedestrians and bicyclists, and/or a design that hampers the ability of motorists to see a crossing pedestrian with sufficient time to stop. The Department would be required to consult local jurisdictions about existing and planned active transportation connections along or across those locations; and to identify connections to other existing and planned public transportation services; existing and planned facilities that connect to the location; and the potential use of speed management techniques to minimize crash risks. DOT would be required to lower the speed limit with appropriate roadway design and operations where this approach aligns with local plans or ordinances, particularly in contexts that present a higher possibility of serious crashes. It would have to plan, design, and construct facilities providing context-sensitive solutions needed to integrate the state route into the local network and contributing to connectivity and safety for pedestrians, bicyclists, and people accessing public transportation and other modal connections, including ADA accessible sidewalks or shared-use paths, bike facilities, and crossings .

The bill would have DOT establish two statewide school-based bicycle education grant program, one for elementary and middle school and one for older students, to develop bicycling skills and street safety knowledge. It would be encouraged to consult with the Environmental Justice Council and the Office of Equity in the process. It would contract with a nonprofit organization with relevant reach and experience, including a statewide footprint and demonstrable experience deploying bicycling and road safety education curriculum via a train the trainer model in schools, for the elementary program, and with a non-profit meeting the same requirements plus experience developing and managing youth-based programming serving youth of color in an after-school and/or community for the junior high and high school program. The elementary program is to identify partner schools according to a long list of equity criteria; provide them with a fleet of bikes; provide a free bike with equipment for participants, and provide in-school bike and pedestrian safety education curriculum, materials, equipment guidance and consultation, and physical education teacher training. The junior high and high school program is to use the equity-based criteria to identify target populations and partner organizations that work with youth from 14 to 18, including schools, community-based organizations, housing authorities, and parks and recreation departments. It would provide education curriculum, materials, equipment guidance and consultation, and initial instructor/volunteer training, as well as ongoing support to those partners. DOT would report annually to the Legislature’s transportation committees on the programs.

The Department would negotiate with the Oregon Department of Transportation to determine the impacts on ridership, revenue, and policy of eliminating Amtrak Cascades fares for passengers 18 years and younger, and report to the transportation committees on the results and the status of fare policy requests to Amtrak by December 1, 2022. The bill would eliminate ferry fares for these passengers. It would establish a transit support grant program to provide support for operating and capital expenses to transit agencies that maintain or increase their local sales tax authority and have adopted a zero-fare policy for at least passengers 18 and younger. Grants would be prorated according to expenditures for operations; no agency could receive more than 35% of the money; and fuel type could not be a factor in the grant process.

The bill would expand the areas in which speed cameras could be used to include any roadway in a school walk area, public park speed zones, and hospital zones, and would require notification signs for drivers in those zones. It would increase the number of additional cameras that cities with over 195,000 people in a county of over 1.5 million were allowed to install, allowing one for every 10,000 residents in specified areas for cities that have done an equity analysis of livability, accessibility, economics, education, and environmental health, and consider that in their placements. Half of the net revenue from cameras in these new specified zones and the additional cameras authorized for larger cities would go to the State’s Cooper Jones active transportation safety account.

The bill would have the Transportation Commission reevaluate options to improve performance on the Interstate 405 and State Route 167 corridors at least every two years, since it has not met the goal of keeping average vehicle speeds in the express toll lanes above 45 mph at least 90% of the time during peak hours. It would remove the block on spending revenue from various accounts until a compliance path for emissions-intensive, trade-exposed businesses to achieve their share of the state’s emissions reduction through 2050 was in place. (HB1682 is intended to provide that.)

It would create a formal interagency council for coordinating the state’s transportation electrification efforts to ensure it’s leveraging state and federal resources to the best extent possible and to ensure zero emissions incentives, infrastructure, and opportunities are available and accessible to all. This would be led by the Departments of Commerce and Transportation with participation from Ecology; Enterprise Services; the State Efficiency and Environmental Performance Office; Agriculture; Health; the UTC; a representative from the Office of the Superintendent of Public Instruction knowledgeable about student transportation; and other agencies with key roles in electrifying the sector. It would provide ongoing reports to the Governor and appropriate legislative committees. It would develop a statewide transportation electrification strategy to ensure market and infrastructure readiness for all new vehicle sales; identify EV infrastructure grant related funding opportunities, and coordinate grant funding criteria across agency programs to most efficiently distribute state and federal electric vehicle-related funding in a manner that is most beneficial to the state, and advances best practices. It would recommend additional criteria that could be useful in advancing transportation electrification. It would provide ongoing reports to the Governor and appropriate legislative committees.

SB5974

SB5974 – 2022 Transportation Package.
Prime Sponsor – Senator Liias (D; 21st District; Southwest Snohomish County) (Co-Sponsor Saldaña – D)
Current status – Sent to conference  committee; its report was adopted by both houses March 10. Relative to the amended House striker, the final version restores the specification that $500 million in preservation and maintenance funding is for stormwater projects with an emphasis on green infrastructure. It no longer specifies an intent to fund projects according to the LEAP document.  It drops the 6¢/gallon tax on fuel exported to other states, and transfers $57 million a year to the Move Ahead WA flexible fund from the general fund; allows using the Public Works Assistance account for Move Ahead WA projects; and transfers $57 million a year from that account to Move Ahead WA. It restores the inflation adjustment to the border fuel tax, and drops the authorization for voters to approve an increase of up to 2% in their local gas utility tax, and the tax sticker on fuel pumps. It allows extending the local transit benefit tax with a vote more than once. It shifts creating the rail crossing grant program to the Department of Transportation, and limits regional mobility grant awards to transit authorities with free fares for riders 18 and under. It requires Transportation to estimate and report on the cap and invest program credits to be generated as a result of Move Ahead WA projects, and to make recommendations on the most effective ways to invest those to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and decarbonize transportation. It specifies that completing Connecting Washington projects is a legislative priority, and recognizes that “the application of practical design” during project design may produce cost saving, but it specifies various requirements for legislative oversight of proposed changes. It requires reporting on estimated savings as a result of practical design, and transfers those and some other possible project savings to the transportation future funding program to be split evenly between accelerating current Connecting Washington projects and funding new ones.
Next step would be – To the Governor
Legislative tracking page for the bill.
HB2119 is a companion bill in the House.

In the House – Passed
Referred to Transportation February 17th; then passed to Rules without a hearing on February 25th. The bill was amended on the floor by Representative Fey to eliminate the 6% tax on fuel exported to other states, to partially replace the expected revenue by transferring $100 million a year for the next 15 years from the Public Works Assistance Account to the Move Ahead WA program, resulting in a estimated net reduction of roughly $500 million in funding for the program over that period, and to drop the specification that $500 million of the preservation and maintenance funding is for enhancing stormwater runoff treatment with an emphasis on green infrastructure retrofits. His striker also defines biofuels in the Fuel Tax Act as those with life cycle emissions at least 40% below those of the petroleum products they’re replacing; drops the authorization for local increases of up to 2% on utility taxes to fund transportation; drops the required railway crossing grant program; adds some environmental justice provisions; drops the increased license plate fee from $50 to $40 for used cars; and has the Electric Vehicle Coordinating Council develop of a public and private outreach plan and create an industry electric vehicle advisory committee. Other amendments have the Department of Agriculture produce and distribute a sticker required on motor fuel pumps with information on Federal and State tax rate, and remove the inflation adjustment from the provision authorizing jurisdictions within ten miles of the border to raise the border fuel tax from 1¢/gallon to 2¢.

