Greater Grays Harbor, Inc. (GGHI), hosted its annual Coastal Caucus Legislative Send-Off at the Rotary Log Pavilion in Aberdeen on Friday.

Local lawmakers Sen. Mike Chapman, D-District 24; Rep. Adam Bernbaum, D-District 24, Position 1; Rep. Steve Tharinger, D-District 24, Position 2; Sen. Jeff Wilson, R-District 19; Rep. Jim Walsh, R-District 19; and Rep. Joel McEntire, R-District 19 Position 2; attended the luncheon catered by Kit’s Catering Kitchen.

According to GGHI’s website, “The legislative send-off offers a one-of-a-kind opportunity to meet with our state Legislators before the start of the year’s Legislative Session.”

Former KXRO News Radio personality and current GGHI Board of Directors Chairman Kyle Pauley served as the master of ceremonies for the event that began with opening remarks from GGHI CEO Darrin Raines.

Each lawmaker was afforded the opportunity to inform the assembled business and government leaders about their committee assignments and priorities for the coming 105-day legislative session that began on Monday.

Two themes emerged while the lawmakers addressed the attendees — the state budget and the uncertainty that comes with a new presidential administration. Other topics of focus included affordable housing, regulations, improving government efficiency and homelessness.

An article published by MyNorthwest on Monday stated, “Washington state faces a budget shortfall of at least $12 billion over the next four years. Measured in dollars, this is the largest budget deficit in state history.”

Walsh, the ranking member of the House Judiciary Committee, and a member of the State Government and Elections Committee, and House Capital Budget Committee, spoke of eliminating regulations that get in the way of solving problems.

“We need to resolve overburdensome, job-killing and economy-crushing regulations that don’t create positive outcomes for regular people but create a lot of activity and career tracks for people in Olympia,” Walsh said. “And I believe very strongly in loosing creativity in the private business sector to solve problems like the housing crisis we face in this state.”

McEntire, who serves on the K-12 Education, Post-Secondary Education and Labor and Workforce Development committees. considers himself a jack-of-all trades legislator.

“I enjoy in dabbling in different things, I like being able to broaden out, I like some of these events we’re doing right now, you have a broad spectrum of things you’re worried about, it helps broaden my horizons, and stretch out a little and hear what’s interesting to you,” McEntire said. “I know we’re going to talk about the budget, this is a day of reckoning, this is something that was foretold, this was going to happen. There is no infinite supply of money, there is an insatiable appetite government has to want to grow.”

Wilson, who serves on the Transportation, and Business, Financial and Management Services committees and is the ranking member on the State Government and Elections Committee, said state government is getting too big.

“We need to control and control responsibly on behalf of you, it’s your funds, it’s you and your families’ households we should be concerned about, versus continuing government at the level it’s in, government is becoming the biggest business in Washington state. I’ve never been a big fan of that,” Wilson said. “These are things that matter, building an economy of scale is what’s important.”

Tharinger, who serves on the Health Care and Wellness and House Appropriations committees, said that education is a major priority.

“One of the things we’re working on is a better way to fund school construction,” Tharinger said. “We hope to come up with a better plan for doing that. The capital gains tax, the first $500 million generally goes to early learning (and other programs).”

The new member of the group, Bernbaum, who will serve on the Agriculture and Natural Resources and Early Learning committees and as Vice Chair of the Transportation Committee, said the budget is going to dictate much of what happens this year. He also spoke about working with his legislative colleagues.

“This is going to be a pretty bad year in the budget. Representing you all well means having six people sit down together, we disagree about a whole lot of things, effective representation for the citizens of Grays Harbor County requires us to work together,” Bernbaum said. “I’m looking forward to talking with my Republican counterparts, hearing how we think differently and finding the things we can work together on.”

Chapman is the new Chair for the Agriculture and Natural Resources Committee, and will also be a member of the Transportation and Health Care committees and serve as Deputy Chair of the Capital Budget Committee.

Pauley asked the lawmakers to label 2025 as the “Year of …”

“I’m not a big year of anything, every year is different, every week is different, and we have a new administration in (Washington) D.C., we have a new Congress representative, we don’t know what kind of changes they’ll be making,” Chapman said. “I spent three days in De Moines, Iowa, at a national agricultural conference for state agricultural leaders. They’re scared to death, the ag community around this country is scared to death of tariffs. I had a chance to tour a John Deere factory, literally in the middle of the heartland, and they just (went) through a round of layoffs. The spectre of tariffs is really potentially going to hurt the heartland of our country and we on the coast may or may not feel that.”

