(The Center Square) – Committees in the state House and Senate advanced their respective chambers’ supplemental capital budget proposals on Thursday, setting them up for floor votes in the coming days.
The proposals are in addition to the $7.6 billion enacted 2025-27 capital budget, not a brand new one.
The Senate has proposed an additional $723.5 million in total budgeted funds, taking the total capital budget to about $8.3 billion. The House proposal adds $914.2 million, raising the total to $8.5 billion.
Both plans rely on a mix of funding from the Climate Commitment Act — a controversial cap-and-trade program — and debt-limit bonds, leaving only $4.4 million to $5.4 million in bond capacity. That means the Legislature can’t spend much else without offsetting those appropriations through other accounts.
Climate projects fall under the CCA category, but the plans also tap revenues from the cap-and-trade program for other items. The House wants to draw another $639.9 million from CCA accounts. Budget writers say $400 million would go to CCA-related projects, while relying on a refinancing chain to free up additional funds to send the remaining $239.9 million to the operating budget to cover the deficit.
Meanwhile, the Senate only wants to spend $219 million in CCA funds, most of which would go directly to the CCA category, while adjusting other accounts to send $1 billion in cash to the operating budget.
The biggest spending areas in the House proposal are on housing/homelessness and climate projects.
The House capital budget allocates an additional $221.5 million to housing/homelessness and around $409 million to the CCA category. The Senate only added about $150 million to the housing category and $191 million to the CCA category, focusing instead on commerce spending and filling the deficit.
According to chamber budget summaries, the Senate’s capital budget puts an additional $117 million behind the commerce category for local infrastructure and community projects, while the House only adds about $30 million. The Senate also allocates more to the public education, higher-ed, and natural resources categories than the House budget, which spends more on the general government category.
The House Capital Budget Committee and the Senate Ways & Means Committee both advanced their supplemental capital budget proposals with wide bipartisan support after making a few minor changes.
While Republicans offered support for the proposed capital budgets, they’re largely opposed to the $2 billion spending hikes proposed by Democrats in the supplemental operating budget for each chamber.
Vice Chair Rep. Lisa Callan, D-Issaquah, told the Capital Budget Committee that the House will not be voting its proposal off the floor after advancing it to the Rules Committee on Thursday. Instead, House lawmakers will wait for the Senate’s proposal to pass off the floor, then the House will place its version within the Senate proposal as a striker amendment. After that, the two must negotiate a compromise.
The Senate advanced its proposal without discussion, except to adopt budget-neutral amendments.
“This is a budget that’s always enjoyable to work on in a bipartisan way, and we do indeed focus on all corners of Washington state as we try to put people to work,” Rep. Mike Steele, R-Chelan, said Thursday before the House committee unanimously advanced its capital budget proposal to the Rules Committee.