In the Senate – Passed
Had a hearing in the Transportation Committee Thursday February 10th at 10:00 AM; continued February 11th at 8:00 AM. Referred to Rules. Amended by the prime sponsor to adjust the bill in a number of small ways; and by others to declare the State’s intention to fully fund the ferry vessel and terminal electrification program in accordance with the 2040 Long Range Plan and the need to replace vessels on a biennial basis; and to delay the imposition of the tax on imported fuel for five months, reducing expected revenues by $51.2 million. Referred to Rules. Amended on the floor to eliminate telephone businesses from the optional additional 2% tax; to specify that $500 million of the preservation and maintenance funding under LEAP 2 is to go to enhance stormwater runoff treatment with an emphasis on green infrastructure retrofits; to create a grant program for projects that eliminate at grade highway-rail crossings; to create a Department of Transportation program focused on safety improvements to prevent lane departures in dangerous areas; and to make a couple of other minor changes. Passed by the Senate February 15th.

Comments –
The Washington State Wire has a summary of the anticipated budget allocations plus a little political commentary.

Summary –
The bill would specify that transportation appropriations from the carbon emissions reduction account which is funded by revenue from the cap and invest program can only by used for active transportation, transit programs and projects, alternative fuel and electrification, ferries, and rail. It would declare the Legislature’s intention to use this money for the activities identified in the LEAP Transportation Document. 24% of that money would be dedicated to active transportation and 56% to transit. The bill would expand the cap and invest program’s requirement for environmental justice assessments, for reporting to the Environmental Justice Council, and for directing specified percentages of funding to vulnerable populations to include these investments.

It replaces the section of  the Clean Fuels Act about Commerce’s creation of implementation rules with a new section, which simply deletes the subsection of the original act that the Governor vetoed.

The bill would apply the fuel tax to direct deliveries and bulk transfers to any destination with the United States, including tribal lands, but then it would provide credits against that, resulting in a tax of 6¢ a gallon, and no tax if the state to which the fuel went imposed a higher tax on it than Washington’s. (It would extend the current provisions that allow claiming a credit against the tax for fuel used in particular activities like urban transit to those uses of fuel exported to other parts of the country.) It would raise the tax on aircraft fuel sold, delivered or used in the state from 11¢/gallon to 18¢/gallon.

The bill would create a Move Ahead Washington account and a Move Ahead Washington flexible account which could only be spent on projects, programs, or activities assigned to those accounts in an omnibus transportation appropriations act. The bill would raise the basic license plate fee from $10 to $50, raise the motorcycle fee from $4 to $20, raise the dealer permit fee from $15 to $40, and raise license replacement fees; most of that additional revenue, the 25¢ license plate technology fee, and the 50¢ license service fee would be directed to the Move Ahead Washington account. It would raise the enhanced license fee from $32 to $56; add $2 to the fee for abstracts of driving records (and $4 after July 1st 2029); raise the fee for replacing driving identification to change or correct material information from $10 to $20; and deposit the additional revenue in the Move Ahead Washington flexible account. It would raise the documentary service fee that dealers can charge to cover their administrative costs in concluding sales and leases, which include licensing and registration fees and other agency fees, from $150 to $200.

The bill would direct $31 million a year from the general fund to the Move Ahead Washington flexible account from 2026 through 2038. (The bill says this represents the estimated state sales and use tax generated from the new transportation projects and activities it would fund.)

It would fund the sales and use tax reductions for the sale or lease of plug-in and fuel cell vehicles from the general fund rather than the electric vehicle account. It would fund the credits against the B&O tax and the public utility tax for purchases of alternative fuel vehicles over 14,000 pounds, for alternative fuel infrastructure, and for employers’ investments in financial commute trip reduction incentives from the general fund rather than the multimodal transportation account. It would fund the exemptions from the sales and use taxes for the sales of batteries and fuel cells for vehicles, and for work on them, from the general fund, and not the multimodal account.

The bill would raise the maximum amount of the excise tax voters in border area jurisdictions could decide to impose on the retail sale of fuel for the purpose of street maintenance and construction from 1¢/gallon to 2¢/gallon, adjusted for inflation going forward. It would allow cities and towns to impose an additional tax of up to 2% on natural gas, steam energy, or telephone businesses. (This would not require a vote of the people as I read the bill). The revenue would have to be used for improvements in the transportation plan of the state, a regional transportation planning organization, the city, or the county, but might include public transportation and transportation demand management projects. It would allow transportation benefit districts to increase an existing sales or use tax for special transportation needs from 2/10 of one percent to up a maximum of 3/10 of one percent. It would allow the governing board of a district that included all the territory of the jurisdiction establishing it to impose a new local sales and use tax of up to 1/10 of one percent, and to vote to extend it for up to ten years.

The bill would make having all new vehicles sold, purchased, or registered in Washington be electric beginning with the 2030 models a target for the State, and would require the Department of Commerce to create “a scoping plan” for achieving that.

It would have Commerce establish a competitive bus and bus facilities grant program to provide funds to transit authorities for the replacement, expansion, rehabilitation, and purchase of transit rolling stock (including ferries and vans); the construction, modification, or rehabilitation of facilities; and the retrofitting of rolling stock and facilities to adapt to technological change or innovation. It would be required to incorporate environmental justice principles and geographic diversity into the selection process, to exclude fuel type as a factor, to limit any single grantee to a maximum of 35% of the funding in a biennium, and to establish an advisory committee to carry out the requirements for the program, including assisting with establishing the grant criteria.

The bill would establish a Connecting Communities program at Commerce to improve active transportation connectivity in communities by providing safe, continuous routes for pedestrians, bicyclists, and other nonvehicle users carrying out daily activities; mitigating for the health, safety, and access impacts of transportation infrastructure that bisects communities and creates obstacles in the local active transportation network; investing in greenways providing protected routes for nonvehicular users; and facilitating the planning, development, and implementation of projects and activities to improve the connectivity and safety of that network. The program would propose projects to the Legislature considering
(a) Access to a transit facility, community facility, commercial center, or community-identified assets;
(b) The use of minority and women-owned businesses and community-based organizations in planning, community engagement, design, and construction of projects;
(c) Whether they will serve overburdened communities, vulnerable populations, low income households, and people with disabilities;
(d) Environmental health disparities;
(e) Location on or adjacent to tribal lands or locations providing essential services to tribal members;
(f) Crash experience involving pedestrians and bicyclists; and
(g) Identified need by a community.
Commerce would report to the transportation committees of the Legislature in December of each year for five years on selected projects for funding and on the status of previously funded projects.

The bill would require state transportation projects starting design on or after July 1, 2022, and costing $500,000 or more to identify locations on State rights-of-way that don’t have a complete Americans with Disabilities Act accessible sidewalk or shared-use path, that don’t have a bike lane or adjacent parallel trail or shared-use path, that have such facilities on a state route within a population center with a posted speed over 30 mph and no buffer or physical separation from vehicular traffic for pedestrians and bicyclists, and/or a design that hampers the ability of motorists to see a crossing pedestrian with sufficient time to stop. The Department would be required to consult local jurisdictions about existing and planned active transportation connections along or across those locations; and to identify connections to other existing and planned public transportation services; existing and planned facilities that connect to the location; and the potential use of speed management techniques to minimize crash risks. DOT would be required to lower the speed limit with appropriate roadway design and operations where this approach aligns with local plans or ordinances, particularly in contexts that present a higher possibility of serious crashes. It would have to plan, design, and construct facilities providing context-sensitive solutions needed to integrate the state route into the local network and contributing to connectivity and safety for pedestrians, bicyclists, and people accessing public transportation and other modal connections, including ADA accessible sidewalks or shared-use paths, bike facilities, and crossings .

