Saturday, August 29, 2009
Inside the Capitol
As summer draws to an end we are starting to hear murmurs from Olympia. The primary has passed and although there were not many races that captured the “political-junkies” interest outside of the big cities there were some interesting results. Perhaps the most surprising was in Seattle with the incumbent Mayor Greg Nickels coming in third and not moving forward to the general election. The state seems to be settling in to the new “Top-Two” and earlier primary system that was so controversial and it now seems to be working well.
Legislators are looking forward to January and soon they will start filling interim hearings once a month with reports about how things they have done are working, how the budget is going, and new ideas they want to present in January. Monitoring those is a primary focus of a lobbyist’s attention as summer ends.
In the TRAW we have been listening to the concerns of our members and trying to come up with ideas of our own. We have held Legislative Committee meetings in Seattle, Moses Lake and Cle Elum and made listening to members thoughts and ideas at the Tow Show our first order of business.
The Tow Show was fantastic, the biggest in many years, and it was wonderful to see and chat with members from all over the State as well as folks from other states and Canada too. The banquet was great as well and Master of Ceremonies Al Runte commented in introducing me that I had been representing the interests of the towing industry for almost twenty years now. That brought back a flood of memories of issues we have worked on and the people who have given so much time and effort to make this association such a fixture in the halls of the Capitol.
Now we have legislators wanting to know our thoughts before they introduce legislation that might affect the industry and strong committee chairmen who will tell interest groups to work with us if they want their proposals to have any chance of moving forward. Agencies seek us out to be part of discussion or “stakeholder” groups on issues that we have concerns with and on critical issues like Major Incident Response we are considered as necessary, respected part of the “team” along with the WSDOT, the WSP and others.
We won’t always get what we want, but we will be in the thick of things both protecting our interests and moving forward our vision of an effective, professional, and profitable full service towing and recovery industry. Thank you all for your help in making this possible. It serves all our members well to be known and respected in the halls of the Legislature.
Tuesday, July 28, 2009
Inside the Capitol
The Capitol is relatively quiet now, the session having ended and the members having gone back home to their districts. Not being an election year they have some community events such as parades and meetings and a few fundraisers but primarily they are taking a breath, reconnecting with their families, working at their real jobs, and not focusing on “issues”.
This is the time that people who do business “with” the legislature, individuals and advocacy groups, businesses and associations, local governments and state agencies to plan and develop ideas that they want to be considered by the next session in January. We are doing that too, and you are and can be a part of it.
We had a Western Washington “listening and discussion” meeting of the legislative committee on July 16th at Lincoln Towing in Seattle and another Eastern Washington one in Moses Lake on July 23rd. At both I went over several continuing issues we are working on, talked about how ideas can become laws and listened to members of the TRAW as they talked about what they felt should be done and things that bothered them or made their jobs harder. The discussions were good and what we heard will help us set our priorities as we develop the association agenda for next year. We will have another “listening and discussion” meeting on August 4th in Cle Elum from 7:00 to 9:00 PM and I will be available at times during the Tow Show in Ferndale for “one on one” discussions.
If you can’t get to one of the meetings please feel free to send your ideas and concerns to us, by email or fax to association Executive Director Mike Walcker, our Legislative Committee co-chairs Paul Bressi or Ron Madler, or me. The important thing is to do it now because even the best idea if it is brought forward during the session just won’t be able to be acted upon. Things just go too fast then.
So far the issues that seem to be foremost on members minds include sellers reports of sale, dealer transfers and the inspection and insurance of “non-rtto” towers. On those two we are already developing ideas and soon I will be writing bills.
This fall your legislative committee will discuss all the input we have received and prioritize them with an eye towards what is legally “do-able”, politically “do-able” and what would give our members the most benefit. Please take the time to be a part of this process. We will never know your concerns if we don’t hear them. And you may well find you enjoy the discussions and planning and want to be more acticve with your Legislative Committee.
