So Close But Yet So Far

Dear Washington Public Campaign Supporters,

Unfortunately, Senate Bill 6221, our local public financing bill, did not pass the State House by the cutoff time of 5:00 PM on Friday.  So, the bill will not pass the State Legislature this session. SB 6221 would have allowed local governments to institute public financing programs for their local elections, which is currently prohibited by state law.

We came very close to getting it passed.  The bill had passed the full Senate and its House committee, and it had also passed the House Rules Committee and was listed on the Floor Calendar.  Usually bills do not pass the Rules Committee unless the leadership plans to take a vote on them.  And we were confident that we had enough votes to pass it if a vote had been taken.  But, unfortunately, there was not enough time to pass all the bills in line, and ultimately ours was one of the ones that was not voted on this year.

While this is obviously disappointing, I feel very good about the work we did this session.  We made huge progress in educating legislators about the issue, and we have laid great groundwork for next year and future years.  Next year will be a "long session," where the Legislature meets for 4 months instead of 2 months, so there will be more time for bills next year and we should have a good chance of getting ours passed.  We will also have time to strategize and gain more legislative support during the time before the next session.

I also want to extend a big THANK YOU to all of you who helped in getting us so close this year.  Many of you called and wrote to your legislators, and your calls and e-mails made a difference! We heard from many legislative offices that they had heard from you.

Thanks again everyone, and don't be discouraged -- we are making great progress and we will ultimately be successful in making our election system fair and accessible to all qualified candidates.

Katy Carter
Executive Director
Washington Public Campaigns
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P.S. We now have lots of work to do in 2006 to be better prepared for the legislative session in 2007. Please make a generous donation now to support our organizing efforts by clicking here: /donate.html.