The bill would have DOT establish two statewide school-based bicycle education grant program, one for elementary and middle school and one for older students, to develop bicycling skills and street safety knowledge. It would be encouraged to consult with the Environmental Justice Council and the Office of Equity in the process. It would  contract with a nonprofit organization with relevant reach and experience, including a statewide footprint and demonstrable experience deploying bicycling and road safety education curriculum via a train the trainer model in schools, for the elementary program, and with a non-profit meeting the same requirements plus experience developing and managing youth-based programming serving youth of color in an after-school and/or community for the junior high and high school program. The elementary program is to identify partner schools according to a long list of equity criteria; provide them with a fleet of bikes; provide a free bike with equipment for participants, and provide in-school bike and pedestrian safety education curriculum, materials, equipment guidance and consultation, and physical education teacher training. The junior high and high school program is to use the equity-based criteria to identify target populations and partner organizations that work with youth from 14 to 18, including schools, community-based organizations, housing authorities, and parks and recreation departments.  It would provide education curriculum, materials, equipment guidance and consultation, and initial instructor/volunteer training, as well as ongoing support to those partners. DOT would report annually to the Legislature’s transportation committees on the programs.

The Department would negotiate with the Oregon Department of Transportation to determine the impacts on ridership, revenue, and policy of eliminating Amtrak Cascades fares for passengers 18 years and younger, and report to the transportation committees on the results and the status of fare policy requests to Amtrak by December 1, 2022. The bill would eliminate ferry fares for these passengers. It would establish a transit support grant program to provide support for operating and capital expenses to transit agencies that maintain or increase their local sales tax authority and have adopted a zero-fare policy for at least passengers 18 and younger. Grants would be prorated according to expenditures for operations; no agency could receive more than 35% of the money; and fuel type could not be a factor in the grant process.

The bill would expand the areas in which speed cameras could be used to include any roadway in a school walk area, public park speed zones, and hospital zones, and would require notification signs for drivers in those zones. It would increase the number of additional cameras that cities with over 195,000 people in a county of over 1.5 million were allowed to install, allowing one for every 10,000 residents in specified areas for cities that have done an equity analysis of livability, accessibility, economics, education, and environmental health, and consider that in their placements. Half of the net revenue from cameras in these new specified zones and the additional cameras authorized for larger cities would go to the State’s Cooper Jones active transportation safety account.

The bill would have the Transportation Commission reevaluate options to improve performance on the Interstate 405 and State Route 167 corridors at least every two years, since it has not met the goal of keeping average vehicle speeds in the express toll lanes above 45 mph at least 90% of the time during peak hours. It would remove the block on spending revenue from various accounts until a compliance path for emissions-intensive, trade-exposed businesses to achieve their share of the state’s emissions reduction through 2050 was in place. (HB1682 is intended to provide that.)

It would create a formal interagency council for coordinating the state’s transportation electrification efforts to ensure it’s leveraging state and federal resources to the best extent possible and to ensure zero emissions incentives, infrastructure, and opportunities are available and accessible to all. This would be led by the Departments of Commerce and Transportation with participation from Ecology; Enterprise Services; the State Efficiency and Environmental Performance Office; Agriculture; Health; the UTC; a representative from the Office of the Superintendent of Public Instruction knowledgeable about student transportation; and other agencies with key roles in electrifying the sector. It would provide ongoing reports to the Governor and appropriate legislative committees. It would develop a statewide transportation electrification strategy to ensure market and infrastructure readiness for all new vehicle sales; identify EV infrastructure grant related funding opportunities, and coordinate grant funding criteria across agency programs to most efficiently distribute state and federal electric vehicle-related funding in a manner that is most beneficial to the state, and advances best practices. It would recommend additional criteria that could be useful in advancing transportation electrification. It would provide ongoing reports to the Governor and appropriate legislative committees.

HB2100

HB2100 – Drops a requirement for reporting moving violations by autonomous vehicles in testing programs, and requires a plan for interactions with the vehicle in emergency and traffic enforcement situations.
Prime Sponsor – Representative Boehnke (R; 8th District; Tri-Cities) (Co-Sponsors Bronoske -D, Eslick – R)
Current status – Had a hearing in the Committee on Transportation February 1st. Still in committee by cutoff.
Next step would be – Dead bill.
Legislative tracking page for the bill.
SB5828 is a companion bill in the Senate.

Comments –
This bill is identical to the prime sponsor’s HB2070, except that the title no longer says it’s “Relating to implementing recommendations of the autonomous vehicle work group.”

Summary –
The bill would no longer require including moving violations by autonomous vehicles in testing programs in their annual reports to the Department of Licensing. It also drops a clause implying the Department can require information about collisions in addition to what the law currently specifies. It requires submitting a law enforcement interaction plan to the Department including information on how to interact with the vehicle being tested in emergency and traffic enforcement situations, and requires submitting the expected period of time during which testing will occur to the Department rather than to various local and state law enforcement agencies with jurisdiction over public roadways on which testing will occur.

SB5896

SB5896 – Shifts a report by the Department of Enterprise Services on the use of electricity to recharge vehicles at State Offices from an option to a requirement.
Prime Sponsor – Senator Sefzik (R; 42nd District; Whatcom County) (Co-Sponsors Lovelett, Carlyle, Liias, Lovick, Saldaña, Frockt, Nobles, Randall, Salomon, Wellman – Ds; Fortunato, Honeyford, Schoesler, Warnick, Lynda Wilson, and Jeff Wilson – Rs)
Current status – Had a hearing in the Senate Committee on State Government & Elections January 26th. Still in committee at cutoff.
Next step would be – Dead bill.
Legislative tracking page for the bill.

Summary –
Currently, the Department of Enterprise Services is authorized to report to the Governor and the appropriate committees of the Legislature on the the number of plug-in electric vehicles charging at State offices, and the amount of state-purchased electricity consumed by them. The bill would change this from a report made when the Director deemed it necessary, if the cost were significant, to an annual requirement.

SB5908

SB5908 – Creating a Clean Car Authority to distribute, coordinate and oversee electric vehicle grants.
Prime Sponsor – Senator Liias (D; 21st District; Everett) (Co-Sponsors Carlyle, Hunt, Nguyen, and Saldaña – Ds)
Current status – Had a hearing in State Government and Elections January 28th; passed out of committee February 2nd. Had a hearing in Transportation February 3rd.
Next step would be – Action by the committee.
Legislative tracking page for the bill.

Summary –
The bill would create a new State agency, the Clean Car Authority, to distribute electric vehicle grant funding awarded to Washington from the Federal Infrastructure bill, provide a vision for the state about the most beneficial and efficient distribution of electric vehicle grants, as well as coordinating and overseeing their administration by state agencies and local governments. (It would coordinate with the Office of Climate Commitment Accountability, if that were created by SB5842. It would be subject to the requirements of the Environmental Justice Act.

Its Director would be appointed by the Governor the State’s with the consent of the Senate, and serve at the pleasure of the Governor. The Director would have complete charge and supervisory powers over the authority, and could create the Authority’s administrative structures and employ any necessary personnel.  (They would be covered by civil service provisions, except for the Director and the Vice Director, if one were created.) The director would be required to appoint an industry advisory committee including representation from the electric vehicle industry, interested stakeholders, and state and local governments administering electric vehicle grants.

SB5903

SB5903 – Requiring multimodal transportation options at drive-up services.
Prime Sponsor – Senator Billig (D; 3rd District; Spokane) (Co-Sponsors Rivers – R; Das, Dhingra, Hunt, Keiser, Kuderer, Liias, Lovelett, Lovick, Nguyen, Randall, Saldaña, Trudeau, and Wellman – Ds)
Current status – Had a hearing in Transportation January 31st. Still in committee at cutoff.
Next step would be – Dead bill.
Legislative tracking page for the bill.

Summary –
The bill would require any public or private drive-up service open to motor vehicles to allow bicyclists, pedestrians, and other nonmotor vehicle modes of transportation to access the service. (If mixing multimodal traffic and motor vehicles in the same lane would create a safety hazard, an alternative lane or lanes would have to be made available for it.)

