AI task force will advise the WA Legislature on the emerging tech

man sitting at a computer showing a new artificial intelligence tool for generating images

At a September 2023 company event in New York, Jared Andersen, director of product marketing for Bing Chat at Microsoft, shows a new artificial intelligence tool for generating images on Microsoft’s Bing Chat Enterprise. (AP Photo/Cora Lewis)

The Washington House has greenlighted the creation of a task force to study artificial intelligence issues for the Legislature.

Senate Bill 5838, sponsored by Sen. Joe Nguyen, D-White Center, passed late Thursday 68-28 and will go back to the Senate for a vote on the House’s minor tweaks.

The bill calls for the creation of a 42-person task force, to begin meeting this year, to come up with recommendations on how the Legislature and state government should address AI issues. Preliminary recommendations on future legislation and regulations would be due to the governor’s office and to the Legislature by Dec. 31, 2024 and Dec. 1, 2025, with a final report due July 1, 2026.

Participants in the task force would include state government officials and representatives of universities, technology associations, business groups, labor and community advocate organizations. The task force must meet at least twice annually. The Washington Attorney General’s Office will coordinate its work.

“I believe the rapid development of artificial intelligence will bring about one  of the most momentous developments in technology. It will alter the world and we will see massive changes in society,” said Rep. Clyde Shavers, D-Oak Harbor, on the House floor. “We often forget or ignore the enormous challenges that come with these great technological advances. … Right now, companies are either self-regulating or not subject to adequate oversight, and we need both now.”  

Rep. Travis Couture, R-Allyn, added: “People don’t realize artificial intelligence touches their lives. … There are risks and opportunities.”

Couture acknowledged some GOP representatives opposed the bill because they object to the attorney general’s office being in charge.

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Gov. Inslee approves plans for WA's largest wind turbine farm

About a dozen wind turbines are on a hill; an empty road is in the foreground.

Wind turbines on a hill near Ellensburg, WA, November 19, 2022. Washington’s electricity needs are expected to double by 2050. (Genna Martin/Crosscut)

Gov. Jay Inslee has approved a revised plan to populate the Horse Heaven Hills south of Kennewick with the largest wind turbine farm in Washington. 

His approval leaves intact more than three-quarters of the originally requested number of turbines. While Inslee gave his approval on Oct. 18, his office and the Energy Facility Site Evaluation Council confirmed that approval to Cascade PBS on Friday. 

This Horse Heaven Hills project has aroused the most contentious disagreement among several clean energy projects in Washington. The proposed turbine farm has drawn scrutiny for its possible impact on Native cultural sites and on wildlife in the area, as well as its visibility from the Tri-Cities. Tri-Citians have also questioned the effects of the wind farm on ferruginous hawk nests.

In September the Site Evaluation Council voted 4 to 3 to approve the recommendation. Opponents of the project have until Dec. 17 to appeal the decision to the state’s courts.

Inslee has been pushing new wind turbine projects and solar panel farms to be located across the state as part of his campaign to trim the state’s carbon emissions. In an Oct. 18 letter posted to the Council’s website last week, Inslee said that the Council had adequately addressed the environmental, cultural and community impacts of the project. But the letter also had an undercurrent of impatience over the delay, since the Horse Heaven Hills project took most of this year to be approved.

“We will not meet our state’s urgent clean energy needs if the path to a final recommendation from the Council spans multiple years and contains conditional micrositing process requirements that further prolong final siting approval for a significant portion of the primary project components,” Inslee wrote. “I strongly encourage the Council to identify opportunities to increase its efficiency and provide for more timely decision-making. You can expect my office to engage with you on this critical issue before the end of my administration.”

The original plans by Scout Clean Energy of Boulder, Colorado, called for either a maximum of 147 670-foot-tall wind turbines or 222 500-foot turbines along a 24-mile east/west stretch of the Horse Heaven Hills, producing a projected 1,150 megawatts of wind power. The plans also called for two 500-megawatt solar panel farms on the east and west sides of the 24-mile stretch.

After some back-and-forth between the Council and Inslee’s office, the council set a 0.6 mile buffer around 60 to 70 ferruginous hawk nests, a 0.25-mile buffer around historic Native American fire sites and a one-mile buffer alongside Webber Canyon, another culturally sensitive spot for Indigenous nations. The Council ordered that the eastern solar farm be removed from the plan because of its proximity to sensitive Native cultural sites.

If 500-foot turbines are installed, that would trim the number of turbines by approximately 50, from 222 to roughly 172. If 670-foot turbines are installed, that would cut the number of turbines by approximately 34, from 147 to roughly 113. More precise figures will be calculated later.

