Electronic newsletter

Dear Neighbor:

The committee work is over and the action in the 2007 legislative session is now on the floor of both the Senate and the House of Representatives. At this time, the Senate is considering bills sent over by the House and vice versa. I thought that you might be interested in knowing about the status of a few bills.

Family Leave Insurance

Working families should not be forced to choose between their job and their family. Under a family leave insurance measure passed by the Senate recently, they would not have to.

SB 5659 would allow workers to take up to five weeks of paid leave to spend time with a newborn or newly placed child, or to care for a seriously ill family member. It would provide a benefit of up to $250 a week, for a maximum of five weeks, funded by a premium of 2 cents per hour paid by employees starting Jan. 1, 2009. This bill is currently being considered in the House.

Mental Health Parity

One in five Americans is diagnosed each year with a mental illness. For the 10 million children affected, untreated mental illness is especially devastating because it is the leading cause of hospitalization for kids between the ages of 5 and 19.

Two years ago we passed a mental health parity bill to bar insurers from requiring higher co-pays, deductibles or other out-of-pocket expenses for mental health treatment than they require for other medical services. That law did not apply to individual and small-group plans, leaving an estimated 540,000 people without mental health coverage.

HB 1460 eliminates exemptions for employers with fewer than 50 workers and applies mental health parity requirements to all individual and small group health insurance plans. It also bans discriminatory limits on treatment days, doctor visits and coverage for catastrophic expenses. I am pleased that the Senate passed the bill on March 23, and on March 30, Gov. Gregoire signed it into law.

Puget Sound Partnership

Shrinking Orca populations and toxic shellfish scares are just some of the symptoms of pollution-caused illnesses afflicting Puget Sound. Fortunately, the Sound gained a major victory recently in the Senate.

Under SB 5372, the Puget Sound Partnership would be assigned the task of restoring the health of Puget Sound. The partnership would provide for better collaboration, a long-term strategic plan and strong involvement of citizens around the Sound. This partnership would be led by a leadership council and work closely with regional watershed groups around the Sound. The leadership council would be responsible for defining an action agenda and setting priorities to make sure we have a healthy Puget Sound by 2020. An independent Science Panel would also help set goals and benchmarks to measure progress.

This bill is now under consideration in the House. Since it supported a similar bill earlier this session, the chances for passage look promising.

I encourage you to share your thoughts with me. You can find more information on issues by visiting my Web site at http://sdc.leg.wa.gov/jacobsen.htm.

Sincerely,

Ken

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