SJR8211

SJR8211 –
Prime Sponsor – Senator Fortunato (R; 31st District; Southeast King and Northeast Peirce Counties)
Current status – Referred to the Committee on Transportation.
Next step would be – Scheduling a hearing.
Legislative tracking page for the bill.

Summary –
The bill would submit a Constitutional amendment to the voters that would require any state revenue collected from a road usage charge, vehicle miles traveled fee, or other similar charge be used exclusively for highway purposes.

HB2062

HB2062 – Allows a regional transit authority to create enhanced service zones with improved service from rail or high capacity systems, to be approved by residents of the zone and financed by them.
Prime Sponsor – Representative Hackney (D; 11th District; Seattle); Co-Sponsor Rep. Liias (D; 21st District; South Seattle, Renton, Tuckwila)
Current status – Referred to Transportation.
Next step would be – Scheduling a hearing.
Legislative tracking page for the bill.
SB5528 is a companion bill in the Senate.

Comments –
It’s hard to see how the operators of commercial parking facilities without attendants are supposed to be able to keep track of how many of the vehicles that used them were exempt from a commercial parking tax.

Summary –
The bill would authorize regional transit authorities to create enhanced zones to improve rail or high capacity service in ways that directly benefited residents of the zone. A zone would have to be recommended to the authority by an advisory committee whose members represented the proposed zone, and then authorized in a special election by the voters in the zone. The improvements would be financed by increasing the maximum rate of the local special motor vehicle excise tax available to regional transit authorities in counties with a population over 1.5 million from .85% to 1.5% within the enhanced zone, and/or through a local commercial parking tax.

The parking tax could be imposed as a tax on commercial parking businesses in the zone, based on the number of stalls or gross proceeds, or as a tax “for the act or privilege of parking a motor vehicle in a facility operated by a commercial parking business.” In that case, it would still be collected and paid by operator of the facility, but it might be a fee per vehicle or proportional to the charge for parking, and might vary according to a number of reasonable factors including the facility’s location, the time of day, or the duration of the parking. It would also apply to leased spaces as well as temporary parking, unless those were for buildings’ residents. Carpools, vehicles with a disabled parking placard, and government vehicles would be exempt.

An enhanced service zone would have to be within the transit authority’s boundaries and include at least all of a city or town within them; it could also include one or more entire adjacent cities or towns and adjacent unincorporated areas. There might also be multiple enhanced service zones encompassing the same city or town, or adjacent unincorporated area.

HB2070

HB2070 – Drops a requirement for reporting moving violations by autonomous vehicles in testing programs, and requires a plan for interactions with the vehicle in emergency and traffic enforcement situations.
Prime Sponsor – Representative Boehnke (R; 8th District; Tri-Cities) (Co-Sponsors Bronoske -D, Sutherland – R)
Current status – Referred to the Committee on Transportation. Did not receive a hearing, ans still in committee by cutoff.
Next step would be – Dead bill.
Legislative tracking page for the bill.
SB5828 is a companion bill in the Senate.

Comments –
Since the bill’s officially titled “Relating to implementing recommendations of the autonomous vehicle work group”, the changes it would make were apparently recommended by that group. (Since the prime sponsor has now introduced HB2100, which is identical to this bill except for a new title with no mention of the autonomous work group,  perhaps they weren’t…)

Summary –
The bill would no longer require including moving violations by autonomous vehicles in testing programs in their annual reports to the Department of Licensing. It also drops a clause implying the Department can require information about collisions in addition to what the law currently specifies. It requires submitting a law enforcement interaction plan to the Department including information on how to interact with the vehicle being tested in emergency and traffic enforcement situations, and requires submitting the expected period of time during which testing will occur to the Department rather than to various local and state law enforcement agencies with jurisdiction over public roadways on which testing will occur.

HB2026

HB2026 – Implementing a pilot program collecting a per mile road use charge on vehicles in place of the gas tax.
Prime Sponsor – Representative Wicks (D; 38th District; Everett)
Current status – Had a hearing in Transportation February 3rd.
Next step would be – Action by the committee.
Legislative tracking page for the bill.

Summary –
The bill would create a road use charge program for electric and hybrid-electric vehicles, collecting an annual fee of 2.5¢ for each mile they drove in the previous year rather than the $225 in fees they currently pay. The new system would apply to new all electric cars purchased or leased after July 1 2025, and would be a registration option for other all electric vehicles. It would be an option for plug-in hybrids after July 1, 2026. The total annual fee could not exceed the current additional fees for the car, and that limit would be reduced by $50 for voluntary participants.

After July 1st 2027 owners of an internal combustion vehicle could choose to pay the road use fee, and would get a credit against the fuel tax that the Department determined corresponded to the tax they would have paid on its annual fuel usage. The charge could not exceed the current additional fees for plug-ins, and that limit would be reduced by $50. The department would have to design and execute a public outreach and education program, in consultation with the Transportation Commission, before implementing the program.

The bill would require at least 500 state owned electric, electric-hybrid, and internal combustion passenger or light duty truck fleet vehicles to be included in the program. They’d be selected by the Department of Transportation, in consultation with the Transportation Commission, to further test the viability of a per mile fee on electric-hybrid and internal combustion vehicles, but would not be subject to the fee until July 1, 2027.

The Department would offer owners one or more methods of reporting miles driven, including one based on submitting odometer readings periodically. It could also include one or more automated methods, and could certify one or more private sector services to provide those. It would have to offer periodic payment options to participants. It would report to the Legislature on the program’s performance each year, and offer recommendations for improving it. The Transportation Commission would be required to assess approaches to implementing a per mile fee discount for low-income vehicle owners, in collaboration with the DOT, and to report its findings and recommendations to the Legislature’s Transportation Committees by January 10, 2024, as part of its report on the results of its Federal research program. By January 1, 2029, the Joint Transportation Committee would evaluate the road use charge in consultation with the Department to assess requirements for fully implementing it in place of the fuel tax, well as the potential revenue impacts of that, and report to the Legislature’s transportation committees.

SB5744

SB5744 – Creates a ten year sales and use tax deferral for projects investing at least $2 million in clean technology manufacturing, clean alternative fuels production, generating renewable electricity, or storing it, with options for reducing or eliminating the deferred taxes.
Prime Sponsor – Senator Nguyen (D; 34th District; White Center) (Co-Sponsors Carlyle, Conway, Das, Kuderer, Mullet, Pedersen, Saldaña, Trudeau – Ds) (By request of the Office of Financial Management.)
Current status – Had a hearing in the Senate Committee on Environment, Energy & Technology  January 19th. Replaced by a substitute and passed out of committee February 2nd. Referred to Ways and Means.
Next step would be – Scheduling a hearing.
Legislative tracking page for the bill.
HB1988 is a companion bill in the House.

Summary –

Substitute –
The substitute would expand the deferral for facilities to store energy from renewable sources to include storage for renewable or electrolytic hydrogen and for any electricity. It would leave the current tax exemptions for renewable hydrogen production facilities as part of “electric vehicle infrastructure” in place. It would require Labor and Industries to adopt rules for the minimum labor standards and good faith efforts required to get the bill’s reductions in deferred tax obligations.

Original bill –
The bill would defer state and local sales and use taxes on materials and equipment, labor, or services for projects investing at least $2 million in buildings, or machinery and equipment, or both, for any new, renovated, or expanded clean technology manufacturing operation; facility to produce clean fuels or renewable or electrolytic hydrogen; or facility to generate or store electricity from renewable resources. The manufacturing of vehicles with no tailpipe emissions other than water, including motorcycles would be qualified; so would charging and fueling infrastructure for any of those, as well as equipment and facilities for generating renewable and electrolytic hydrogen (including preparing those for distribution); for producing clean fuel with associated greenhouse gas emissions not exceeding 80% of 2017 levels, and for generating electricity from renewable resources or equipment used directly in storing it.