Thursday, June 18, 2009
The Legislative Committee - Get Involved
This is the time of year that the Legislative committee of the TRAW has to do its work in preparation for the next Legislative session in January, and the key to the whole process is YOU! As your lobbyist I advise the Board and Legislative Committee on how Olympia works and what can be done to advance the association’s interests as well as advocating the positions of the TRAW to legislators and state agencies. With my twenty seven years of experience as both a legislator and lobbyist that is my area of expertise, not the day to day specifics of running a tow company. We have two experienced co-chairmen, Paul Bressi of Nisqually Towing and Ron Madler of Kitsap Towing who, with the assistance of the administrative staff, schedule and chair meetings, work on setting and prioritizing the associations agenda and act as a conduit of legislative information to the membership. The Legislative Committee itself, because it does take a time commitment, is made up of several members who have a keen interest in the laws that impact our industry and have been involved in many of the fights in the legislature to stop bad legislation and advance bills that benefit the industry as a whole. They all deserve your support, appreciation and thanks.
All that being said the most important part of the process, the key link in the chain, the factor without which we wouldn’t be able to accomplish anything is YOU the membership. We need your input in shaping our efforts into proposals that realize the greatest benefit for each and every member towing company in the state. If we don’t hear from you, if you don’t come to a meeting and speak out, if you don’t participate then your concerns may not be addressed. I have said that over and over in articles and meetings because it is so important to our efforts. I know everyone in busy, we all are, but if you let us know what you think is important, you will be playing a great part in making things better. If you don’t speak up, or if you wait until the legislature is already in session to get mad and say “why didn’t you do this?” then it will be too late. This is not just in the towing industry but in every interest group that interacts with the government. “Speak now or forever hold your peace” could well be the most important rule for any association trying to put together a legislative agenda. It’s not as hard as you might think to get involved, and once you do, you may enjoy the process and want to do even more.
How can you be heard? Well the Board has adopted a plan to schedule several membership “listening” meetings over the next two months. One all-state meeting will be held in July in Cle Elum followed by a meeting at the TowExpo and two dinner meetings in August, one on the eastside, probably Spokane, and one on the westside. You will enjoy the chance to talk about specific problems and to brainstorm workable solutions. I guarantee it. If you just can’t get out to one of these meetings take a few minutes and write down a list of things that you are concerned about, having problems with, or think could be done better, and then call one of our Legislative Committee chairs and discuss those issues with them for a few minutes. They can take notes and bring them to the meetings. If you are a District chair put a discussion like this on your meeting agenda and ask your members what their concerns are and then take notes and communicate that to the Legislative Committee chairs. You could even write a letter and send it in. We could consider your comments at one of the meetings. I know many will read this and think, “yes, I’ll do that” and maybe not come back to it. Well, the best solution for that is to take five minutes now and start a list. Ask your employees for their thoughts, then Let us know what’s important to YOU.
Inside the Capitol
June 17, 2009
The 2009 Legislative session ended six weeks ago when they adjourned “Sine Die”, which is Latin for “without a day” to reconvene. Although they could be forced to come back in a “special session” if the economy doesn’t improve and State revenues continue to decline, they aren’t formally scheduled to come back into session until the second Monday of January, 2010.
This last session was the most difficult one I have seen in twenty six years in Olympia. With the real estate market crashing, bank insolvencies, people buying less and unemployment numbers going through the roof, our state budget which is heavily based on taxes on property, sales taxes, and taxes on business activity nose-dived. For the two year cycle of 2007-2009 the general fund operating budget was about $33 Billion and legislators in January found themselves with a budget deficit that by mid-session was over $9 Billion.
Under our state constitution K-12 education is mandated to be the “Paramount Duty” of the state so basic education was to a great degree “off limits” for budget cutting. Some other aspects of state spending, like prisons and Medicaid, have their spending levels dictated either by the number of people locked up or set by Federal eligibility requirements so they weren’t areas for many cuts either. Looking at that, legislators soon found that other areas of government such as colleges were facing up to 40% cuts.
Public opinion and campaign promises pushed both the Governor and legislators to find a “no-new-taxes” solution which they eventually with the aid of Federal stimulus money were able to do. Still many fees were increased, the “rainy-day-fund” tapped and tuition was dramatically raised. Thousands of state workers were cut, and many teachers as well in areas not covered by “basic education”. Many state boards and commissions were eliminated or cut back and some entire programs put “on hold” or ended.