 

The Washington State Republican Party owes $5,000 in fines after Washington’s Public Disclosure Commission, a campaign watchdog for the state, found the committee to be in violation of state campaign laws in 2023 and 2024. 

The fines are related to four campaign finance and political advertising violations, the PDC said in a statement Tuesday, and administrative charges were filed by PDC staff earlier this month. 

PDC staff allege that the state party illegally contributed to the political action committee Let’s Go Washington by transferring $100,000 from the Republican committee’s exempt fund for unallowed activities. The PDC noted that exempt accounts can only be used for limited purposes and can not be used for direct contributions to other campaigns. 

Let’s Go Washington is the sponsor behind the four initiatives included on the general election ballot this year that seek to overturn Democrat-backed programs such as the state’s cap-and-trade program, the capital gains tax and the long-term care program.

The state Republicans were also fined for depositing $106,500 in anonymous contributions on Sept. 17 and failing to disclose the source of those contributions. The state party then amended the disclosure report to reveal contributors a few days before the PDC hearing on Oct. 24

According to the disclosure commission, political committees cannot hide sources of contributions as “anonymous” if they know the source. Campaigns and committees cannot accept more than $500, or 1% of total contributions in a year, from anonymous sources, the PDC added.

The PDC also alleged that the Republican committee failed to include sponsor identification in a 2023 campaign text, then failed to submit expenditure reports for the texts on time. The state party was 87 days late submitting the reports, which was also 80 days after the 2023 general election.

Committees and campaigns are required to include sponsor identification in such text messages.

The Republican Party has 10 days to ask the commission for a reconsideration, and up to 30 days to appeal to a Superior Court. Additionally, $1,000 of their fine can be suspended if the state Republican Party meets conditions laid out by the PDC, including transferring $100,000 from the non-exempt fund to cover the cost of the illegal expenditure from the exempt fund.

In a statement to Cascade PBS from GOP Chairman Jim Walsh, he said that the party always cooperates with the PDC and supports transparency at all levels regarding campaign finance laws, but said that recently he believed the PDC has reached some “hasty conclusions about a grab-bag of minor WAGOP projects.”

“The timing of these hasty conclusions is worth noting—right around the general election,” Walsh said. “The WAGOP will consider all options in responding to the PDC’s conclusions, as allowed by law and tradition. But there’s no need to match haste with haste. For the next few days, the WAGOP is focused on winning elections.”

Update 3:45 p.m. October 30, 2024: This article has been updated with a statement from Washington GOP Chairman Jim Walsh.

Whitman County searching for about 250 missing election ballots

The state capitol building

The Washington Capitol building in Olympia in a January 2024 photo. (AP Photo/Lindsey Wasson)

Whitman County is investigating how hundreds of election ballots went missing somewhere between the printing plant and voters’ homes.

County Auditor Sandra D. Jamison said she has verified that all the ballots were processed out of the Spokane printing plant on Oct. 16 and were scanned by the U.S. Postal Service into their system. But they do not know yet what happened to the roughly 250 ballots after that.

Jamison said she is working directly with postal officials in Washington to retrace the next distribution steps in hopes of finding out what happened.

“I certainly understand how frustrating it is for those of you who have not yet received a ballot,” she said in a letter to voters and the media. 

The Whitman County elections staff is asking voters to call their office at 509-397-5284 if they did not receive a ballot, and another one will be issued to them. Any voter in any county who is missing their ballot may also print a replacement by signing in to vote.wa.gov.

“Rest assured that I am diligently investigating this matter. My goal is to make sure that every Whitman County registered voter receives a ballot and has the opportunity to participate in this election,” Jamison wrote. 

Open enrollment for 2025 health insurance through the Washington Healthplanfinder starts Nov. 1 and runs through Jan. 15, 2025, the Washington Health Benefit Exchange announced this week.

This includes individual private health and dental plans, as well as state health insurance through Medicaid, known as Washington Apple Health.

Washingtonians who do not have health insurance from an employee, spouse or government program can browse through health and dental plans for the following year online. Beginning 2025, at least 74 qualified health plans and nine dental plans will be offered.

If enrolled by Dec. 15, coverage will begin Jan. 1, 2025.

Enrollment for free or low-cost coverage is available for individuals and families who qualify. Eligibility can be determined through visiting the official website. Apple Health coverage was expanded in July 2024 for all, regardless of citizenship status.

Cascade Select plans (public option) which cover more services before deductible and lower monthly premiums will be available statewide, including in Lincoln and Gray’s Harbor counties for the first time.

Cascade Care Savings, the state’s health care insurance subsidy program, is available to everyone in the state, regardless of citizenship, which the state started offering during last year’s enrollment period for 2024. Deferred Action for Childhood Arrival recipients and those with noncitizen status are eligible for federal premium tax credits and cost-sharing reductions.

