GREATER VOICE
Greater Spokane Inc. (GSI), the Spokane region’s business development organization, works yearround with business, civic, and community partners on public policy initiatives to provide a greater voice on behalf of employers and the community at the local, state, and federal levels.
PRINCIPLES
The Public Policy Principles provide the framework to judge when and how GSI should engage on a policy issue. The principles have internal and external components meant to provide certainty to stakeholders about guideposts being used to justify GSI’s engagement, provide flexibility to staff, and help narrow the focus of advocacy efforts. While most policy issues GSI engages on will satisfy most of these principles, the guidance is, in the end, subjective. It will be the work of GSI’s member and staff leadership to frame the conversation around the principles, determine the degree to which policy action adheres to the principles, and at which point they need to be reevaluated.
GSI BELIEVES THAT:
EMPLOYERS
ECONOMY COMMUNITY
1. Public policy should make Spokane a better place to live, work, and raise a family.
2. When our community thrives, business thrives; policy should build employers, the economy, and the community.
3. The important policy work for our region is forward thinking, proactive, and aspirational for our economic future.
4. The employer community should proactively engage with policymakers to seize timely opportunities on politically or socially ripe issues.
5. Education, outreach, and incentivization are greater tools than regulation; regulatory structures, when implemented, should impact businesses of all shapes and sizes equally.
6. Policy should be developed in a collaborative, nonpartisan process with the opportunity for participation of GSI’s membership, board, and community partners.
7. The development of our regional workforce is a critical component to uplifting the entire community; employment opportunities and growth should be available to all.
8. Spokane employers should lead our community on policy that would otherwise fail in our absence; as the foremost regional business development organization, GSI has a unique perspective to bring to local, state, and federal policy.
GSI 2025 LEGISLATIVE AGENDA
GSI ADVANCES PUBLIC POLICY THAT:
• Makes it Easier to Start and Grow a Business
• Addresses the Hiring Crisis
• Creates Safe & Vibrant Communities
• Reduces the Cost of Living & Protects our Open Space
• Protects & Improves Healthcare
• Efficiently Connects Commerce & People
• Eases the Cost of Energy & Protects our Environment
• Invests in the Spokane Region
PRIORITIES
COMPETITIVENESS, RESILIENCY, CONNECTIVITY, EQUITABLE GROWTH
BUSINESS CLIMATE AND TAXATION
GSI will defend and improve Washington’s business climate as a strong member of business-focused coalitions, engaging with stakeholders across the region and state to support those who create jobs for our community.
ATTAINABLE HOUSING
GSI will advance legislative efforts to expand attainable housing and address critical workforce needs. Increasing access to diverse, affordable housing options will help attract and retain talent, foster economic growth, and enhance quality of life throughout our region. GSI urges policymakers to prioritize funding, streamline regulatory processes, and incentivize private and public partnerships to advance housing solutions.
MEETING OUR TRANSPORTATION OBLIGATIONS
GSI will ensure our regional transportation obligations are met by defending established project timelines, advancing a focus on maintenance and preservation, and diversifying transportation revenues to include sales and use tax from transportation-related transactions.
SCHOOL PSYCHOLOGY COMPACT
GSI will expand workforce capacity for our school systems to address youth mental health impacts and expand employment opportunities for our military spouse community by advancing efforts to join the federal School Psychology Licensure Compact.
MAKE IT EASIER TO START AND GROW A BUSINESS
When our community thrives, business thrives. GSI believes policy should build employers, the economy, and the community. We support efforts to improve and protect the business climate of Washington State and oppose the growing regulatory burden on jobmakers and the broad expansion of liability and litigation.
• The Spokane business community recognizes the critical need for expanded access to high-speed broadband for businesses and consumers in the greater region. Broadband infrastructure and access make Spokane a regionally competitive site for new businesses and help current businesses access a global market. Rural broadband access should be expanded, and urban capacity increased to ensure that our region and state continue to grow and flourish.
• GSI is adamantly opposed to legislation that would provide an employee the ability to pursue legal relief on behalf of an agency for the enforcement of various occupational and employment laws, a qui tam action . Such legislation is unnecessary as there are existing penalties in law for violations and the process does not allow the employer to cure.
