3 rural WA lawmakers voted ‘No’ on state’s new drug law. They have good reason | Opinion
Thanks to this week’s special legislative session, we now have a uniform drug possession law in Washington state.
If lawmakers hadn’t succeeded, the state law currently on the books would have ended July 1 and then it would have been up to cities and counties to establish their own ordinances.
Such a crazy quilt of drug laws would have been a mess. In Tri-Cities alone, Richland and Kennewick passed their own laws on the issue and Pasco hadn’t yet..
So while it is a relief lawmakers were finally able to reach a consensus, there were three legislators representing rural Eastern Washington who just couldn’t go along with the compromise.
Sen. Mark Schoesler, R-Ritzville, and Reps. Mary Dye, R-Pomeroy and Joe Schmick, R-Colfax, all represent the geographically vast 9th District.
Considering the bipartisan measure was approved with a 43-6 vote in the Senate and an 83-13 vote in the House, the combined “No” votes from the 9th District stood out.
Senate Bill 5536 was not decided on party lines. There were Democrats and Republicans both in favor and against it.
So the nay votes from the 9th District were less about partisan posturing and more about the difference between managing drug addiction in urban and rural communities.
The 9th District is comprised mostly of farmland and small towns. It runs from southern Spokane County down to the Oregon border, and then from the Idaho border in the east all the way to Connell in Franklin County to the west.
While the need to tackle drug problems and crime in city centers is obvious, Dye said drugs are everywhere and her rural district is no different.
She told the Herald that the drug line in her region gets started in Spokane and works its way south to Washington State University in Pullman, and then on through Asotin County in the southeastern corner of the state.
She has been told by constituents that they can’t take their kids to certain parks because that’s where addicts tend to congregate.
The new law, which was approved in a quick one-day special session on Tuesday, makes drug possession a gross misdemeanor, which means there’s a penalty of up to 180 days in jail and a maximum fine of $1,000 for the first and second offense. The penalties increase with a second conviction.
There is also an effort to get addicts into treatment by allowing them to enter a pretrial diversion program. If they complete it, they can seek to have their drug charges removed from their records.
But those treatment programs won’t work if they don’t exist.
That was among the issues for the 9th District lawmakers.
Rep. Schmick said there are small, rural counties that don’t have a way of providing those services. He also is concerned that not enough attention is being paid to workforce issues.
Even if the state funds the building of new mental health facilities, they won’t be able to operate without enough staff — and rural counties have an even tougher time attracting qualified employees.
Consider that the 9th District includes Columbia County, which has about 4,000 people and just closed its county jail. The district also includes Garfield County, which has around 2,300 people and is the least populated county in the state.
While the recently approved bill allocates $63 million to help with treatment and other programs, how that money ends up affecting rural communities remains to be seen.
Senator Schoesler said the latest compromise bill is better than no bill at all, and it’s better than the bill the Legislature left on the table when it ended its regular session in April.
But he believes it still needs work and he is hopeful that lawmakers will be willing to revisit the issue in 2024. He’s concerned that those convicted of drug charges will be able to plea bargain their case down and circumvent the system that’s been put in place.
The concerns by Schoesler, Dye and Schmick are all valid and point to the fact that even though the Legislature made a good save this week, there’s still work to be done.
