State House plan: Tax wealthy, businesses to pay for schools
OLYMPIA — House Democrats on Monday proposed a budget to better fund public schools and strengthen the social safety net with billions of dollars from new taxes on the wealthy and thousands of businesses.
The two-year, $44.6 billion spending plan pours another $1.87 billion into public schools — the bulk for salaries of teachers, administrators and staff — to push the state closer to covering the full cost of basic education by next year, as required by the state Supreme Court.
It increases funding for early learning programs and services for unemployed adults and lower-income families, provides negotiated raises for thousands of state employees and freezes tuition at colleges and universities.
There are millions of additional dollars to improve the quality of care at the state’s two psychiatric hospitals while beginning a transformation that will see increasing numbers of people with mental illness receiving treatment at facilities in the community. And there is $2.35 billion in reserves, including money in the constitutional rainy day account.
“This is a families-first budget,” said Rep. Timm Ormsby, D-Spokane, who as chairman of the House Appropriations Committee is the lead budget writer. “This is a contract between generations that says we’re going to look out for each other.”
At the heart of the proposed Democratic budget proposal is $3 billion in new revenue from tax changes, including a capital gains tax, hikes in the three primary business tax rates and revision of the real estate excise tax to make buyers of expensive properties pay more and cheaper properties pay less. And there is a renewed attempt to tax bottled water and end the sales tax exemption for out-of-state residents.
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