The effect of all this budget anguish was that the focus of the Legislature was taken away from more general “law-making” to try to come up with a way out. Agency personnel seemed more worried about whether they would have jobs in July than in working on “new ideas”. It was like a road-block on top of a log-jam with everyone just hoping they could get out of town without ending their political careers. In the end they did, with an ugly budget but no new taxes, and they sprinted out the door to go home.
Now the focus for us, and every other group, association, and company is to look internally and to discuss what we want to do or work on next year and keep an eye on ideas that other interest groups, legislators and agencies might be thinking of doing too.
I won’t go over the specific issues from the last session, if you want to read a discussion of those you can check back to prior reports that you have received or find them on my blog at: http://traw-legislative.blogspot.com/. There are issues that are starting to be developed, however, mostly from legislator-constituent interest that have now been placed on our table.
Last session Senator Phil Rockefeller filed a bill that would have required us to make several attempts to contact registered owners by telephone in addition to the required RCW 46.55 notices. After we made a strong showing at the hearing and discussed the matter with the Senator the bill didn’t move. He remains concerned about situations where a person goes on a vacation and doesn’t receive their mail under the strict timelines of the law resulting sometimes in newer and more valuable cars going to auction. Although it is a very rare occurrence we promised him we would work with him over the interim to try to find a solution. So far the best idea came from Randy Houston and it is that for some valuable late model vehicles we would go back to 30 days before auction, possibly solving his problem and allowing us some more storage on vehicles that clearly would bring a good price. This is done in some other states and may well work here.
Another issue that has resurfaced is an idea by Rep. Mike Sells from Snohomish County that would look for some way of paying towing and storage for people whose cars have been stolen. He brought this up a couple of years ago but didn’t want to make tow operators a “replacement-victim” by shifting the burden onto them. Mike wants us to work with him to find a way whether it be by some kind of fund to pay the fees or through changes in insurance to make sure people are made whole, somehow. We will work with him closely to protect our interests.
Lastly after the failure of the WSP bill this last year that would have prohibited lawsuits against law enforcement for the discretion they exercise in impounding the cars of arrested DUI drivers another legislator is looking at approaching it in a different way to get to the same result. Dan Johnson has been researching a New Jersey law called ”John’s Law” which may work very well. Instead of giving police discretion, which is asking for a lawsuit, it would make an impound mandatory for 12 hours in most circumstances and solve the problem that way. We are already engaged in discussions and providing information to legislative staff.
I’m sure we will see other issues “pop-up” but that is only half the equation, we also need to discuss internally what WE want to do. That’s our mission now. It’s your job now. Another article in this newsletter will discuss the plans of the Legislative team to do just that.
Stu Halsan
TRAW Lobbyist
The 2009 Legislative session ended six weeks ago when they adjourned “Sine Die”, which is Latin for “without a day” to reconvene. Although they could be forced to come back in a “special session” if the economy doesn’t improve and State revenues continue to decline, they aren’t formally scheduled to come back into session until the second Monday of January, 2010.
This last session was the most difficult one I have seen in twenty six years in Olympia. With the real estate market crashing, bank insolvencies, people buying less and unemployment numbers going through the roof, our state budget which is heavily based on taxes on property, sales taxes, and taxes on business activity nose-dived. For the two year cycle of 2007-2009 the general fund operating budget was about $33 Billion and legislators in January found themselves with a budget deficit that by mid-session was over $9 Billion.
Under our state constitution K-12 education is mandated to be the “Paramount Duty” of the state so basic education was to a great degree “off limits” for budget cutting. Some other aspects of state spending, like prisons and Medicaid, have their spending levels dictated either by the number of people locked up or set by Federal eligibility requirements so they weren’t areas for many cuts either. Looking at that, legislators soon found that other areas of government such as colleges were facing up to 40% cuts.
Public opinion and campaign promises pushed both the Governor and legislators to find a “no-new-taxes” solution which they eventually with the aid of Federal stimulus money were able to do. Still many fees were increased, the “rainy-day-fund” tapped and tuition was dramatically raised. Thousands of state workers were cut, and many teachers as well in areas not covered by “basic education”. Many state boards and commissions were eliminated or cut back and some entire programs put “on hold” or ended.