• GSI supports local grocers, brewers, distillers, and restaurants in developing a regulatory framework for delivery of alcohol that protects their ability to engage in the retail sale of adult beverages responsibly.
• As implementation of the Clean Building Act continues, GSI supports an extended compliance timeline and regulatory relief for public and private building owners as technology is developed and employed to decarbonize our built environment. Where possible, a presumption of compliance should be given to innovative and economic technologies which seek to fulfill the spirit of the Clean Buildings Act.
• Combinations of excessive regulations, increasing wage laws, one of the most expensive workers’ compensation systems in America, and continued encroachment on the funds in that system all threaten to regulate the employee-employer relationship out of existence. GSI supports efforts to reduce the monetary and time cost to comply with an ever-restrictive regulatory system which
is creating fewer and fewer opportunities for everyone.
• Washington state law requires the Department of Labor and Industries to release the calculation for minimum-wage increases at the end of September based on changes in the federal Consumer Price Index for Urban Wage Earners and Clerical Workers (CPI-W). This method and timing leave small businesses with only three months to plan for increasingly large increases in labor costs. GSI supports efforts to provide small business owners with transparency and time to properly plan for such increases due to minimum wage changes.
• Wage laws in Washington state disadvantage overtime-exempt employees who work for companies with employees in other states and impact their career trajectories, often placing undue burdens on small companies and nonprofits that have limited revenues and fluctuations in their work. GSI supports legislative action to correct and reform wage laws to align better with national norms , acknowledge the reality of a global workforce, and provide access to work for teens and other entry-level labor.
• State support for Associate Development Organizations (ADO’s) to advance economic development in their communities is critical to building an inclusive economy. GSI supports expanded funding to ADOs and a local sales tax credit for economic development in border counties like Spokane. These programs can provide permanent and sustainable support critical to maintaining our region’s competitiveness for business retention and targeted recruitment.
ADDRESS THE HIRING CRISIS
GSI supports programs and opportunities that increase industry-ready workforce in the Spokane region for targeted sectors such as life and health sciences, advanced manufacturing, construction, and early learning. Especially important are Career Connected Learning, preapprenticeships, apprenticeships, Career and Technical Education (CTE), STEM programs, and accredited post-secondary credential programs.
• A longstanding lack of affordable childcare in the Spokane region has been exacerbated by the COVID-19 pandemic, which forced the closure of multiple childcare centers. Nationally, more than 20% of workers cite the absence of childcare as the reason they have had to reduce their hours or exit the workforce. Strong regulatory relief in the childcare industry is necessary to unlock the potential of the private market and bring back critical childcare infrastructure to support Washington’s return to work. Among these reliefs should be a consideration of schoolaged child-to-staff ratios and group size.
• GSI supports the development of Career Pathway and Career Launch programs with an emphasis on childcare and early learning. These programs aim to prepare Washington students to enter the workforce prepared to take on these vital, in-demand jobs.
• GSI supports a statewide fund to assist lowincome students with dual credit attainment in our public schools. Students currently pursuing post-secondary credit in high school are often burdened with the increased cost of books, laboratory supplies, transportation, and other necessities that act as barriers to credit attainment. A statewide needsbased fund and expansion of the program are necessary to help Washington students access dual-credit programs.
• GSI supports legislation to establish a fouryear pilot program which appropriates resources to match local investment from the LaunchNW scholarship in ten eastern Washington counties. The legislation should establish a program within the pilot providing no-cost community college for students graduating from two high schools in Spokane County regardless of income.
• Expanding access to apprenticeships in our region is critical to meeting employers’ demand for a skilled workforce. GSI
supports legislation that would align Washington’s apprenticeship approval process with other states like Oregon and expand apprenticeships through other regulatory fixes.
• GSI supports expanding student aid to fill seats in high-demand degree programs. Through targeted public and private support, Washington’s institutions of higher learning can ensure that residents meet critical state workforce needs.
• To empower the local economy, GSI believes all workers should have the ability to easily access earning opportunities and to choose how and when to work. Working independently enables hundreds of workers in the Spokane region to earn with complete control over their own schedule and their goals. We believe in protecting and strengthening independent work to ensure that flexible earning opportunities are available for everyone.