Applications for the deferral could not be submitted after June 30th, 2032. Ten percent of the deferred taxes would become due on December 31st of the second year after completion of the project, and the rest of them would be due in annual payments of 10% at the end of each of the nine following years. (No interest would be charged, except on delinquent payments.)

The State would reduce its part of the taxes to be repaid by half for projects certified by L&I as including procurement from and contracts with women, minority, or veteran-owned businesses; procurement from and contracts with entities that have a history of complying with federal and state wage and hour laws and regulations; apprenticeship utilization; and preferred entry for workers living in the area where the project is being constructed. (If a project was built without one or more of these, the Department would be allowed to certify that it met them if it demonstrated it had made all good faith efforts to do so, but was unable to due to lack of availability of qualified businesses or local hires.) Projects that met these standards and paid workers at prevailing wage rates determined by local collective bargaining would receive a 75% reduction, and those that also were developed under a community workforce or project labor agreement would not have to repay the deferred taxes at all. A person leasing qualified buildings, machinery, and equipment would only receive the tax benefits if the owner agreed to pass them on in writing, and if the lessee agreed in writing with the Department to do the required tax performance reporting.

Construction would have to begin within two years or the taxes would become due. A gradually decreasing percentage of them would be due if the project had not been completed within five years or if it were used for some other purpose that didn’t qualify for the deferment.

The bill would revise a definition so that renewable hydrogen production facilities would no longer be included under the current sales and use tax exemptions as part of “electric vehicle infrastructure.”

SB5828

SB5828 – Drops a requirement for reporting moving violations by autonomous vehicles in testing programs, and requires a plan for interactions with the vehicle in emergency and traffic enforcement situations.
Prime Sponsor – Senator Nguyen (D; 34th District; West Seattle) (Co-Sponsors Wagoner, Rivers – Rs; Dhingra, Nobles – Ds)
Current status – Had a hearing in Transportation February 3rd; replaced by a substitute changing the title to drop the reference to the autonomous vehicle work group and passed out of committee February 7th. Referred to Rules. Still in Rules at cutoff. Sent to the “X” file Februry 17th.
Next step would be – Dead bill.
Legislative tracking page for the bill.

Comments –
Since the bill’s officially titled “Relating to implementing recommendations of the autonomous vehicle work group”, the changes it would make were apparently recommended by that group.

Summary –
The bill would no longer require including moving violations by autonomous vehicles in testing programs in their annual reports to the Department of Licensing. It also drops a clause implying the Department can require information about collisions in addition to what the law currently specifies. It requires submitting a law enforcement interaction plan to the Department including information on how to interact with the vehicle being tested in emergency and traffic enforcement situations, and requires submitting the expected period of time during which testing will occur to the Department rather than to various local and state law enforcement agencies with jurisdiction over public roadways on which testing will occur.

HB1896

HB1896 – Requires battery producers to participate in and fund a stewardship program providing for responsible environmental management of used batteries.
Prime Sponsor – Representative Harris-Talley (D; 37th District; Rainier Valley) (Co-Sponsors Berry, Ryu, Simmons, Slatter, Peterson, Gregerson, Ormsby, Goodman, Ramel, Kloba, Frame, Bateman, Macri, Valdez, Duerr, and Pollett – Ds)
Current status – Had a continued hearing in the Committee on Environment and Energy January 27th. Replaced by a substitute making minor changes which are summarized by staff at the beginning of it, and passed out of committee February 3rd. Referred to Appropriations, and had a hearing February 5th. Amended (by Rep Boehnke from the Tri-Cities) to require Commerce to contract with PNNL for a study of the end-of-life management of large format batteries rather than doing it, and passed out of committee February 7th. Referred to Rules; still there at cutoff.
Next step would be – Dead bill.
Legislative tracking page for the bill.

Comments –
The bill is a slightly revised version of HB2496, which was introduced in the 2020 session, and had a hearing in the House, but did not advance beyond that. This bill eliminates the exemption for producers selling less then 5,000 batteries a year in the state, and adds some environmental justice standards. There are roughly 25 pages of details in the bill, and I haven’t tried to get all of them into the summary.

Summary –
The bill would make producers responsible for creating and funding a product stewardship system for dealing with all used batteries under twenty-five pounds (with a few exceptions, including vehicle batteries.). The bill would have users drop off used batteries at “free, continuous, convenient, visible, and accessible” sites, and prohibit putting them in containers for mixed recycling, landfills, incinerators, or waste-to-energy plants. (The system would include education and outreach to encourage participation.) Batteries from producers who weren’t participating couldn’t be legally sold in the state.

Producers could set up one or more battery stewardship management organizations. An organization would have to have a plan approved by the Department of Ecology. Plans have to include performance goals for target collection rates and targets for the percentages of materials recovered through recycling. (They must collect and provide for the end-of-life management of batteries in an amount roughly equivalent to the Washington market share of the batteries of producers participating in the plan, and recover and recycle at least 70% of the weight of rechargeable batteries and 80% of others.) Plans have to include a system to collect charges from participating producers to cover the costs of the system, and structure the charges to encourage designs that reduce the environmental impacts of products. They have to adjust the financial obligations of producers in proportion to their use of recycled content in batteries.

There have to be collection sites for batteries under 12 pounds within fifteen miles for at least 95% of residents and at least one additional site in areas with over 30,000 people, as well as locations in all counties and tribal lands, and in special locations like parks and on islands. Collection sites have to operate on a free, continuous, convenient, visible, and accessible basis for any person, business, government agency, or nonprofit organization. Programs have to use the collection sites of any retailer, wholesaler, municipality, solid waste management facility, or other entity that meet the requirements for sites and request it. They have to reimburse organizations implementing a State  approved electronic recycling plan for their costs, and reimburse local governments for the costs of any facilities of theirs used as battery collection sites for the program.

Plans have to include a procedural manual for collection sites about reducing risks of spills or fires, and protocols for responding to those, and for managing damaged batteries.  There have to be at least twenty-five collection sites in the state for hefty batteries between twelve and twenty-five pounds, with reasonable geographic dispersion, including one in each county with more than 200,000 people. (They have to be certified to handle and ship hazardous materials. )

Plans have to manage batteries by prioritizing prevention and waste reduction first, then reuse when that’s appropriate, and then recycling. They can only deal with batteries in other ways, like landfilling them, after a year, and after demonstrating to Ecology that these other higher priority options aren’t technologically feasible or economically practical.

Plans have to include various education and outreach activities for consumers, retailers, and the operators of collection sites, and management organizations have to survey the public about their awareness of the requirements at the beginning of the program in 2026, and every five years after that, sharing the results with Ecology. They have to submit an annual report to Ecology, including an independent financial audit, data about battery collections and recovered materials, and a variety of other information about the program, including steps for reducing the amount they haven’t recycled if that’s relevant.

After issuing a warning, Ecology can impose fines of up to $1,000 a day for violations of the law and of up to $10,000 a day for intentional, knowing, or negligent violations. In addition, management organizations can seek reimbursement from another battery stewardship organization that fails to deal with its batteries in an amount roughly equivalent to the national battery market share of its producers. In fact, organizations are authorized to sue producers who are not participating in an approved plan for their expenses in dealing with that producer’s batteries, and if there’s more than one management organization they can sue others that are not dealing with their producers’ share of the used batteries for their expenses in collecting and dealing with those.

Details –
The bill requires batteries to have labels disclosing their chemistry and producer; it doesn’t cover batteries sealed in products.

Plans have to be reviewed and approved by the Department of Ecology, which is to collect a fee from producers to cover the cost of administering the program. It’s to maintain a public list of producers and brands that can be legally sold because they’re in the program.

