Plastic bags, clean water: local legislators vote on wide-ranging issues in 2020

State legislators from the 40th and 42nd districts represent constituents in Whatcom, Skagit and San Juan counties.

Update: All four representatives to the state House from the 40th and 42nd legislative districts voted in every roll-call vote during the past session, according to the Missed Votes Report issued by WashingtonVotes.org at the session’s end.

Debra Lekanoff (D-Bow) and Alex Ramel (D-Bellingham) from the 40th district and Sharon Shewmake (D-Bellingham) and Luanne Van Werven (R-Lynden) from the 42nd each voted in all 617 roll-call votes.

On the Senate side, the 42nd district’s Doug Ericksen (R-Ferndale) missed a quarter (143) votes and Liz Lovelett (D-Anacortes) of the 40th district missed 7 of the 569 roll-call votes. Senator Ericksen had not replied to an opportunity offered by WashingtonVotes to explain his absences when the report was released.

WashingtonVotes.org noted that 381 of 1,486 bills and measures introduced (including joint resolutions and memorials) were passed in the 2020 session; also:
• Legislators with no missed votes: 82 (65 House members; 17 Senators)
• Legislators with more than 50 missed votes: 11 (7 House members; 4 Senators)

“As the Legislature adjourned Thursday, 60 days felt like a lifetime ago,” noted Northwest News Network reporter Austin Jenkins on Friday, March 13. “A surreal ‘new normal’ had taken hold as Washington finds itself in the grips of a global coronavirus pandemic — which poses a threat not just to the public, but also to the economy and to state revenues.”

Jenkins reported on what transpired over the last two months in ‘What passed, what died in the 2020 Washington Legislature’.

Here’s how 40th and 42nd Legislative District officials voted on selected bills that were passed and sent to the governor for signing or veto by June 11, according to Washington Votes.

SB 5395: Requires every public school to provide comprehensive sexual health education to each student by the 2022-23 school year

YEA: Lekanoff, Ramel, Shewmake, Lovelett

NAY: Van Werven, Eriksen

SB 5323: Prohibits a retailer from providing a customer a single use plastic bag, a paper or reusable plastic bag that does not meet recycled content requirements

YEA: Lekanoff, Ramel, Shewmake, Van Werven, Eriksen, Lovelett

HB 2567 Prohibits warrantless arrests within one mile of a court facility

YEA: Lekanoff, Ramel, Shewmake, Lovelett

NAY: Van Werven, Eriksen

HB 2602 Prohibits hair discrimination

YEA: Lekanoff, Ramel, Shewmake, Van Werven, Lovelett

NAY: Eriksen

HB 2511 Protects domestic workers from discrimination