The effect of all this budget anguish was that the focus of the Legislature was taken away from more general “law-making” to try to come up with a way out. Agency personnel seemed more worried about whether they would have jobs in July than in working on “new ideas”. It was like a road-block on top of a log-jam with everyone just hoping they could get out of town without ending their political careers. In the end they did, with an ugly budget but no new taxes, and they sprinted out the door to go home.
Now the focus for us, and every other group, association, and company is to look internally and to discuss what we want to do or work on next year and keep an eye on ideas that other interest groups, legislators and agencies might be thinking of doing too.
I won’t go over the specific issues from the last session, if you want to read a discussion of those you can check back to prior reports that you have received or find them on my blog at: http://traw-legislative.blogspot.com/. There are issues that are starting to be developed, however, mostly from legislator-constituent interest that have now been placed on our table.
Last session Senator Phil Rockefeller filed a bill that would have required us to make several attempts to contact registered owners by telephone in addition to the required RCW 46.55 notices. After we made a strong showing at the hearing and discussed the matter with the Senator the bill didn’t move. He remains concerned about situations where a person goes on a vacation and doesn’t receive their mail under the strict timelines of the law resulting sometimes in newer and more valuable cars going to auction. Although it is a very rare occurrence we promised him we would work with him over the interim to try to find a solution. So far the best idea came from Randy Houston and it is that for some valuable late model vehicles we would go back to 30 days before auction, possibly solving his problem and allowing us some more storage on vehicles that clearly would bring a good price. This is done in some other states and may well work here.
Another issue that has resurfaced is an idea by Rep. Mike Sells from Snohomish County that would look for some way of paying towing and storage for people whose cars have been stolen. He brought this up a couple of years ago but didn’t want to make tow operators a “replacement-victim” by shifting the burden onto them. Mike wants us to work with him to find a way whether it be by some kind of fund to pay the fees or through changes in insurance to make sure people are made whole, somehow. We will work with him closely to protect our interests.
Lastly after the failure of the WSP bill this last year that would have prohibited lawsuits against law enforcement for the discretion they exercise in impounding the cars of arrested DUI drivers another legislator is looking at approaching it in a different way to get to the same result. Dan Johnson has been researching a New Jersey law called ”John’s Law” which may work very well. Instead of giving police discretion, which is asking for a lawsuit, it would make an impound mandatory for 12 hours in most circumstances and solve the problem that way. We are already engaged in discussions and providing information to legislative staff.
I’m sure we will see other issues “pop-up” but that is only half the equation, we also need to discuss internally what WE want to do. That’s our mission now. It’s your job now. Another article in this newsletter will discuss the plans of the Legislative team to do just that.
Stu Halsan
TRAW Lobbyist
Wednesday, June 17, 2009
Inside the Capitol
May 20, 2009
It’s been almost four weeks since the Legislature finished up it’s business and adjourned. Early talk of coming back for a short special session to deal with several bills that they didn’t come to agreement on in the final hours changed to not coming back when Legislative leaders and the Governor realized that they still couldn’t come to agreement. The Governor has been reviewing and signing bills and just signed the budget after vetoing several sections and cutting out about another $80 million in spending.
One bill she did sign was our Certified Mail bill, House Bill 1426. In talking with some state agency folks after the session I found that they had used the “electronic” method before not knowing that it wasn’t legally authorized. When I explained to them that the postcard method and the electronic method were two totally different Postal Service products they said “Oh my gosh, you’re right. Thank you”. Many thanks go to Dan Johnson for bringing this opportunity to save money to our attention.
It appears that the recession, if not getting better, has started to bottom out with state revenues not going down as much. It is still possible that with new official revenue forecasts this summer and fall may show more decreases and require a special session to adjust the budget, but that is looking less likely. That would be wonderful as it would make budgeting more predictable and legislators wouldn’t shy away from proposals that might cost small amounts of money to implement.Now is the time for us to start working towards next year.
To be successful we need to reach out to members, find out what their concerns are, evaluate whether they can be solved legislatively or not, figure out how that can best be done, resolve any internal disagreements, prioritize those issues, draft the bills, reach out to other groups, agencies, and associations to try to gain their support or address their concerns, re-write the bills if necessary, re-prioritize if necessary, and talk to key legislators to get them on board. It’s not an easy process, and it’s one that needs to start early. It’s not one I can do alone but one that I will need the active participation and commitment of a broad based Legislative Committee. If you would like to be involved and represent your District please contact our Legislative Committee co-chairs, Paul Bressi and Ron Madler. Even the best of ideas if brought up late in the fall will have to wait a year.
