HB 1152 and its companion bill SB 5173 seek to take your county level health departments ( Local Health Jurisdictions ) and create in their place regionalized "comprehensive public health districts"! The problem with comprehensive health districts are that they are regionalized, and not specifically accountable to the county governments of just one county. This makes your county health district less accountable to you as a citizen of a specific county.
Here is the text of the second substitute bill though the text regarding the takings of property have been toned down, the bill is still unacceptable and if passed would make us vulnerable to amendments in following sessions where the original bill language could be re-inserted. The bill must be rejected by the senate outright! As we have seen over the past year, the Department of Health has far too much administrative power, and the local health jurisdictions get their marching orders through WACs created by, or emergency power dictated by the State Departments and Boards of Health, especially over these "emergency" conditions imposed by governor Inslee.
We need county based health jurisdictions accountable to the citizens of each county, not regionalized multi-county departments that are less available to citizens and which obfuscate their actions through unclear processes of bureaucratic layers ensnared in regionalized governance.
Oppose bills 1152/5173 today, the proposed districts would be mergers of counties into over-sized regions of over 250,000 citizens and overseen by committees. Many citizens would not have any direct representation. Most of the Committee positions would be appointed. In many cases, their decision making would not reflect the communities they serve.
Call and email your senator today to tell them No on HB 1152.
Find your senator at this link or call 800 562 6000 and ask to have your message forwarded to your senator!
January 28, 2021