By Walker Orenstein

The News Tribune

Gov. Jay Inslee released the full details Wednesday of a two-year, $46-billion spending plan that aims to overhaul the state’s education system, as well as bolster Washington state’s mental health system and improve conditions at the state’s largest psychiatric hospital.

The governor’s proposed capital and operating budgets invest about $300 million to improve mental health services, while simultaneously working to solve problems with Washington’s education system that have landed the state in contempt of court.

The plan would rely on $4.4 billion in new tax revenue, much of which would come from new taxes on capital gains and carbon emissions. About $2.3 billion would come from hiking the business and occupation tax for service businesses from 1.5 percent to 2.5 percent.

The vast majority of the new revenue — about $3.9 billion — will go toward K-12 schools, addressing a court ruling that says the state is failing to fully fund education while also increasing spending on other school needs, Inslee said.

On Wednesday, the Democratic governor talked about where the rest of the money would go, focusing on the need to improve mental health treatment and combat homelessness throughout the state.

In all, the governor’s budget would add about 1,000 new beds and about 700 staff positions to the state’s mental health system, his office said.

“We are not just nibbling on the edges. We are transforming this system, starting today,” Inslee said Wednesday.

Western State Hospital in Lakewood has faced quality-of-care issues and safety concerns for years, drawing federal scrutiny that requires improvement for the facility to continue getting millions of federal dollars.

A report released in September says cuts to staffing and poor management, particularly during the recession, have caused safety and morale issues at the approximately 800-bed facility.

The state has been trying to hire new staff to deal with shortages of nurses, social workers, psychologists and psychiatrists. The hospital has struggled to hire and keep staff over the years, a problem exacerbated by budget cuts during the Great Recession.

On the campaign trail in his re-election effort this year, Inslee pledged to find more money for new staff and has been trying to secure more options for patients to have adequate care outside the hospital so they can be released from Western State.

Under the governor’s proposed budget plans, 180 new psychiatric staff positions would be added at the state’s mental health hospitals, his office said.

The budgets also would add more capacity to the state’s mental health system by starting to fund nine new regional hospitals throughout the state, each of which would have 16 beds.

The governor’s capital and operating budgets would spend about $120 million to combat homelessness. His capital budget for construction and building projects would fund about 1,700 affordable housing units.

Already, the taxes in the governor’s plan are proving hard for Republicans to stomach.

State Sen. John Braun, a Centralia Republican who is the Senate’s lead budget writer, said that after two years, the proposed taxes in the governor’s plan would balloon to $8 billion every two-year budget cycle.

“It’s leaps and bounds by a huge measure the largest tax increase in state history,” Braun said, adding that taxes should be the state’s last resort.

“I’m a little shocked this is the starting point, frankly.”