Thank you for joining us for our December Legislative Preview! This annual two-hour membership meeting features visits from our state lawmakers and our partners in advocacy at the state level. This year, we heard from Representatives Emily Alvarado and Strom Peterson, along with the Washington Low Income Housing Alliance, the State Poverty Action Network, and Civil Survival. We heard the importance of continued and sustained advocacy along with what priorities we should pay attention to during the upcoming state legislative session.
Gearing Up for the State Legislative Session
2025 is the beginning of a new biennial budget in the state legislature, and the upcoming state legislative session is a long one. It is scheduled to run for 105 days starting on Monday, January 13.
We were lucky to have two state lawmakers join our meeting, Representatives Emily Alvarado and Strom Peterson. Raise your hand if you’re in their districts!
Representative Emily Alvarado
Representative Emily Alvarado from the 34th Legislative District—which includes part of Seattle, Burien, and Vashon Island—is a champion of all things housing. She is starting her second term in the legislature and is serving on the Housing, Local Government, and Capital Budget committees.
Rep Alvarado grounded us in the challenges and uncertainty at the federal level and the budgetary concerns and challenges at the local level.
She shared there is a $10-$12 billion state budget deficit over the next four years, which she attributed to Washington state’s regressive tax code, the second-most regressive tax code in the country.
One of Rep Alvarado’s priorities for this upcoming session is a rent stabilization law that would cap rent increases at 7% on an annual basis. This is a high-impact, low-cost policy. The biggest argument in opposition claims it will negatively impact the ability to build new housing. Rep Alvarado does not believe the two are mutually exclusive. She shared that this is a “both/and” rather than an “either/or.”
Thanks to many champions, Rep Alvarado said, last year we made the most progress we’ve ever made on moving forward a rent stabilization policy.
The goal this year: Get the rent stabilization bill off the House floor quickly, get it through the Senate, and pass it into law.
Achieving this will require collective advocacy, Rep Alvarado said.
“We can’t pass it, honestly, without you all,” Alvarado said.
Rep Alvardo called on us to share stories of what we see on the ground, what we know is happening to people, to ourselves, to the people we work with, and why this law is important.
“We can do this,” she said. “We can’t do it without you.”
Representative Strom Peterson
Representative Strom Peterson from the 21st Legislative District—which includes Edmonds, Everett, Lynwood, and Mukilteo—helps keep city governments accountable for taking care of people who need state resources the most. His first term in Olympia was in 2015.
Rep Peterson agreed with Rep Alvarado: Rent stabilization is the number one low-cost priority for the upcoming legislative session. Rep Peterson expects there to be less support for federal housing vouchers with the incoming Trump administration, and therefore rent stabilization will play an even more important role in preventing homelessness.
Besides rent stabilization, Rep Peterson’s other top priority this upcoming session is a bill that holds cities accountable for allowing “step housing,” or housing availability at every income and need level including emergency housing, permanent supportive housing, transitional housing, and more.
Expanding affordable housing at the city level is important, as is closing loopholes in existing legislation. Including counties in state legislation is important too, said Rep Peterson, who has a large unincorporated urban area in his district.
He spoke to his almost ten years in the state legislature by adding: Cutting services to the most vulnerable is not the way to make up for a budget deficit.
“Tough decisions will be made,” he said, “but always with the vision of we have to do whatever we can to protect the folks and the families that you all are working with on a day-to-day basis.”
To catch the live Q&A with these two housing champions in the Washington state House of Representatives, jump to 00:38:47 in the recording.
Washington Low Income Housing Alliance
Michele Thomas from our state partner in advocacy, the Washington Low Income Housing Alliance (WLIHA), joined us to provide some insight into the recent election, context for the governing of our state, and let us know what the organization’s top priorities will be during the upcoming state legislative session.
Rent stabilization is the top priority for WILHA. Every lawmaker that voted “yes” on rent stabilization last session was re-elected this term, Michele shared. She echoed the need for advocacy to get this bill passed.
Another top priority is the document recording fee shortfall. Document recording fees are the primary way we fund homelessness services in Washington state. Backfilling these cuts is absolutely critical, Michele explained, as they will impact every single homelessness service that has any state funding.
There is a $253 million shortfall in the revenue needed to maintain the current level of homelessness services in our state. Massive support from the community is needed to ensure this backfill is fully funded.
“It’s going to be a huge effort and we need your support,” she said.
If you’d like to give public testimony in support of funding document recording fees, contact Michele directly. The voices of people who have been impacted by homelessness and who receive homelessness services are particularly valuable.
Jump to 00:47:32 in the recording to see the full talk by Michele from the WLIHA.
Statewide Poverty Action Network
The Statewide Poverty Action Network (SPAN) advocates for poverty reduction policy and ensures that the voices of those impacted by policy are centered in the decisions that impact their lives.
