Frustrations boil over on Senate floor Friday night as the Gang of 25 tells Senate Majority Leader Lisa Brown that it might not show up for work Saturday. In the end, it showed up -- not that it did much work. Only two bills passed.

OLYMPIA, April 7.—After a chaotic debate in the Senate that reached the boiling point just before the Easter holiday, it appears that the Legislature is close to an agreement on the big issues of the year, but it is unlikely that lawmakers will make the Tuesday deadline to wrap up their 30-day special session.

The Senate on Saturday passed two out of the three big “reform” bills that budget hawks in that chamber have demanded, though it remains to be seen whether the more liberal House will be able to swallow them. Those bills aim to equalize health insurance premiums for teachers and other school district employees, and insert an amendment in the state constitution requiring a balanced budget. A third big reform bill, ending special early retirement incentives for state employees, is scheduled to be debated in the Senate Monday.

Meanwhile, budget negotiators say they are within inches of agreement on the single biggest bill of the session – the budget. Senate Republican budget-writer Joe Zarelli, R-Ridgefield, and House Ways and Means Chairman Ed Murray, D-Seattle, said legislative players are only $22 million apart – really nothing in a $31 billion budget.

And you might get the idea that all went swimmingly over the weekend. Zarelli issued a statement that made it all sound easy, by failing to mention the 26 hours of pitched battle that had come before.

“Today turned out to be the most productive day so far of this special session, after strong bipartisan votes sent two of our proposed reforms over to the House. One would address the inequitable health-insurance costs many of our K-12 employees are forced to pay, and another would require budgets to balance across four years, which can only help prevent future budget gaps like the one we’re now working to close. Unless the House wants to prolong its stay at the Capitol this year, it should move these meaningful reforms forward to the governor right away. The door also is now open for our coalition to act on our proposed reform of the state pension system, which would save $2.6 billion while protecting the benefits promised to current state employees.

“I’m as anxious as anyone to complete our work, but I want to leave here with a supplemental budget that doesn’t automatically lead to another financial crisis in 2013, and with reforms that will produce substantial returns in the long run; if that takes us a day or two or three beyond Tuesday, when this special session ends, it’ll be worth the time.”

A heated discussion during a break in Friday's Ways and Means meeting, between Senate Republican budget chief Joe Zarelli, R-Ridgefield, and Senate Majority Leader Lisa Brown, D-Spokane.

Yes, that’s how things ended. But for a while there, it sure looked like a mess.

One Vote Does Make a Difference

You might say that the debate that raged Friday and Saturday proved one thing – one person’s vote really does make a difference. That person is named Mike Hewitt, and he is the Senate minority leader. He is the top-ranking legislative official in the new order that has prevailed in the Senate since March 2. A month ago 22 Senate Republicans and three centrist Democrats teamed to take control of the upper chamber, wresting it from the Senate Democratic Caucus and taking a decidedly more conservative stance. Among other things, they insisted on a budget that would close this year’s billion-dollar budget shortfall without shunting expenses to next year and making the 2013 budget problem even worse than it already looks. The takeover March 2 gave the budget hawks a 25-24 advantage.

The Gang of 25 also says they’re not going home without big reforms aimed at bringing spending into line in the future.

Trouble is, Hewitt has been out for the last week because of abdominal surgery. And so the two armed camps in the Senate have a 24-24 tie. The coalition forces still have final say – Democrats are genteel enough not to take advantage of the absence of a member due to illness, and they have pledged to provide a vote when needed for Hewitt. But there are a thousand procedural decisions that have to be made in the course of legislative business, each one of them requiring a majority vote, and they came to a head Friday and Saturday.

No one seemed to know which side was in charge. As it turned out, neither of them were.

Dems Force Issue

Democratic Party leaders said they wanted to vote on the big bills that stood in the way of adjournment; coalition members said they were being jammed. The only things that made it through were the bills that were supported by both sides. The two key reform bills passed by wide bipartisan votes, K-12 health insurance by 29-17 and the balanced-budget amendment by 30-17.

But at times the debate got pretty nasty, and the result was an argument that produced more than the usual heartburn.

Democrats said they hoped to do it all Friday – pass the reform bills that stand in the way of adjournment, and then the budget. They still hold the positions in the Senate that allow them to set the chamber’s calendar and schedule.

