By Bill Lucia | Editor
Washington has paid unemployment benefits to at least 138 striking workers since Jan 1. Democrats in the Legislature last year pushed through a law that opened the safety net program to people who are on strike or locked out by their employers during labor disputes. Payments could soon climb as striking employees at Hilton’s Embassy Suites in Seattle’s Pioneer Square neighborhood recently applied for benefits.
Also in today’s edition…
An investigation into fish and wildlife commissioners grows longer and costlier.
Washington and other states sue over cuts to school mental health funding.
And, plans to ramp up logging in eastern Oregon and southeast Washington.
News tips, feedback, questions? Email us: [email protected]
Workers at Hilton’s Embassy Suites in Seattle’s Pioneer Square neighborhood have been on strike since June 18. (Photo courtesy of UNITE HERE Local 8)
By Jake Goldstein-Street
Workers on strike in Washington are eligible for six weeks of unemployment insurance. Last week, the state had paid out the equivalent of 642 weeks of benefits worth about $506,000. Absent a labor agreement, benefits for the striking Hilton workers in Seattle would kick in within a few weeks. Aspen Desmarais, a bartender at the hotel’s Zephyr restaurant, said that without unemployment insurance, the hotel workers would be more willing to accept a worse contract to return to work. “It does allow people to go on strike for longer and be better off financially,” Desmarais said.
By Jerry Cornfield
An investigation Gov. Bob Ferguson launched into the conduct of Washington Fish and Wildlife Commission members was originally due last fall, and the initial expected cost was $40,000. Now, the price could reach $130,000, and the release of findings isn’t anticipated until the end of July. The status and scope of the inquiry aren’t entirely clear. But it appears traceable to the commission’s controversial 2022 decision to ban recreational hunting of black bears in the spring. “To protect the integrity of the investigation, we will not comment on the specifics of the investigation until it is complete. I will note that it involves the review of a significant volume of records,” Brionna Aho, Ferguson’s communications director, said in an email.
By Anna Claire Vollers
(Photo by Corinne Smith/Alaska Beacon)
Washington and 14 other states are suing the Trump administration to prevent millions of dollars in cuts to school-based mental health funding. It’s part of an ongoing legal battle between Democratic-led states and the Department of Education over a grant program that Congress established following the 2018 school shooting at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Florida. At stake is a $1 billion program that offers grants to school districts to help them hire and train more mental health professionals to work in schools. Washington Attorney General Nick Brown’s office said the cuts are projected to cost schools and universities here over $20 million.
By Alex Baumhardt
The U.S. Forest Service is proposing new management plans for eastern Oregon’s Blue Mountains that could triple logging across 5.5 million acres in the next decade. The proposal would allow more logging, mining and grazing across four national forests in eastern Oregon and parts of southeast Washington: the Malheur, Ochoco, Wallowa-Whitman and Umatilla. The draft plan describes logging and grazing as important to local economies and to preventing wildfire. Environmental advocates disagree. The public has until Sept. 30 to submit comments on the proposal.
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