As I have mentioned before, and as an example of the difficulty changing state law, between three and four thousand bills are filed every year but only a few hundred ever get to the Governor. The prime sponsor of our Certified Mail bill and last years TRAW co-Legislator of the year Rep. Sam Hunt, prime sponsored 24 bills for various groups and agencies this year and our bill was the only one of them that actually passed into law.. even though he is the chairman of the House State Government committee.
I look forward to working with the Legislative Committee and Board over the summer and fall to get prepared for a great session next year.
Stu Halsan
TRAW Lobbyist
It’s been almost four weeks since the Legislature finished up it’s business and adjourned. Early talk of coming back for a short special session to deal with several bills that they didn’t come to agreement on in the final hours changed to not coming back when Legislative leaders and the Governor realized that they still couldn’t come to agreement. The Governor has been reviewing and signing bills and just signed the budget after vetoing several sections and cutting out about another $80 million in spending.
One bill she did sign was our Certified Mail bill, House Bill 1426. In talking with some state agency folks after the session I found that they had used the “electronic” method before not knowing that it wasn’t legally authorized. When I explained to them that the postcard method and the electronic method were two totally different Postal Service products they said “Oh my gosh, you’re right. Thank you”. Many thanks go to Dan Johnson for bringing this opportunity to save money to our attention.
It appears that the recession, if not getting better, has started to bottom out with state revenues not going down as much. It is still possible that with new official revenue forecasts this summer and fall may show more decreases and require a special session to adjust the budget, but that is looking less likely. That would be wonderful as it would make budgeting more predictable and legislators wouldn’t shy away from proposals that might cost small amounts of money to implement.Now is the time for us to start working towards next year.
To be successful we need to reach out to members, find out what their concerns are, evaluate whether they can be solved legislatively or not, figure out how that can best be done, resolve any internal disagreements, prioritize those issues, draft the bills, reach out to other groups, agencies, and associations to try to gain their support or address their concerns, re-write the bills if necessary, re-prioritize if necessary, and talk to key legislators to get them on board. It’s not an easy process, and it’s one that needs to start early. It’s not one I can do alone but one that I will need the active participation and commitment of a broad based Legislative Committee. If you would like to be involved and represent your District please contact our Legislative Committee co-chairs, Paul Bressi and Ron Madler. Even the best of ideas if brought up late in the fall will have to wait a year.
As I have mentioned before, and as an example of the difficulty changing state law, between three and four thousand bills are filed every year but only a few hundred ever get to the Governor. The prime sponsor of our Certified Mail bill and last years TRAW co-Legislator of the year Rep. Sam Hunt, prime sponsored 24 bills for various groups and agencies this year and our bill was the only one of them that actually passed into law.. even though he is the chairman of the House State Government committee.
I look forward to working with the Legislative Committee and Board over the summer and fall to get prepared for a great session next year.
Stu Halsan
TRAW Lobbyist
Inside the Capitol
April 15, 2009
There are only nine days left in the 2009 legislative session.. maybe.
In odd numbered years, after the legislators are elected, their primary task is to adopt a two year State Budget. To do that the legislative session is longer, 105 calendar days as compared to 60 in the even numbered years. Although that is the time limit there is always a possibility of a “special” session of 30 days following if they haven’t been able to complete their work on time. This may be one of those “extra-inning” years. With state revenues $9 Billion less than they had predicted much of this session has been devoted to hand wringing and floating ideas for cuts in programs as well as speculation on whether any temporary increase in taxes might be part of their budget-balancing mix.
As the final day approaches it seems the legislators are getting farther apart rather than closer together. Miracles may happen but unless they can come to agreement in a week and a half they possibly could be here for a long time.
The Towing and Recovery Association of Washington has done well this year. Although several “Bad” bills surfaced we managed to kill or amend them all and in the event the legislators look to a tax increase it would be almost certainly be a small temporary sales tax increase on the ballot and not business taxes that they would consider.