SPAN’s legislative priorities for this session are informed by community voices. Those priorities are:
- Make sure eligible families can receive Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF) benefits, by eliminating the arbitrary 5-year limit on benefits and ensure the program keeps up with the cost of inflation
- Extend the Working Families Tax Credit (WFTC) to cover childless adults and adults aged 18 to 25 years
- Pass a data sharing bill so people can be categorically eligible for benefits*
- Increase the amount in a person’s bank account protected from garnishment to $3,000 and make it all self-executing**
* SPAN has heard from its community that eligibility for benefits is hard to navigate and applying for different benefits from different agencies is confusing. SPAN is working on the administrative side to help different agencies data share so that “categorical eligibility” is possible for the people of Washington state. This means that when someone applies for SNAP and is eligible for the WFTC, they will receive both simultaneously without having to apply separately. In order to achieve this, SPAN is trying to pass a data sharing bill in this legislative session. Doing so would be free and one step toward categorical eligibility.
** In 2021, SPAN helped pass a bill that protects $2,000 in a person’s bank account from being garnished by debt collectors. In function, this law was effectively only safeguarding $1000 for people who needed to employ the protection. This session, SPAN would like to increase the amount protected from garnishment to $3000 and make all that amount be self-executing, which means the person who owns the bank account would know they can keep the money.
SPAN will be posting its full legislative priorities on its website in the coming weeks. Jump to 01:01:54 in the recording to see the full talk by Molly Gallagher from SPAN and access the slide deck here.
Civil Survival
Civil Survival is a statewide organization that focuses on voting, re-entry, sentencing, and poverty issues. Its priorities for the upcoming legislative session are:
- A bill that would establish minimum standards for jail voting, including voter education and access to voting resources
- A bill that would allow people in prison to get civically engaged, such as attending virtual meetings, being able to testify, or allowing them to help develop public policy
- A bill that would end poverty fees in criminal courts
- A bill that would push the background check portion of a job application process until after someone has received a conditional offer of employment and ensure there’s a legitimate business reason to not offer someone a job based on the results of their background check
- A bill that would end solitary confinement as punishment for non-violent infractions in prisons
Read more about Civil Survival’s legislative priorities here. Jump to 01:17:23 to see the entire talk by Anthony Blankenship from Civil Survival.
Coalition on Homelessness
The Coalition will be posting our legislative priorities for this session soon. However, we can sneak-preview one of the top priorities we have this session: A new bill that is a reasonable and protective response to the Grants Pass v. Gloria Johnson Supreme Court ruling.
We’ve been working on this bill with our partners at WLIHA, ACLU, Colombia Legal Services, and several state lawmakers. Stay tuned for more information!
Easy Advocacy
The easiest way you can be an effective advocate is by signing up for Coalition email alerts. We will email you an alert when you should take action and provide a link to a form letter you can personalize and send to YOUR elected officials. Sign up for these email alerts here and make sure you click “Yes” for the question “Would you like to speak up about key public policies and advocate for housing justice?”
A great first step to becoming an effective advocate is learning who your elected officials are. We each live in a state legislative district and have three state lawmakers: two Representatives and one Senator.
Let’s test it! Find your district and lawmakers here: https://app.leg.wa.gov/districtfinder/
It’s important to talk directly to the lawmakers that represent your district, because lawmakers are more likely to listen to the people in their own districts. They are the ones who elect them to office!
Don’t be concerned about contacting your lawmakers too much. You’re the reason they have jobs! They want to hear from you. You are not annoying them by contacting them. The more you communicate with them, the better! In fact, when you contact them consistently, they’ll start to learn who you are. It’s great practice to introduce yourself to your lawmakers. Let’s do that together now: https://actionnetwork.org/letters/2025-wa-state-legislature-action/
The Coalition will call on its community to take action multiple times on the same issue. It’s beneficial to keep communication frequent and consistent, even for the same issue you’ve already spoken up about. And it’s beneficial to contact lawmakers who are both in favor and in opposition of what you’re advocating for.
There are lots of different ways you can speak up during the legislative session:
- Sign up on a public list for being pro or con a specific piece of legislation
- This is useful for showing massive support or opposition
- Call your lawmakers
- Email your lawmakers
- Give public testimony in-person or virtually in Olympia
- Attend a Town Hall in your district
- Attend an Advocacy Day in Olympia
An important part of being an effective advocate is encouraging others to join you in speaking up. Advocacy is most effective when a large range of people are involved. How are you going to use your voice this legislative session? And how are you going to amplify the voices and lived experiences of others?
Some final words from Rep Alvarado to inspire you as we prepare for the upcoming legislative session together: “It takes advocacy and hearing from lots of people to get these things across the finish line.”
P.S. Be on the lookout for invites to the Coalition’s “Easy Advocacy Power Half Hours” starting in January.