CREATE SAFE & VIBRANT COMMUNITIES
Criminal activity and especially retail crime affect the Spokane community and our local businesses every day. Increases in visible property crime and violence rob our business corridors of the vibrancy and accessibility our community has worked so hard to instill. Consumers feel the impact of increased prices and reduced convenience, service, and feelings of safety in local retail environments. GSI believes that government and the business community both play a vital role in creating a safe experience for all and that public safety can be increased while pursuing accountability and rehabilitation.
• The massive and recent increase in organized retail crime has resulted in millions of dollars in losses for Spokane businesses. GSI supports legislation to combat this rise including increased penalties for organized criminals targeting the business community.
REDUCE THE COST OF LIVING & PROTECT OUR OPEN SPACE
Needs like housing and food cannot be made more affordable by making them more expensive to produce. Onerous and overbroad land use and environmental regulations on residential development and agriculture have made it more difficult to build homes and own farms. They have resulted in a severe lack of housing for working families in our state and driven up the cost of food.
• The housing industry in Washington is restricted by laws that harm its ability to meet demand for townhomes and condominiums. GSI supports proposed legislation that would increase the viability of 12-plexes by allowing for their construction to include an additional story of non-residential space for uses such as parking, storage, and retail.
• GSI supports a sales and use tax exemption on farm machinery and equipment to reduce costs for Washington farms, ensuring they remain competitive and sustainable. By lowering operational expenses, this policy strengthens the agricultural economy, promotes local food production, and helps family farms thrive.
• Impact fees are often assessed on new construction to pay for required infrastructure investments that support the construction. These fees are often unavailable to developers when they are assessing a project’s viability and can be so large that they impact whether new construction moves forward. GSI supports price transparency and predictability for impact fees through legislation that would require jurisdictions to publish the fees they assess and have a regular update process for those fees.
• The vitality of our downtowns is critical to the success of our region. GSI supports legislation that would make office to residential conversion more economical including the use of robust tax incentives with a requirement for workforce housing.
• GSI strongly supports amending the Growth Management Act (GMA) to address significant population fluctuations and enhance flexibility for local government in the GMA planning process. Amendments should account for and accommodate growth in the Spokane region and encourage the state to allocate adequate funding to
local jurisdictions to effectively implement planning directives from the state.
• GSI supports legislation that modernizes and reforms the currently overburdensome subdivision process across our state. With regulation accounting for tens of thousands of dollars on each new home built, modernizing and streamlining the subdivision process while maintaining regulatory oversight is critical to meeting our housing needs.
• Fully utilizing infill and density opportunities in our state is absolutely critical to protecting our open spaces. GSI supports legislation that would, among other provisions, eliminate lot size, lot coverage, and maximum floorarea ratio requirements so that diverse and unique housing can be developed to both increase housing and meet community needs.
PROTECT & IMPROVE HEALTHCARE
• GSI supports the expansion and funding of bridge bed , bed readiness, and other programs to support the appropriate and timely discharge of complex cases from hospitals.
• GSI supports increased and sustained investment in behavioral health to include better and more complete insurance reimbursements, youth-specific support, state- and system-wide capital investment in behavioral health and increased focus on the critical workforce shortage in the behavioral health area.
• GSI supports access to health care services by continuing to support telemedicine and telehealth in Washington. This relief is especially important for access to care in underserved and rural communities that face increased obstacles accessing health care.
• Physician Assistants and other advanced practice providers play a vital role in expanding access to affordable healthcare in Washington State. GSI supports efforts to develop care models which expand a Physician Assistant’s ability to practice independently and provide primary care for all Washingtonians under the appropriate training and supervisory conditions.
EFFICIENTLY CONNECT COMMERCE & PEOPLE
GSI advocates for robust investment in transportation infrastructure to ensure the connectivity and economic vitality of our region. By supporting the Spokane Regional Transportation Council’s (SRTC) Unified List of Regional Transportation Priorities, policymakers can address critical infrastructure needs that enhance mobility, reduce congestion, and support economic growth. GSI urges the legislature to prioritize funding for these key projects, fostering growth and improving quality of life for residents and businesses across Eastern Washington.