As I have said many times our most important mission in Olympia is to work to stop bad things from happening to the industry. The worst threat we had this year was Senate Bill 5524 dealing with requiring repeat telephone call notification of impounds. This was a constituent request through Senator Rockefeller resulting from a vehicle being impounded while the owner was on vacation. We marshaled opposition at the hearing, bringing together other groups including the WSP to kill the bill. Special thanks to Doug Faber for his direct contacts with the chair of the Senate Transportation committee, Sen. Mary Margaret Haugen.
A bill we had to amend dealt with impounding vehicles driven by the patrons of prostitutes. As it was originally drafted we could have become a collector for law enforcement of a civil penalty in the amount of $500. We amended the bill to make sure that we didn’t have that responsibility and additionally to protect us if we release a vehicle depending on a fraudulent document authorizing release.
We have now passed our bill, House Bill 1426, allowing officially the use of “electronic return receipts” with certified mail. With this bill’s passage we can save up to $1.20 for each letter we send out, slightly less if we use a mail service vendor. The Governor has about three weeks to sign the bill but that is almost a foregone conclusion that she will.
The budget crisis here, as in most other states, has put a damper on getting through any good changes in the law that cost any money whatsoever to implement including even minor new rules. Hopefully after they stabilize this budget we can then move forward on the important issues that will not just defend the industry but give us a better business environment to operate in.
Stu Halsan
TRAW Lobbyist
There are only nine days left in the 2009 legislative session.. maybe.
In odd numbered years, after the legislators are elected, their primary task is to adopt a two year State Budget. To do that the legislative session is longer, 105 calendar days as compared to 60 in the even numbered years. Although that is the time limit there is always a possibility of a “special” session of 30 days following if they haven’t been able to complete their work on time. This may be one of those “extra-inning” years. With state revenues $9 Billion less than they had predicted much of this session has been devoted to hand wringing and floating ideas for cuts in programs as well as speculation on whether any temporary increase in taxes might be part of their budget-balancing mix.
As the final day approaches it seems the legislators are getting farther apart rather than closer together. Miracles may happen but unless they can come to agreement in a week and a half they possibly could be here for a long time.
The Towing and Recovery Association of Washington has done well this year. Although several “Bad” bills surfaced we managed to kill or amend them all and in the event the legislators look to a tax increase it would be almost certainly be a small temporary sales tax increase on the ballot and not business taxes that they would consider.
As I have said many times our most important mission in Olympia is to work to stop bad things from happening to the industry. The worst threat we had this year was Senate Bill 5524 dealing with requiring repeat telephone call notification of impounds. This was a constituent request through Senator Rockefeller resulting from a vehicle being impounded while the owner was on vacation. We marshaled opposition at the hearing, bringing together other groups including the WSP to kill the bill. Special thanks to Doug Faber for his direct contacts with the chair of the Senate Transportation committee, Sen. Mary Margaret Haugen.
A bill we had to amend dealt with impounding vehicles driven by the patrons of prostitutes. As it was originally drafted we could have become a collector for law enforcement of a civil penalty in the amount of $500. We amended the bill to make sure that we didn’t have that responsibility and additionally to protect us if we release a vehicle depending on a fraudulent document authorizing release.
We have now passed our bill, House Bill 1426, allowing officially the use of “electronic return receipts” with certified mail. With this bill’s passage we can save up to $1.20 for each letter we send out, slightly less if we use a mail service vendor. The Governor has about three weeks to sign the bill but that is almost a foregone conclusion that she will.
The budget crisis here, as in most other states, has put a damper on getting through any good changes in the law that cost any money whatsoever to implement including even minor new rules. Hopefully after they stabilize this budget we can then move forward on the important issues that will not just defend the industry but give us a better business environment to operate in.
Stu Halsan
TRAW Lobbyist
Sunday, February 15, 2009
Inside the Capitol
February 15, 2009
The 2009 Legislative session began on January 12th amid the worst economic times in my 27 years of experience in Olympia. The latest estimates have the deficit of expected revenue below carry-forward budget costs at almost $8 Billion out of a $33 Billion budget. No clear plan has been developed but there are many bills abolishing boards and commissions, cutting reimbursements of medical costs, and making deep cuts all through state government. The underlying question is whether or not they can cut their way out of a twenty percent hole while still educating children as the constitution requires and keeping criminals in prison as people want.
