The Issues

• Acquire public and non-profit properties, at no or little cost, for social housing, co-located with community facilities for early learning, health clinics, and more.
• Continue to add major new revenue sources for affordable housing, including an assessment on high salaries in large corporations.
• Address homelessness as a public health emergency. Empower doctors to order a prescription for a home, through a housing voucher, if medically necessary for those suffering from mental illness or substance use disorders.
• Expand the rights of tenants and rent assistance in the costly housing market.
• Create cottage housing (small homes with full basic utilities), to lower the cost of new construction, as a model across King County and Washington state.

A few examples…

• Co-founded Washington State’s Housing Trust Fund, which has invested over a billion dollars in affordable, non-profit housing across the state, including 100 apartment buildings in and close to the 43rd District.
• Dedicated half of the hotel/motel tax in King County for affordable housing for low-wage workers.
• Created and increased funding for the Home Security Fund, dedicated to providing emergency housing and services for the homeless.
• Initiated the Home and Hope project, which has acquired over 20 major public properties for building hundreds of units of affordable housing in Seattle.
• Enacted legislation creating hundreds of millions of dollars for Seattle and King County to invest in affordable workforce housing and supportive housing for people suffering from mental illness and substance use disorders.
• Co-founded the Low Income Housing Institute (LIHI) which has developed thousands of non-profit, rent-restricted apartment units in Seattle and beyond.

• Implement Free College Tuition especially for those who need it the most.
• Create a public bank, in partnership with non-profit credit unions, for low-interest student loans, to relieve students and families of burdensome debt.
• Extend free college tuition and forgive existing student loans for graduate degrees, apprenticeships and professions in areas of great public need (behavioral health for example), and partner with employers to pay for it.
• Promote accountability in higher education through legislation for Truth in Tuition and other innovative ideas.

A few examples…

• Initiated and served as the lead architect of the landmark Workforce Education Investment Act of 2019, granting free college tuition for those who need it the most in Washington state, and other major investments.
• Enacted the Dream Act and Dream Act 2.0, providing a pathway for undocumented immigrant Washingtonians to receive student financial aid.
• Created the Washington State Opportunity Scholarship, helping low-income and middle-class Washingtonians reach good paying careers in technology and health care.

• Expand the Early Education and Assistance Program and Working Connections Child Care, towards universal coverage for all.
• Expand funding to increase the wages, health benefits, and training for the teachers and support workers.
• Dedicate progressive revenue (capital gains on investments in stocks and bonds, and other sources) to pay for the best investment we can make in early learning.
• Expand the state’s Early Education Facilities Fund, to provide decent classrooms and facilities, co-located with affordable, non-profit housing.

A few examples…

• Expanded the Early Childhood Education Assistance Program.
• Increased funding ($100 million over the next three years) for Working Connection Child Care to keep early learning providers in business and subsidize low-income parents.
• Helped enact “Breakfast After the Bell” to provide nutritious food for low-income kids.
• Enacted legislation in support of the union of child care workers, advocating for better pay, benefits, and training.

• Build the new UW Behavioral Health Hospital to replace the failed Western State Hospital, and the new Behavioral Health Institute in Seattle as a welcoming front door for people facing mental illness and substance use disorders.
• Implement Cascade Care, the newly-enacted public option in Washington state, for those who need affordable health care.
• Expand Social Security and Medicare through the Long-term Care Trust Act.
• Initiate a plan to create a state-funded, non-profit factory to manufacture insulin and other high-cost drugs.

A few examples…

• Initiated and implemented Apple Health for All Kids, providing free health care to half the young people in Washington State.
• Expanded Medicaid and included dental care for low-income people as part of Obamacare.
• Prime sponsored legislation to create a new Behavioral Health Teaching Hospital at the University of Washington.
• Led legislative actions and investments in the new Behavioral Health Institute at Harborview Medical Center.
• Helped enact Cascade Care, the first state-level public option for the uninsured.
• Enacted legislation to helped create the best home care program in the nation, based on a partnership with the Service Employees International Union, 775.
• Helped enact the Reproductive Parity Act and other legislation, to promote women’s health and guarantee a women’s right to choose.
• Enacted landmark, best in the nation, paid family leave and long-term care trusts.

• Implement the state legislation mandating 100% clean electrical power plants.
• Pass a progressive Clean Fuel Standard, as they have in Oregon and California, to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and improve air quality especially in our low-income communities and communities of color that are disproportionately impacted by transportation emissions.
• Take steps to electrify cars and trucks, the largest source of greenhouse gas emissions.
• Support public transit for the benefit of the entire community.
• Identify specific communities in need of environmental clean-up for social and economic justice, and make sure polluters pay for it.
• Help enact local Green New Deal programs to lay the groundwork for a better future for us all. 

A few examples…

• Enacted legislation to require 100% clean electricity – one of the best clean energy transition mandates in America.
• Strengthened energy codes for buildings to reduce emissions and improve efficiency.
• Helped pass the Clean Fuels Standard through the state House of Representatives.
• Raised taxes on oil companies to expand the Model Toxics Control Act.
• Enacted new revenue authority for Metro Transit and Sound Transit.
• Banned the use of several toxic chemicals including PFAS and hydrofluorocarbons (a major greenhouse gas).
• Initiated the first para-transit program, Seattle Personal Transit (now part of the non-profit Solid Ground), which led to the Access vans of Metro Transit, providing door-to-door service for people with disabilities who cannot get to the bus stops without our help.