The bill allows manufacturers to request that submitted information be exempted from public records requests, and has the Director of the Department do that if it isn’t detrimental to the public interest and is consistent with the public records law. It authorizes the Pollution Control Hearings Board to deal with appeals.

HB1831

HB1831 – Creates an EV infrastructure training program and requires electricians certified through that to be present when public chargers are being installed or maintained.
Prime Sponsor – Representative Bronoske (D; 28th District; Southwest Pierce County) (Co-Sponsors Representatives Berry, Macri, and Ramel – Ds)
Current status – Had a hearing in the House Committee on Labor and Workplace Standards January 18th; replaced by a substitute by the prime sponsor and passed out of committee February 2nd. Referred to Rules; still there at cutoff.
Next step would be – Dead bill.
Legislative tracking page for the bill.

Summary –
Substitute –
The substitute removes an error, to say that the current exemptions would apply instead of that they wouldn’t;  and specifies that the requirements apply to installation, maintenance, and replacement of equipment, but only on sites that are “public works”, rather than on any for public use.

Original bill –
The bill requires the Department of Labor and Industries to create the rules for an electric vehicle infrastructure training program certification. Beginning July 1, 2023, all electric vehicle equipment intended for public use would have to be installed by appropriately licensed electrical contractors and appropriately certified electricians. At least one certified electrician would have to be present at any given time on a jobsite where that equipment was being installed or maintained. On a jobsite where the installation of equipment included one or more charging ports intended to supply 25 kilowatts or more to a vehicle, at least 25% of the certified electricians present on the site at any given time would have to have the electric vehicle infrastructure training program certification. (By way of comparison, a typical 40 amp 240 volt charger supplies 9.6 kilowatts.) The current provisions for exemptions from electrical contractor licensing and electrician certification laws would not apply to this work.

HB1793

HB1793 – Creates rules for owners’ installations of charging stations in common interest communities such as condominiums, cooperative apartments, and developments with homeowners’ associations.
Prime Sponsor – Representative Hackney (D; 11th District; South Seattle, Renton, Tukwila.) (Co-Sponsors Representatives Fitzgibbon & Berry – Ds)
Current status – Had a hearing in the Senate Committee on Law and Justice February 17th. (An amendment to allow charging a reasonable fee for the placement of a charging station was initially reported as passing, but actually failed.) Passed out of committee February 24th. Referred to Rules, and passed by the Senate March 1st.
Next step would be – To the Governor.
Legislative tracking page for the bill.

In the House – Passed
Had a hearing in Civil Rights & Judiciary January 18th; replaced by a substitute and passed out of committee January 28th. Referred to Rules. Amended on the floor by the prime sponsor and passed by the House February 9th.

Summary –

Floor amendment in the House –
This drops the provision allowing an association to  charge the cost of an infrastructure upgrade to meet the power needs of chargers against the unit owners who have them, and requires a written disclosure of some more details about an installed charger to a buyer. It drops the language saying charging equipment is not real property, and no longer says the owner may either remove the EVCS or sell it to the buyer or to the association upon sale of the apartment, unit, or lot. [I don’t know if these last two changes have any significant practical implications or not…]

Substitute –
The substitute no longer allows an association to authorize installing a charger in a common area, or to create a new parking space to facilitate installing a charger; allows alternative ways for a vehicle owner to pay a charger’s electricity besides a separate meter; requires sellers to make disclosures about installed chargers; no longer requires a certificate of insurance from homeowners in associations subject to the Homeowners’ Associations Act; and specifies that the requirement for a certificate from unit owners in associations subject to the Washington Uniform Common Interest Act only applies to certain types of those.

Original bill –
The bill would prevent an apartment owners’ association from prohibiting or unreasonably restricting the installation or use of an electric vehicle charging station in a designated parking space for the personal use of an apartment owner. The association might impose reasonable restrictions on charging stations, and could require an owner to submit an application in advance for approval for the installation. (It would have to be processed and approved in the same way as an application for approval of an architectural modification, would have to be approved or denied in writing within sixty days, and would automatically take effect at the end of that period if it hadn’t been denied by then, unless the delay resulted from a reasonable request for information.) An association could charge a reasonable fee for processing an application if there were a fee for all applications for architectural modifications. It would have to approve an application if the installation were reasonably possible and the apartment owner agreed in writing to:
(a) Comply with the association’s reasonable architectural standards for the installation;
(b) Engage an electrical contractor familiar with the standards to install it;
(c) Provide, within14 days after an approval, a certificate of insurance naming the association as an additional insured on the apartment owner’s policy for any claim related to the installation, maintenance, or use of the station, or, if the charging station is located in a common area, reimbursement to the association for the actual cost of any increased premium attributable to the station, which would have to be provided with 14 days of receiving an invoice for that from the association;
(d) Register the electric vehicle charging station with the association within 30 days after installation;
(e) Pay for the electricity associated with the separately metered electric vehicle charging station; and;
(f) Comply with the other requirements of the bill.
The owner would have to obtain any permit or approval required by the local government for a station, and comply with all relevant codes and safety standards. A station would have to meet all applicable health and safety standards and any national, state, or local requirements.

If installation of an electric vehicle charging station in a designated parking space were impossible or unreasonably expensive, an association could authorize the installation of an electric vehicle charging station for the exclusive use of an apartment owner in a common area.. In such cases, the association could enter into a license agreement with the owner for the use of the space; the owner would still have to comply with the requirements of the bill.

Unless a written contract set other terms, an apartment owner would be responsible for the costs of installing a station. It would be the owner’s property, and if it was removable, the owner could take it or sell it to the buyer of the apartment or to the association if either decided to purchase it. An owner would be required to inform any prospective buyers of the existence of a station, the related responsibilities, and whether the owner planned to remove it . The owner and each successive owner would be responsible for:
(a) Costs for the maintenance, repair, and replacement of the station;
(b) Costs for damage to it, a common area, or limited common area resulting from its installation, maintenance, repair, removal, or replacement;
(c) The cost of electricity associated with it;
|(d) Obtaining and maintaining an insurance policy that meets the bill’s requirements;
(f) Removing the station if that were reasonably necessary for the repair, maintenance, or replacement of the common area or limited common area; and,
(e) Any costs for a removal of the station and the restoration of the common area or limited common area after the removal.

An association might install a charging station in the common areas for the use of all apartment owners and, in that case, the association would have to develop appropriate terms of its use.  An association would be authorized to create a new parking space to facilitate the installation of a station. If it reasonably determined that the cumulative use of electricity in the community attributable to the installation and use of  charging stations required the installation of additional infrastructure to provide a sufficient supply of electricity, it could assess the cost of the improvements against each apartment owner that had, or would, install a charging station.

An association that willfully violated the bill’s requirements would be liable to the apartment owner for actual damages, subject to a civil penalty of up to $1,000 to the owner, and responsible for reasonable attorneys’ fees and costs In any action in which an apartment owner requesting to have a station installed and seeking to enforce compliance with the bill prevailed.

The bill would create identical provisions for the installation of chargers in a condominium unit or common space by the owner of a unit , and for the installation of chargers in a lot or designated parking space by the owners of residences in developments with home owners’ associations.

HB1731

HB1731– Enhancing the requirements for autonomous vehicle testing.
Prime Sponsor – Representative Kloba (D; 1st District; Kirkland) (Co-Sponsor Representative Boehnke-R)
Current status – Rescheduled for a hearing in Transportation Thursday February 1st at 3:30 PM.
Next step would be – Action by the committee.
Legislative tracking page for the bill.

Summary –

The bill would require programs for testing fully autonomous vehicles with a backup human operator in the car on public roadways to certify that only someone with a valid US driver’s license and authorized by the developer of the system will operate or monitor the vehicle, that the vehicle will be continuously monitored by the operator, that he or she will be able to direct the vehicle’s movements if human assistance is required, and that the vehicles’ operation will comply with Washington State motor vehicle laws at all times.

