Blog

Local governments and unfunded mandates

In a work session last week, the House Local Government Committee heard from the Washington State Association of Counties (WSAC) and the Association of Washington Cities (AWC) about unfunded mandates and the revenues that are available to local governments. Both organizations talked about Washington’s property tax limits. There are two limits, and there is sometimes […]

A shortfall in the new workforce education investment account

The Senate Higher Education & Workforce Development Committee’s work session on Thursday included presentations on the workforce education investment act (E2SHB 2158) that was enacted earlier this year. As I wrote last week, a staff presentation at the Senate Ways & Means Committee’s work session included a concern about a reduced 2021–23 revenue estimate for […]

A new budget outlook, and prospects for the 2020 supplemental

As Kriss noted, the Economic and Revenue Forecast Council (ERFC) adopted a new revenue forecast yesterday. The ERFC also adopted a new budget outlook. The June outlook, which was based on the 2019–21 enacted budget and vetoes (and the March revenue forecast), estimated that the unrestricted ending fund balance was $372 million in 2019–21 and […]

Tax policy after the election

In the wake of the passage of I-976 and the results of some local races, tax policy is an emerging theme. For example, King County Executive Dow Constantine used the occasion to call for comprehensive state tax reform: Our state’s tax system is inefficient, unfair, volatile, inadequate, and bad for business. Local governments have few […]

The budget implications of I-976

Heidi Groover has a story in the Seattle Times today that considers what might happen with the state budget if I-976 is approved. (I-976 would reduce vehicle fees and revoke local governments’ authority to levy certain transportation fees and taxes.) The initiative would significantly reduce state and local funding for transportation. As we wrote in […]

More on the proposed new tax on Uber and Lyft in Seattle

Kevin Schofield of SCC Insight provides a rundown of some of the issues the Seattle City Council is debating as part of the 2020 budget. One of these is Mayor Durkan’s proposal to levy a new tax on transportation network companies (TNC; i.e., Uber and Lyft). The Council’s staff memo on the proposal includes some […]

As part of her 2020 budget proposal, Seattle mayor would add a new tax on Uber, Lyft

Earlier this week Seattle Mayor Jenny Durkan proposed a city budget for 2020. The Seattle Times reports, “The mayor’s proposed budget calls for $6.5 billion in total spending in 2020, including infrastructure projects and $1.5 billion in general-fund allocations for basic services such as parks maintenance and policing.” The mayor does not propose major spending […]

Notes from today’s ERFC meeting: exports down, cannabis and REET activity, budget outlook accuracy

Today’s Economic and Revenue Forecast Council (ERFC) meeting included a report from the budget outlook workgroup on the outlook’s accuracy and a presentation from ERFC executive director Steve Lerch on the economic outlook. The economic review (beginning on page 19 of the pdf) notes that the preliminary economic forecast for Washington is “very similar” to […]

Tariffs, tariffs, tariffs

Last week, the Congressional Budget Office (CBO) released “An Update to the Budget and Economic Outlook: 2019 to 2029.” In a follow-up on Thursday, a CBO analyst wrote about how tariffs factored in to the new economic projections. Specifically, higher trade barriers—in particular, increases in tariff rates—implemented by the United States and its trading partners […]

Forecasting sin tax revenue can be complicated

The Pew Charitable Trusts has a new paper about how states are forecasting revenues from marijuana taxes: “Forecasting revenue from a product that was illegal just a few years ago, and remains so under federal law and in most states, presents a unique challenge for state budget planning.” The table below (from the report) compares […]