Background

2017 was a 105 day “long session” for the Washington State Legislature, tasking lawmakers with creating a budget to fully fund Washington State for the next two years. The budgetary process involved lawmakers reconciling the Governor’s, Senate Republican, and House Democrat budgets to reach a compromise to fully fund the state. In light of the 2012 McCleary court decision, the state was also tasked with ensuring that any budget passed fully funded K -12 education.

This year, the Governor was forced to call three special sessions as the legislature was unable to reach a budget agreement during regular session. Ultimately, the legislature passed, and the Governor signed, a $43.7 billion dollar budget for the 2017 – 2019 biennium. Notable for this year, the legislature was unable to come to terms on a capital budget.

2017 WTIA Engagement

The WTIA had several budgetary and public policy objectives this year. Working with our allies and partners, the WTIA actively sought funding for:

• Apprenti training matching grant
• Growing University of Washington Computer Science
• Expanding Computer Science in K-12

On policy, WTIA served as an advocate, subject matter expert, unifying industry voice, and facilitator on several issues including:

• Paid Family Medical Leave (SB 5975)
• Biometrics (HB 1493)
• Online Privacy (HB 2200)
• Telecom Infrastructure Investment (SB 5711)
• Non-Competes (HB 1967)
• Gender Pay Equity (HB 1506)

Apprenti training matching grant

WTIA’s Apprenti is the only nationally registered tech apprenticeship program, administered in partnership with the U.S. Department of Labor and WA Department of Labor and Industries. The primary purpose of Apprenti is to help fill job openings in the technology sector with skilled, underemployed workers who seek a path into a tech career. The program actively recruits women, people of color, and veterans — representing more than 80% of apprentices placed thus far.

Our request of the state legislature this session was $4 million in state funds for Required Supplemental Instruction (RSI) for each apprentice placed. These funds would be matched dollar-for-dollar in private donations. The RSI funding  is a crucial component to help ensure that apprentices can afford to quit their current job and dedicate themselves full time to training before they start working as an apprentice in their new job.

The Governor’s policy office was instrumental in obtaining support for this funding request. WTIA actively worked with policy and budget leaders in the Executive Branch, the State House, and State Senate. As the legislative session unfolded, the Governor’s budget, Senate Republican budget, and House Democrat budget all included $4M funding for Apprenti RSI, highlighting the bi-partisan support for this program. The final signed budget included the full $4 million matching funds request. A special thanks to the Governor’s team, legislators from both parties, and everyone else who worked to support Washington apprentices.

Growing University of Washington Computer Science

Together with the University of Washington, the WTIA advocated to secure $6 million in funding to double enrollment for computer science at the UW and place more students in high demand, high growth fields. Despite being a global leader in the tech industry in terms of GDP growth, job growth, and product innovation, Washington State is still a net importer of talent. Expanding the capacity of Computer Science at UW is essential to ensure our continued leadership in product innovation and to help close the gap between job growth and local talent supply. Ultimately, the UW received only 2 million in funding for STEM, which we fully expect to be allocated to CS. We will continue to advocate that lawmakers fund at least $4m per year for UW CS in the supplementary budget starting in 2018 and will endeavor to bolster our economic argument in the interim.

Expanding Computer Science in K-12

With our partners at WA STEM, WTIA actively supported efforts to increase funding for computer science and career connected learning in our K – 12 system. This effort builds on our previous success working with WA STEM to line-item $2 million for K – 12 computer science as a matching grant tied to $2 million of private funding. This session, we sought $6 million for increased Computer Science and $6 million for Career Connected Learning, both matched dollar-for-dollar in private funding.

It was a tall order. Both were included in the Governor’s budget and found support in the House, but were not supported by the Senate.

In the final budget, Career Connected Learning received no funding and computer science in K – 12 saw its funding level maintained at $2 million matching grant, but not expanded. WTIA will continue to work with our partners and advocate for increased access to computer science for Washington’s students.

Paid Family Medical Leave (SB 5975)

The WTIA was actively engaged in passing a Paid Family Medical Leave (PFML) policy for the state. WTIA has been an advocate for this program for two years and served as a subject matter expert. We noted to State and Seattle City lawmakers that many companies in the technology industry have already adopted PFML policies to improve the chances of relocating workers to the region and to create a sustainable work environment that retains a higher percentage of women in the workforce. At the same time, we also reminded lawmakers that start-ups have great difficulty offering any PFML on their own, and given that the State has the economic scale and administrative infrastructure to monitor and deliver PFML benefits, that makes the State a more appropriate mechanism to provide the benefit broadly in society.

A state solution offers all Washingtonians an opportunity to participate in the program, makes Washington a leading state in the nation, creates one set of standards for companies to follow, and utilizes an experienced state agency to administer the program.

Fortunately, groups from labor and business worked closely and all four corners (Senate, House, Republicans, Democrats) of the state legislature worked closely to get a PFML deal over the finish line this year. The PFML policy is one of the finest in the country – both in terms of benefits for workers and in terms of how it is funded and administered.  

