Feb 16, 2016
In the last ten days, various committees of the Washington State Senate have been considering Senate Bill 6482 which seeks to modify current lien law.
The bill has been moved out of the Rules Committee aiming for an ultimate vote by the Washington State Senate. It is clear that none of the business association testimony was heeded. None of the proposed changes are acceptable for the commercial credit profession.
A summary of the proposed legislation can be found here.
NACM was in Olympia again on Thursday, February 11, 2016 and met with the prime sponsor of the bill, Sen. Mike Hewitt of Walla Walla and his staff attorney. The bottom-line is that his interest is in “protecting consumers.” We tried to educate him about the ramifications of the proposed bill and explain how current law really works. He really didn’t want to hear it but ultimately called in his attorney. NACM’s Washington lobbyist is working with the attorney to see if some re-writing is possible to help the bill pass assembly with NACM members and others in mind and workable language that can help pass the bill.
We’ve also been in contact with lobbyists for other associations and we’re building a nice coalition of interested parties who want to kill or modify senate bill 6482.
From our vantage point, the best outcome is that 6482 does not make it on the schedule for a vote by next Wednesday, 2/17 (the deadline). Senator Joe Fain of Auburn/Des Moines controls that schedule and we’ve reached out to him to help keep 6482 from coming up for a vote. In that way, Sen. Hewitt can let his constituent know that he tried but the bill didn’t make it out for a vote because of tight schedule, short session, etc.