“Without knowing what the federal government is going to do it’s hard to say what the state is going to need to do responsibly,” Bernbaum added. “It’s the Year of Governmental Efficiency. We have a new gubernatorial administration that at least is initially signaling real interest in paring back some of these agencies, doing government better. The challenge is doing that in a way that preserves the services people want. There is a profound need for more childcare services, for more housing services, for a more responsive healthcare system.”

“I guess it would be the Year of the Budget, if we need to put a title on it,” Tharinger said. “That encompasses what Adam (Bernbaum) said about finding efficiencies, and Governor Elect (Bob) Ferguson’s memo from yesterday, talked about looking from middle management and seeing where maybe some of that could be trimmed, I think over the years it’s gotten a little top-heavy.”

“It’s plain and simply going to come down to money. I can give you billions of reasons since I’ve been a senator how our budgets have increased. Are you getting your money’s worth through efficiency and effectiveness of your government? I don’t think we are,” Wilson said. “I think we could always do better. But now, more than ever, your money should matter more, we should place respect where it belongs. Where do we get our money from? Generally it’s from people. We need to be clearly listening to you what is most important and work down that list.”

“If we have to name it, it’ll be the Year of Hurt Feelings. Every legislator has a passion they work on, to them it is the most important thing, and they advocate for it all day, and they could be noble causes,” McEntire said. “Nothing is free, everything comes at cost. Nobody is asking for cuts. Nobody wants to actually cut. Somebody is going to be reduced, somebody is going to have hurt feelings.”

“It’s about budgets and taxes this year,” Walsh said. “We have been growing government spending at the state level very aggressively, the deficit assumes we continue to grow state government spending. I’m not even convinced we need to cut very much to shrink the projected deficit if we just hold steady at current spending levels, that budget projection deficit will shrink. Some of the urgency that has been created by the projection of that deficit is designed to justify tax increases. So, let’s tread cautiously in this year of the budget, in this year of taxes, and know that if we choose well and carefully now about stopping the growth of spending we can shrink the projected deficit and put ourselves in a position to let the rest of the state economy basically catch up and grow as fast as government has been growing and we will earn equilibrium budget-wise in four or five or six years. It is not a crisis but it is a challenge.”

The lawmakers were then asked what they would do if they were individually in charge of the state budget.

“I believe the capital budget and the transportation budget are not the problem, the operating budget, again, the big one, that’s where the problem lies,” Walsh said. “What would I cut? If you force my hand, only because Kyle Pauley forced me, I think there are some administration of state benefits that are over-generous. It is no secret that Washington state is very generous in how it offers taxpayer benefits to illegal immigrants in this country. I think we have taken on the funding of public benefits that the federal government will not pay. I think we can trim that. The way we fund homeless housing has become a black hole lacking accountability and efficiency.”

“About the homeless industrial complex, about the upside-down economics of how we deal with homelessness, it’s crazy,” McEntire said. “There’s so much money poured into something that has a wrong economic incentive program. There’s no incentive to solve the problem, (homeless outreach groups) would put themselves out of work if they actually solved the problems of homelessness. We need to swipe the table, roll out a fresh new sheet of paper, and start with new ideas on how to solve these problems.”

“I’m going to hit the brake pedal, then I’m going to set the parking brake on dealing with the money you know you have,” Wilson said. “Quit forecasting how much you’re going to be in debt, and really set that parking brake, and run our state responsibly. There’s no way we could ever get to the end of ‘give me more, give me more, give me more.’ Wouldn’t that be nice if we set that as a starting point? Why can’t we just start with that?”

“I’d like to expand this bill on resource project permitting to broader permitting and get a more streamlined process there,” Tharinger said. “I think that would save money both at the state level, the local level, and get our projects done sooner which would reduce the cost.”

Tharinger added that cost savings could be realized by rethinking and revamping the funding for housing programs.

“I really do think there’s an administrative bloat that is always growing,” Bernbaum said. “I don’t want to cut a single penny from programmatic support from things like higher education or human services. I don’t mind at all if we can induce the University of Washington, the state universities here in Washington, to cut back administrative staff that don’t need to be there. There’s work we can do within the programs that slim them down.”

“Great that the budget’s been fixed, next question,” Chapman quipped.

Raines wrapped up the event by discussing GGHI’s upcoming schedule and thanked everyone for attending.

Raines also recently updated the Aberdeen City Council during the Jan. 8 City Council meeting with a comprehensive presentation that included a recap of 2024 activities and accomplishments, along with an overview of current initiatives and plans and goals for 2025.