The top line benefit is 12 weeks paid leave with guarantee of the same or equivalent job on returning to work. Funding for the program comes from payroll premiums, starting at 0.4% (adjusted annually) and represents an equitable split between employees (37%) and employers (63%). There is also special consideration for businesses with less than fifty employees, including optional exemption from paying premiums.

Biometrics (HB 1493)

HB 1493 represented a culmination of three years of stakeholdering on the issue of biometrics and was signed into law by the Governor. The bill prohibits a person from enrolling a biometric identifier for commercial purposes in a database, without providing notice, getting consent, or creating a mechanism to prevent the commercial use of that biometric identifier. WTIA helped serve as a subject matter expert, ensuring that legislators drafting the bill understood the technology around biometric identifiers, properly framed the relevant definitions, and ultimately created public policy that reasonably reflected the use of that technology in the industry.

Nationally, Washington State is seen as a leader on this complex topic. Illinois has a Biometrics law that is considerably more onerous. Other states are now watching to see how the more measured approach used in the Washington law are implemented – and what the impact will be on innovation and privacy protection.

It is worth noting, there are potential issues surrounding biometric legislation for companies that operate in both the private and public sector. While HB 1493 applies to private sector actors, two other biometric bills were passed (HB 1717 and HB 2213) that stipulate guidelines in the public sphere. For companies that operate biometric technologies in the private and public sector, there could be difficulties synchronizing standards, given the differing definitions in the bills. We will monitor and propose action when and where needed.

Online Privacy (HB 2200)

HB 2200 was a late attempt by the Legislature to protect privacy and regulate Internet Service Providers (ISP’s), crafted in-light of Congress’ move to halt FCC regulations in the broadband space that were set to go into place this year.

We expressed early concerns with this legislation, making the case to legislators that ISP regulation is a federal issue and that the state has limited jurisdiction and even less ability to monitor and impose privacy regulations on companies operating outside the state. Also, legislating at the state level creates a patchwork system that leads to confusion for the customers and ultimately would not protect consumer privacy for Washington State residents.  Furthermore, the FTC and FCC are negotiating the terms and conditions regarding privacy rights, obligations and enforcement systems going forward – assuming the Title 2 reclassification of 2015 is rescinded. We urged state lawmakers to wait for clarification later this year, before attempting to act on this complex matter.

While the bill had early momentum, passing the House, the legislation never came up for a vote in the Senate.

As states begin to assert increased autonomy under the Trump Administration, there is a high likelihood we’ll see more privacy legislation like this emerge in the coming sessions.

Telecom Infrastructure Investment (SB 5711)

Access to high-speed (5G) wireless broadband technology is vital to not only creating successful technology companies, but fostering business growth across the state. Despite the desire for telecom companies to invest in our state, local regulations have not created an environment conducive to building out this necessary infrastructure. This is especially true as it relates to rural broadband.

The WTIA testified and supported SB 5711, which took a step forward in fostering this investment. Unfortunately, the opposition to this bill proved too much for it to pass.

Gender Pay Equity (HB 1506)

State legislation around equal pay has been in the works for a number of years now. This year, as in years past, we worked to craft a gender pay equity bill for Washingtonians. We pushed for legislation that held employers accountable to outcomes and steered away from language on methodologies due to the confusing language and wide variations in process across different industries.

The tech industry is a leader in pay equity, with a less than one percent pay differential. We see clear evidence that companies who achieve pay parity across genders are able to retain employees more easily than those who do not. Furthermore, we believe that pay discrimination based solely on gender (or for that matter race, ethnicity, religious affiliation, sexual orientation, etc.) is morally repugnant and contrary to the pay for performance philosophy, essential to a vibrant and economically sound innovation economy.

This session, a gender pay equity bill did not ultimately pass the legislature – once again due to one Senator’s personal priorities, but we expect the opportunity to come up again next session and we will, once again, advocate for passage of a law.

Non-Competes (HB 1967)

This year we saw non-compete legislation almost make it over the finish line. As in previous years, we were actively engaged in this legislation, working with a wide range of technology companies and the bill’s sponsor.

Attempts at the state level creating a new law around this policy area centered around keeping bad actors from misusing non-competes as a threat against employees who do not have the means to hire legal representation. We continued to argue that scope is reasonable. From the standpoint of the technology industry, our goal is to ensure that any new legislation on this matter maintains the current modest protections of intellectual property so helpful to IP-centric startups and trade-secret innovation projects in larger tech companies.

It is unclear why, but HB 1967 was dramatically reduced in scope during caucus, merely codifying the current law and imposing a minor penalty on bad actors.

Despite passing by wide margins in the House, the Senate did not take up this legislation. We expect to revisit this issue next year.

Questions? Contact Ian Griswold at igriswold@washingtontechnology.org.