• GSI will ensure our regional transportation obligations are met by defending established project timelines, advancing a focus on maintenance and preservation, and diversifying transportation revenues to include sales and use tax from transportation-related transactions.
• Short line railroads are typically small businesses and serve as the backbone of some of our most critical transportation infrastructure, reducing transportation cost of trade goods and food. Short lines keep thousands of trucks off roads and tons of carbon out of the air. GSI supports legislation that would allow for the maintenance and upgrade of short line rail through tax incentive programs for capital reinvestment.
EASE THE COST OF ENERGY & PROTECT OUR ENVIRONMENT
Spokane employers support affordable, reliable energy resources and the preservation of consumer choice when it comes to meeting our region’s energy needs and preserving our environment. GSI believes that natural gas and hydroelectricity play an integral role in maintaining the economic vitality of our local business climate and are critical pieces of cost-effective “all-of-the- above” strategies to expand our region’s clean energy capacity, fight climate change, and protect our environment.
• Implementation of the Climate Commitment Act (CCA) has caused energy prices to soar. The CCA is increasing the cost of doing business across all sectors, leaving the Spokane region at a deep
disadvantage and Washingtonians with less in their pockets. With credit prices holding well above projected levels, it’s time to take corrective legislative action and reduce costs. Among other actions, the legislature should immediately force full implementation of promised agricultural fuel exemptions, flatten the GHG reduction curve, bring additional credits to the marketplace, and align the program with other state GHG reduction strategies like the low carbon fuel standard.
• GSI is opposed to breaching the Columbia and Snake River dams that provide lowcarbon transportation, efficient irrigation, flood control, and clean, affordable, renewable electricity.
• GSI believes that successful Extended Producer Responsibility (EPR) legislation must work for local businesses without putting them at a national and international disadvantage. The regional business community is committed to working with policymakers, stakeholders, and other leaders to develop an EPR framework that allows for innovative compliance approaches, minimizes impacts to business operations or profitability, protects jobs in the Spokane region, and centers reducing the financial impact to consumers.
• State law already exempts grants issued during a state of emergency from the business & occupation tax and public utility tax but currently taxes all other state and federal grant funds, reducing the impact of government spending on energy infrastructure. GSI supports legislation that would exempt government grants received for infrastructure projects from the B&O tax.
• Wildfire impacts communities all over the country and our region has seen an uptick in damages as wildfires have ravaged our landscape. GSI supports an aggressive wildfire mitigation approach that includes robust forest land management by landowners, both private and public; creates support and protections for utilities that implement their wildfire mitigation plans and can prove compliance and non-negligent actions; provides access to wildfire insurance coverage for utilities and other entities at risk for litigation.
INVEST IN THE SPOKANE REGION
STATE CAPITAL BUDGET
• $1,500,000 Cancer Can’t Lodging
• $58,000,000 WSU Team Health Education Building
• $3,500,000 Northeast Public Development Authority 3011 Wellesley Mixed-Use Project
• $2,000,000 Mt. Spokane Vista Cruiser Chairlift Replacement
• $3,000,000 Excelsior Wellness Physical Infrastructure Improvement
• $350,000 RMHC Inland NW South House Modernization
• $1,000,000 Plante’s Ferry Sports Complex Renovation (Phase 1)
• $1,000,000 HUB Sports Field Complex Expansion (Phase 3A)
• $4,500,000 Spokane Airport Spotted Road Safety Realignment
• $1,500,000 Felts Field Northeast Development
STATE OPERATING BUDGET
• $3,600,000 WSU Elson S. Floyd College of Medicine Academic Support
• $2,200,000 WSU Native American Scholarship Program
• $2,850,000 College Success Foundation Success in School, Career and Beyond
• $5,000,000 LaunchNW Promise Scholarship
• $4,500,000 EWU Experiential Learning Program
• $4,500,000 Protecting Washington State Tourism Funding
STATE TRANSPORTATION BUDGET
• $50,000,000 Protect the Division Street BRT
PRESENTED BY EXECUTIVE SPONSOR
SUPPORTING SPONSORS
Alaska Airlines
Community Colleges of Spokane Desimone Consulting
DH TC Energy
University of Washington
Washington State University Health Sciences Spokane