On Friday in Olympia, the Senate and House of Representatives approved a new biennial operating budget. The 2017-19 budget was signed by Governor Inslee before midnight on June 30, averting a partial shutdown of state government that would have begun July 1. WWU’s Budget Office has released an analysis of the budget, which can be found here and here.

Under the new budget, the state’s tuition policy is unchanged, permitting a 2.2% increase in resident undergraduate tuition for the 2017-18 academic year and a 2% increase for the 2018-19 academic year at four-year public higher education institutions. These permitted increases follow decreases in resident undergraduate tuition over the past two years. Services and Activities (S&A) fee increases are also limited to 2.2% in 2017-18 academic year and 2% in the 2018-19 academic year.

At public institutions, the budget maintains current levels of the State Need Grant, a need-based financial aid program, and increases award amounts for students attending private non-profit four-year institutions. In 2017, approximately 23,500 students in Washington were eligible for the State Need Grant but did not receive it due to lack of funding. The new budget will decrease the number of unserved, eligible students by approximately 875 students annually.

The biennial budget also approves compensation and benefit adjustments for all public higher education employees that are roughly equivalent to a 2% general wage increase effective July 1, 2017, a 2% general wage increase effective July 1, 2018, and 2% general wage increase effective January 1, 2019. Actual amounts to each employee will be subject to the various contracts and salary guidelines.

Western received $1 million in funding for student success initiatives, a top legislative priority for the university. The new funds will be used for student support programs that improve retention and graduation rates, such as academic advising, tutoring services and mental health support. Western was the only four-year institution to receive student success funds in this year’s budget.

Policy measures related to higher education were also enacted as part of the new operating budget, including:

• Senate Bill 5022, requiring higher education institutions to provide borrowers of student loans a detailed notification about their loans each time the institution certifies a new financial aid package that includes loans. Institutions must begin providing notifications by July 1, 2018.
• Senate Bill 5100, requiring higher education institutions to take reasonable steps to ensure that each enrolled student participates in a seminar about financial literacy and that each incoming student participates in a financial education workshop, which includes recommendations by the Financial Education Public-Private Partnership.
• Section 603 of the budget requires each institution of higher education to employ at least one full-time licensed mental health counselor with experience working with active members of the military or military veterans to work with student, faculty, and staff veterans and their families. This enactment is similar to Senate Bill 5525 and House Bill 1737, although those bills did not pass through the Legislature.
• Section 603 of the budget also requires public baccalaureate institutions to accept the transfer of college-level courses taken by students participating in the College in the High School and Running Start programs if the student has been admitted to the higher education institution and if the college-level courses are recognized as transferable by the admitting institution of higher education

A major challenge legislators faced in crafting the budget was increasing funding for K-12 education as required under the State Supreme Court’s 2012 McCleary decision. Under the new budget, spending on public K-12 schools will grow by approximately $7.3 billion over the next four years to increase educator salaries and make other improvements. The new K-12 funding will come largely from a state property tax increase, an expansion of the online sales tax, and an elimination of tax exemptions on fuel extraction and the sale of bottled water.

The Legislature has yet to adopt a 2017-19 capital budget and is expected to consider a new capital budget in the coming days or weeks. You can continue tracking updates from Olympia by following this blog and by following WWU Government Relations on Twitter.