WA Legislature - Update
(April 25, 2025)

WA Legislature - Update (April 25, 2025) - Takeaways

The conferenced version of the operating budgets was scheduled for release on Saturday morning in time for chamber votes on Sunday in the final sprint towards adjournment sine die.

Here are some observations of the Washington State Legislature (WA Legislature) for Friday April 25th, the 103rd day of the 2025 regular session.

My top 3 takeaways:

  • On Thursday, legislative staff announced that the conference committee on the operating budgets would formally release their report containing revised bill language on Saturday morning, setting in motion final approval by both chambers of billions of dollars in State revenue appropriations.
    • SB 5167 - Operating Budget and Supplemental Operating Budget
      • On Monday April 21st and after some delay, the House accepted the Senate request to form a conference committee to graft new ideas and resolve differences on the operating budgets.
      • On Wednesday, the Washington State Standard reported, “Senate leaders have said their goal is to release their operating budget by Saturday morning and vote on Sunday, the last scheduled day of session.”
      • On Thursday afternoon, legislative staff published multiple announcements indicating, “The Chief Clerk of the House has called a meeting for the purpose of signing the conference committee report on ESSB 5167 - Making 2025-2027 fiscal biennium operating appropriations and 2023-2025 fiscal biennium second supplemental operating appropriations.”  The ceremony and media event was scheduled for Saturday April 26th at 10am PT.
      • Given the revenue challenges legislators had been tasked to confront by the fall of 2024, cannabis-related legislative ambitions had been tempered and budget implications had largely revolved around how much revenue was projected to be collected through the 37% excise tax into the dedicated cannabis account (DCA) to fund State services, for appropriation to agencies, and for distribution to local governments.
        • Some agency budget packages had been whittled down by the Washington State Office of the Governor (WA Governor) before even making it to the Legislature.  Notably, funding to seek a new cannabis traceability platform was excised from the Washington State Liquor and Cannabis Board (WSLCB) budget package.
        • Other agency requests had been removed from either the House or Senate versions of the operating budget, or both.  More funding to support the WSLCB systems modernization project (SMP), at publication time in the midst of a rougher than expected rollout of Licensing changes, had been completely cut from the House budget but only halved in the Senate.
        • Very few cannabis-related bills were passed during the 2025 regular session, and even fewer had revenue requirements.  In fact, the only bill passed which had been projected to require an operating budget appropriation was SB 5206 (Cannabis Retailer Advertising) which had been allotted the $156K projected in the fiscal note in the last Senate version of the budget.  Presumably, that amount would be worked into the conferenced version of the operating budget for release on Saturday morning.
  • There were no introductions of cannabis-related legislation on Thursday, and none staged for Friday.
    • There were no introductions staged in the House for Friday April 25th.
    • The draft introduction report in the Senate for Friday April 25th did not appear to include any cannabis-related legislation.