State Sen. Lynda Wilson helped write Washington's 'Tiffany Hill Law,' passed in 2020 and named for a young mother gunned down by her estranged abusive husband.
Zeiger: A Call to Reform Emergency Powers Hans Zeiger April 22, 2021
Following the 2016 Cascadia Rising exercise led by the Washington Military Department in preparation for a Cascadia Subduction Zone earthquake, I learned about limitations on the governor’s ability to respond to emergencies. While the governor had broad powers to prohibit activities “to help preserve and maintain life, health, property or the public peace,” he did not have the ability that many other governors had to suspend state statutes that could hinder an efficient emergency response.
In the interest of preparing for a Cascadia Subduction Zone earthquake or other emergency, I sponsored legislation to create this new flexibility for the governor to suspend statutes. There was an important condition I wrote into the legislation: if the governor sought to extend these suspensions past 30 days, the legislature would need to review them and either approve or deny extensio