Half-empty "green sheets" await members' signatures in the Senate Ways and Means Committee Friday night.

Members of the R-and-D coalition said nothing doing. On some of those issues, they didn’t have agreements with the House. And they certainly weren’t going to pass a budget before their other big bills made it all the way through.

At one point during Saturday’s debate, Senate Majority Leader Lisa Brown said the situation just wasn’t right. “This has been one of the most – let me be diplomatic to my colleagues – let me say it is not fair to say you can’t vote on the budget until we do this, and then not let us do this.”

But if the Dems had a problem with waiting, coalition members said that was tough.

Said Zarelli, “There is no dragging of feet. What is happening today is a matter of time and space. If people don’t like what’s happening, it’s because they don’t like the way things have turned out, and that is the nature of negotiation.”

Nasty From the Start

The battle began Friday with a televised motion on the Senate floor. Republicans moved to adjourn for the weekend, saying they feared the Democrats would move for a “call of the Senate.” That rarely used motion would require all members to remain within the chamber, under penalty of arrest. Republicans said it was particularly loathsome because Easter was coming up and the religious holiday has special significance for many on their side of the aisle.

Democrats found that argument loathsome because they said religious holidays are just as important for them.  Democrat Ed Murray rose to a point of personal privilege to thank the Jewish members of his caucus for working during Passover.

And Brown said she was just trying to get the Legislature’s work done. “I do not appreciate being treated with disrespect!” she said.

Ultimately the move was defeated when Brown said she would cast a vote for the missing Hewitt, and because the Republicans weren’t eager to be seen as the party that stands in the way.

K-12 Bill Provokes Debate

In the Senate Ways and Means Committee on Friday evening, argument got hot again over the K-12 bill. A Senate deal with the House Dems was announced while the meeting was in progress, but Republicans said Democrats had negotiated away the store.

“We are not getting our day, as far as our due, on what this body wants, on anything,” Zarelli said. “…I have about had it here with this thing, from my perspective.”

So after two hours of debate, the committee shot down the deal and adopted a much tougher version endorsed by Zarelli.

State Sen. Karen Keiser, D-Kent, a strong advocate for the measure, said the move made chances of passage much less likely in the House. “The agreement we had was likely to be passed into law,” she said. “I don’t believe that is the case with what we have now.”

That dispute has to do with a rather complicated point – the event that would require school district employees to transfer from district-managed systems to a state-managed health insurance system, and the manner in which that transfer would take place. Because it is a union-related issue, there are a thousand sensitivities involved, particularly for members of the Democratic party, many of whom are closely allied with the Washington Education Association. Coalition members basically argue that the compromise worked out with the House Democrats, who are more sympathetic toward unions, was so watered-down it is meaningless.

Wouldn’t Sign Green Sheets

Three key bills were held up in the Ways and Means Committee when members of the coalition refused to sign “green sheets.” The bills in question had been approved by the committee on a voice vote, but the rules require members to sign the supporting paperwork to document their votes. By withholding their signatures, the coalition prevents the bills from moving forward. Zarelli said it is a demonstration of the coalition’s resolve to demand reforms before a budget.

“We have given significantly already,” Zarelli said. “If all of my friends understood how significantly we have given on the budget in the interest of a compromise, there would be more acceptance of what we are trying to get on these reforms.”

Democrats rolled their eyes.

Later that night, on the Senate floor, Democrats changed plans, decided not to hold a late-night session, and instead announced they would convene on Saturday. Furious Republicans threatened to boycott the procedings. After the adjournment motion went through and the cameras were shut off, angry Republican senators gathered in a knot on the floor and confronted Democratic leaders. Many had Easter plans, they said, and the whole thing had been a PR stunt designed to make it look as though the Republicans were holding things up.

Said Republican Caucus Chair Linda Evans Parlette, “If you choose to come back tomorrow, we may not be here.”

Ultimately, though, the Senate got back to work on Saturday, and finished a little after 2 p.m. – more than enough time for members to get home for Easter. Murray said it all reminded him about that old saying about the making of laws and sausage, and how both of them are enough to turn your stomach. “Never has it been more appropriate than in this session,” he said.

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