It would require programs for testing fully autonomous vehicles without a backup human operator in the car on public roadways to certify that the vehicles will have an automated system that performs all aspects of the dynamic driving task within the environment in which it’s designed to function; that they’ll be capable of achieving a minimal risk condition to reduce the risk of a collision without human intervention when it’s necessary to maintain safe operations (such as stopping); and that they’ll comply with the motor vehicle laws. These programs would also have to certify that they have a comprehensive safety case framework with identifiable safety-related goals and mandatory feedback mechanisms in place; have conducted driving simulations and closed-course testing in preparation for testing on public roadways; have evaluated the safety record of the autonomous vehicle being tested to determine its readiness for testing on public roadways; and have put any additional safety measures appropriate to the less predictable driving environment of testing on public roadways in place, based on the evidence they’ve collected through these previous measures. Programs  would also have to certify that they’ve verified that the vehicle meets appropriate and applicable industry standards to help defend against, detect, and respond to cyberattacks, unauthorized intrusions, and false control commands.

The bill would shift the current requirements for reporting information about collisions or moving violations to the Department; it would require submitting the information that’s sent to the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration under the national autonomous vehicle incident reporting requirements, or the information the Department decided to require. It would add local fire service providers to the authorities that programs have to notify about periods in which they’ll be testing vehicles, and require providing a guide including instructions for interaction with autonomous vehicles without human operators as part of the notices when those are going to be tested. It would make the registered agent for a testing program responsible for tickets issued for violations of the traffic laws by fully autonomous vehicles without human operators in them, though those would not become part of the agent’s driving record. It would make any commercial or proprietary information submitted to the Department to which the NHTSA grants confidential status exempt from the public disclosure law.

HB1657

HB1657 – Reducing the emissions and the safety risks of insufficient overnight commercial truck parking through tax incentives.
Prime Sponsor – Representative Griffey (R; 35th District; Mason County)
Current status – Had a hearing in Finance Tuesday January 25th at 1:30. Amended to increase the minimum qualifying parking space dimensions to 12 feet wide and 70 feet long, and passed out of committee February 4th. Referred to Rules February 7th; still there at cutoff.
Next step would be – Dead bill.
Legislative tracking page for the bill.

Comments –
The findings include a reference to a 2016 survey by the Department of Transportation in which over 60% of truckers reported spending an hour or more per day looking for parking.

The current language of the bill would seem to exempt any buildings on a piece of property that included a qualified truck parking lot from real and personal property taxes, not just the part of it with the actual lot. It doesn’t say anything about how affordable the charging or hydrogen fueling needs to be, about what capacity for charging or refueling some or all of the trucks is required, or that the spaces need to be in a location where they are used by truckers. The intent to continue the incentives isn’t tied to any evidence that 1,000 additional parking spaces would not have been developed in any case.

The exemptions are subject to the standard review by the Joint Legislative Audit and Review Committee. For that, a new tax preference performance statement is supposed to “specify clear, relevant, and ascertainable metrics and data requirements that allow the committee and the Legislature to measure [its] effectiveness in achieving the designated purpose of the exemption.” In relation to this review requirement the bill specifies the tax preference as “intended to provide incentives to increase safe overnight truck parking capacity.”

Summary –
The bill would exempt all real and personal property “upon which there are at least 10 safe, overnight commercial truck parking spaces constructed” from taxes on their value starting with the taxes due in 2023, and continuing until a year after the Secretary of the Department of Transportation certified to the Department of Revenue that the state has sufficient safe, overnight commercial truck parking for its freight delivery needs of the state or January 1, 2033, whichever is sooner. It would exempt the sales of materials and labor used to construct a parking lot with at least ten qualified commercial or port district truck parking spaces from sales and use taxes, if they were accessible and suitable for overnight use, and allowed for charging electric batteries or fuel cells. It adds all leasehold interests in real property owned by a port and used by a tenant to provide qualified port district truck parking spaces to the current list of interests exempt from the leasehold excise tax.

The bill declares the Legislature’s intent to extend the incentive if the number of truck parking spaces suitable for overnight use grows by at least 1,000 spaces while it’s in place, and at least half of the spaces developed have hydrogen fueling access or electric charging access.

Details –
The exemptions would apply to spaces on which substantial construction work began while they were in place; spaces would have to be at least 11′ by 54′; port district spaces would only have to be accessible and available to any commercial truck authorized to be on port property.

HB1644

HB1644 – Allows using the transportation vehicle fund to plan for clean student transportation vehicles, and to develop charging and fueling infrastructure for them.
Prime Sponsor – Representative Senn (D; 41st District; Mercer Island) (Co-sponsor Rep. Ybarra (R; 13th District; Quincy)
Current status – House concurred in the Senate amendments.
Next step would be – To the Governor.
Legislative tracking page for the bill.

In the House – Passed
Had a hearing in Appropriations January 24th; replaced by a substitute and passed out of committee January 27th. Referred to Rules; passed the House 94 to 2 on February 9th.

In the Senate – Passed
Had a hearing in the Senate Committee on Early Learning & K-12 Education February 18th; passed out of committee February 23rd. Referred to Rules. Amended on the floor to include converting or repowering existing fossil fuel pupil transportation vehicles to electric or zero-emission ones, and passed by the Senate March 2nd.

Summary –
The bill specifies that the transportation vehicle fund can also be used to complete a feasibility plan to transition from gas or diesel student transportation vehicles to electric or alternative fuel ones; and for the purchase, installation, and repair of charging and fueling stations for those, as well as other costs necessary for station installation. The amendment in Appropriations simply replaced “alternative fuel vehicles and fueling stations” with “zero emission vehicles and fueling stations.”

SB5528

SB5528 – Allows a regional transit authority to create enhanced service zones with improved service from rail or high capacity systems, to be approved by residents of the zone and financed by them.
Prime Sponsor – Senator Pedersen (D; 43rd District; Seattle); Co-Sponsor Rep. Liias (D; 21st District; Everett)
Current status – Senate concurred in the House amendments.
Next step would be – To the Governor.
Legislative tracking page for the bill.
HB2062 is a companion bill in the House.

Comments –
It’s hard to see how the operators of commercial parking facilities without attendants are supposed to be able to keep track of how many of the vehicles that used them were exempt from a commercial parking tax.

In the House – Passed
Had a hearing in the House Committee on Transportation February 24th; passed out of committee the 28th. Referred to Rules. Amended on the floor to prevent a regional transit authority from proceeding with improvements financed by an enhanced service zone if they will delay the estimated completion date of high capacity improvements in an existing voter-approved regional transit plan by more than six months rather than preventing this if it would create a material and unreasonable delay. Passed by the House March 3rd.

In the Senate – Passed
Had a hearing in the Senate Committee on Transportation  January 13th; replaced by a substitute making changes that are summarized by staff at the beginning of it, and passed out of committee February 7th. Referred to Rules, and passed by the Senate February 11th.

Summary –
The bill would authorize regional transit authorities to create enhanced zones to improve rail or high capacity service in ways that directly benefited residents of the zone. A zone would have to be recommended to the authority by an advisory committee whose members represented the proposed zone, and then authorized in a special election by the voters in the zone. The improvements would be financed by increasing the maximum rate of the local special motor vehicle excise tax available to regional transit authorities in counties with a population over 1.5 million from .85% to 1.5% within the enhanced zone, and/or through a local commercial parking tax.

The parking tax could be imposed as a tax on commercial parking businesses in the zone, based on the number of stalls or gross proceeds, or as a tax “for the act or privilege of parking a motor vehicle in a facility operated by a commercial parking business.” In that case, it would still be collected and paid by operator of the facility, but it might be a fee per vehicle or proportional to the charge for parking, and might vary according to a number of reasonable factors including the facility’s location, the time of day, or the duration of the parking. It would also apply to leased spaces as well as temporary parking, unless those were for buildings’ residents. Carpools, vehicles with a disabled parking placard, and government vehicles would be exempt.