Your TRAW legislative team has been busy, very busy so far making sure bad things don’t happen and trying to make progress on long standing goals.
We have one bill, HB 1426 which is moving through nicely. It would enable anyone who uses certified mail return receipt requested to utilize instead an electronic return receipt by email. Each piece of mail sent in this manner is $1.20 cheaper than the “post card” version and even if a mailing service is used it amounts to a savings of about $0.80 a letter. The bill passed out of committee and is in House Rules.
We had to clarify another bill, HB 1362, wanting to impound cars used by “johns” of prostitutes and imposing a $500 penalty on them. The bill was very unclear as to how we would handle these impounds but we modified it to make clear upfront notation on the impound orders, that we not handle the penalty money, that a clear document authorize the release and that we would be held harmless for relying on seemingly official receipts for payment.
Another bill, SB 5524 would have required law enforcement to give us phone numbers and require us to call vehicle owners three times if mail came back undeliverable. It also would have allowed requests for hearing on the impound up until the date of auction but not changed the five day notice from the court to the tow companies meaning vehicles would be sold before hearing. With a strong showing of TRAW members at the hearing and discussions with the prime sponsor it appears this bill may stop in it’s tracks.
We have been trying to make progress on our “single plate” or RTTO’s as “all purpose” vehicle handlers by offering amendments to a hulk hauling bill, SB 5381, to exempt us from having to be licensed as a hulk hauler if we came upon a hulk in our ordinary course of business. This issue is still in play but it is possible we may get the exemption.
This is a difficult session because any idea that costs any money whatsoever to implement is not being favorably received because of the budget deficit. We will continue to keep alert to protect the towing industry and make improvements where we can find a way.
Be sure to come down this week for the Board meeting Tuesday the 17th and the TRAW Legislative Day on Wednesday the 18th. Meet your legislators and help us with our issues!
Stu Halsan
TRAW - Lobbyist
The 2009 Legislative session began on January 12th amid the worst economic times in my 27 years of experience in Olympia. The latest estimates have the deficit of expected revenue below carry-forward budget costs at almost $8 Billion out of a $33 Billion budget. No clear plan has been developed but there are many bills abolishing boards and commissions, cutting reimbursements of medical costs, and making deep cuts all through state government. The underlying question is whether or not they can cut their way out of a twenty percent hole while still educating children as the constitution requires and keeping criminals in prison as people want.
Your TRAW legislative team has been busy, very busy so far making sure bad things don’t happen and trying to make progress on long standing goals.
We have one bill, HB 1426 which is moving through nicely. It would enable anyone who uses certified mail return receipt requested to utilize instead an electronic return receipt by email. Each piece of mail sent in this manner is $1.20 cheaper than the “post card” version and even if a mailing service is used it amounts to a savings of about $0.80 a letter. The bill passed out of committee and is in House Rules.
We had to clarify another bill, HB 1362, wanting to impound cars used by “johns” of prostitutes and imposing a $500 penalty on them. The bill was very unclear as to how we would handle these impounds but we modified it to make clear upfront notation on the impound orders, that we not handle the penalty money, that a clear document authorize the release and that we would be held harmless for relying on seemingly official receipts for payment.
Another bill, SB 5524 would have required law enforcement to give us phone numbers and require us to call vehicle owners three times if mail came back undeliverable. It also would have allowed requests for hearing on the impound up until the date of auction but not changed the five day notice from the court to the tow companies meaning vehicles would be sold before hearing. With a strong showing of TRAW members at the hearing and discussions with the prime sponsor it appears this bill may stop in it’s tracks.
We have been trying to make progress on our “single plate” or RTTO’s as “all purpose” vehicle handlers by offering amendments to a hulk hauling bill, SB 5381, to exempt us from having to be licensed as a hulk hauler if we came upon a hulk in our ordinary course of business. This issue is still in play but it is possible we may get the exemption.
This is a difficult session because any idea that costs any money whatsoever to implement is not being favorably received because of the budget deficit. We will continue to keep alert to protect the towing industry and make improvements where we can find a way.
Be sure to come down this week for the Board meeting Tuesday the 17th and the TRAW Legislative Day on Wednesday the 18th. Meet your legislators and help us with our issues!
Stu Halsan
TRAW - Lobbyist
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