An enhanced service zone would have to be within the transit authority’s boundaries and include at least all of a city or town within them; it could also include one or more entire adjacent cities or towns and adjacent unincorporated areas. There might also be multiple enhanced service zones encompassing the same city or town, or adjacent unincorporated area.

HB1603

HB1603 – Shifting funding obligations for non-highway transportation programs from the transportation budget to the general fund.
Prime Sponsor – Representative Barkis (R; 2nd District; Southern Pierce County, Yelm & Lacey) (Co-sponsor Rep. Stokesbary – R, Auburn)
Current status – Referred to Appropriations.
Next step would be – Scheduling a hearing.
Legislative tracking page for the bill.

Summary –
The bill would shift funding obligations for non-highway transportation programs from the transportation budget to the general fund. Beginning July 2025, the general fund would be responsible for financing projects that correct fish barriers on public lands; Americans with Disabilities Act upgrades to transportation facilities; new buildings where primarily state transportation employees work; mobility and public transit-related grants, social services, and programs, such as regional mobility grants, rural mobility grants, vanpool grants, and any pilot or expired grants that are to be continued; programs designated as green or clean fuel programs, such as green transportation capital grants, the clean alternative fuel vehicle charging and refueling infrastructure program, and the clean alternative fuel car sharing program for underserved and low-income communities; programs that provide tax incentives for the purchase or lease of battery electric or alternative fuel vehicles, as well as for other equipment that supports vehicle conversions to alternative fuels; safe routes to schools grants; bicycle and pedestrian pathways that are not an integrated part of a highway project or are administered by any agency other than the department of transportation; capital and operation costs for intercity passenger rail service; assistance funding for freight rail programs; and stormwater facility upgrades and maintenance near highways where untreated runoff containing 6 CPPD and 6 CPPD quinone is killing significant amounts of salmon. It would allow any projects in the nickel, transportation partnership, and connecting Washington transportation packages to get additional appropriations from the general fund if the funding for them through the transportation appropriations act was insufficient to pay for their associated obligations .

The bill would establish a legislative work group to implement the transition. In particular, the bill would replace the annual transfers from the transportation multi-modal account of $2.5 million for rail capital improvements; $45 million for the regional mobility grant program; and $10 million for the rural mobility grant program with transfers from the general fund. It would stop providing the general fund with payments from the electric vehicle account in the transportation budget to cover the lost revenue from the tax exemptions for light and medium duty fuel cell plug-in electric vehicles. It would stop providing the general fund with payments from the multi-modal account in the transportation budget to cover the lost revenue from the sales and use tax exemptions for commercial clean alternative fuel vehicles (which are currently capped at $32.5 million), and for the the lost revenue from the tax exemptions for alternative fuel infrastructure (which are currently capped at $32.5 million).

The bill also declares the Legislature’s intent to fund commute trip reduction programs from the general fund, along with currently expired multi-modal pilot programs (if they’re ever renewed), such as the student ORCA card pilot program, the transit coordination grant program, and the green transportation capital grant program.

HB1607

HB1607 – Allows the Safe Routes to Schools program’s funding to be used for planning, developing, and installing safe routes to new schools being constructed.
Prime Sponsor – Representative Rude (R; 16th District; Walla Walla)
Current status – Referred to Appropriations.
Next step would be – Scheduling a hearing.
Legislative tracking page for the bill.

Summary –
The bill would have appropriations to the Safe Routes to Schools program made out of the general fund rather than from the Multi-Modal Account and the Transportation Partnership Account, and would allow the program to pay for the planning, development, and installation of safe routes from nearby neighborhoods to schools under construction as well as to existing schools. It would require the Secretary of Transportation and the Superintendent of Public Instruction to report to the Legislature on whether administration of the program should be shifted from the Department of Transportation to OSPI, and (if they recommended a transfer) on options for one that would satisfy Federal requirements.

HB1389

HB1389 – More detailed regulations and lower insurance requirements for peer-to-peer car sharing businesses.
Prime Sponsor – Representative Corry (R; 14th District; Yakima, Klickitat and Skamania County) (Co-Sponsor Eslick – R)
Current status – House concurred in the Senate amendments.
Next step would be – To the Governor.
Legislative tracking page for the bill.

In the House 2021 –
Had a hearing in the House Committee on Consumer Protection & Business February 3rd. Replaced by a substitute making minor changes, which are summarized by staff at its beginning, and passed out of committee January 27th.

In the House 2022 – Passed
Reintroduced; had a hearing in Consumer Protection & Business January 13th. Replaced by a substitute which rephrases the point that a peer-to-peer car sharing program does not have to have insurance to cover its assumption of a vehicle owner’s liability for bodily injury or property damage to third parties or uninsured and underinsured motorist or personal injury protection losses while the owner’s car is being shared and makes a few other small changes. Referred to Rules, and passed by the House 96-2 on February 12th.

In the Senate 2022 – Passed
Passed out of Senate Transportation February 17th. Had a hearing in the Senate Committee on Business, Financial Services & Trade February 22nd; passed out of committee the 23rd. Referred to Rules. Amended on the floor to make the require peer-to- peer car sharing programs to be certain that shared cars have at least twice the minimum  insurance required by state law, and passed by the Senate March 2nd.

Summary –
The bill is nearly identical to Representative Corry’s HB2918, which I summarized last year. A striker replaced HB2733 original language with HB2918’s, and it then passed the House nearly unanimously in 2020, but died in committee in the Senate. (This updated version only adds a few lines specifying that various provisions about rental cars don’t apply to peer to peer car sharing.) The bill deletes all of another much simpler set of regulations currently governing this area, Chapter 48.175 RCW., replacing those with finer grained and more specific requirements.

The current law requires companies to provide at least three times the liability coverage required for personal vehicles. This bill only requires them to provide the liability minimums for private vehicles, which are $25,000 for the injury or death of another person; 50,000 for the injury or death of two or more people, and $10,000 for damage to another person’s property. The current law also requires the company to provide collision or comprehensive coverage for at least the actual cash value of the vehicle, if it provides those. (I don’t think the bill’s language would requires a company to, though I’m not sure.)

SB5085

SB5085 – Sets the additional alternative fuel vehicle registration fee for electric motorcycles at $30 a year.
Prime Sponsor – Senator Rolfes (D; 23rd District; Bainbridge Island)
Current status – Referred to House Transportation. Had a hearing and passed out of committee February 28th. Referred to Rules, and passed by the House March 8th.
Next step would be – To the Governor.
Legislative tracking page for the bill.

In the Senate 2022 – Passed
Reintroduced in Transportation; amended to reduce the fee for motorcycle registrations starting in November 2022 rather than 2021, and passed out of committee February 14th. Referred to Ways and Means, and passed out of committee February 22nd. Referred to Rules, and passed by the Senate February 25th.

In the Senate 2021 – Passed
Referred to the Senate Committee on Transportation; had a hearing on February 18th. Replaced by a substitute and voted out of committee February 22nd; referred to Rules. Passed by the Senate March 8th.
In the House 2021 – Died in committee.
Referred to the House Committee on Transportation. Had a hearing March 15th. Died in committee. Still in committee at cutoff; Returned to Senate Rules.

Summary –
I regret to say my original summary of the bill misread a line at the end that would have removed the annual $75 transportation electrification fee currently paid by plug-in vehicles, other alternative fuel vehicles and hybrids. (However, the substitute dropped that, so what the bill would do now is all I thought it did originally – set the additional alternative fuel vehicle registration fee for electric motorcycles at $30 a year.)