The state expects about 300,000 people to use the health care marketplace.

Hundreds of ballots were damaged after a Clark County ballot box was found burning in the Fisher’s Landing neighborhood of Vancouver Monday morning. A suspicious device was found next to the box, Vancouver police said.

A similar incident had been reported about an hour earlier across the river in Portland, damaging three ballots. Police say the incidents likely are connected.

Around 4 a.m. Monday, the Vancouver Police Department received a call about the ballot box at 3510 SE 164th Ave. smoking and on fire. The FBI also is investigating the incident, police said.

Ballots suffered both fire and water damage, though the full extent is not yet known. While all Clark County ballot boxes were freshly equipped this year with fire suppression devices, it did not prevent the damage in this incident, Clark County Auditor Greg Kimsey told Cascade PBS. Some ballots were able to be processed and counted, he said.

Elections officials in Clark County are drying the ballots for a more accurate assessment of the damage, and will contact affected voters, Kimsey said. He said the county will also mail replacement ballots to those affected, with an explanation of what happened. Kimsey also encouraged voters who deposited their ballots at that drop box after 11 a.m. Saturday to contact the county to get a new ballot. Voters can also check their ballot status at voter.votewa.gov.

Kimsey said Clark County elections will also collect ballots from its 23 drop boxes by 5:30 p.m. between now and the election, and encouraged voters to get their ballots in before the boxes are emptied. Law enforcement will also step up patrols near the drop boxes, Kimsey said.

It is the second time in a month that a Clark County ballot box was targeted with a suspicious device. The earlier incident took place Oct. 8, before general election ballots had been sent to voters.

Vancouver is the largest city in Washington’s 3rd Congressional District, which has a closely contested race between U.S. Rep. Marie Gluesenkamp Perez (D-WA3) and Republican challenger Joe Kent.

Free school lunches increased by 32% in the 2024-2025 school year, according to the Office of the Superintendent of Public Instruction. That means at least 70% – 775,000 of Washington’s 1.1 million students – have access to free school lunches.

In the 2023-2024 school year, 1,269 schools offered free meals funded by the federal government, also known as the Community Eligibility Provision, to students, and that number increased to 1,523 schools the following year. Schools get community eligibility to provide free lunches to all students regardless of income if they can document high numbers of students from low-income families.

OSPI worked with the state Legislature to increase the number of students eligible for free lunches by supplementing the funding of federal programs to cover the full or partial cost of school meals for eligible students.

To be eligible, students’ family income must be at or below 130 percent of the federal poverty line. A family of four that makes a monthly income of $3,380 or less is eligible for free student lunch.

However, the federal dollars aren’t enough to cover the increased demand for these lunches, leaving the burden for schools to pay for it in their budgets or make up the difference in their paid school lunch programs.

OSPI is requesting additional funding to make up these differences due to increased school participation, requesting $108 million a year for the program, a budget increase of $17.5 million annually.

During the pandemic, many families and students received universal free breakfast and lunch, but that ended in 2022. In 2023, a bill was passed requiring districts to pursue community eligibility to continue providing meals, falling short of its original goal to provide free meals for all students, as California and Maine do.

 At schools with universal free meals, staff are freed from tracking and collecting meal debt from students and can instead focus on quality meals, OSPI said. OSPI said these universal meal programs are an economic boost to families in need.

“When students participate in universal meal programs, their participation can save their families up to $1,200 per year that they might otherwise be spending on meals during the school day,” said State Superintendent Chris Reykdal in the press release email. “Especially as we all battle rising inflation and our budgets getting tighter, these programs provide much needed financial relief to families statewide.”

Ballots for November’s general election are due to be mailed to voters Friday, Oct. 18. Voters need to submit their ballots to a drop box by 8 p.m. Tuesday, Nov. 5, or postmarked by that day. Many counties, such as King, Thurston and Spokane, are ahead of the game and have already sent them out. Washington has been a vote-by-mail state since 2011.

Voters this year will weigh in on numerous issues, including preferences for U.S. President, U.S. Senator and congressional representatives as well as 12 statewide Washington races: governor, lieutenant governor, secretary of state, attorney general, superintendent of public instruction, commissioner of public lands, insurance commissioner, auditor, treasurer and three state Supreme Court positions. State lawmakers in the House of Representatives and half of the state senators are also up for election this year.

Voters statewide will also be asked about four ballot initiatives: Initiative 2109 to repeal the state’s capital gains tax, I-2117 to repeal the state’s cap-and-invest program, I-2124 to make the Washington Cares program optional instead of mandatory and I-2066 to prohibit bans on natural gas usage.

Local races are on the ballot as well, with hundreds of county commissioners, district judges and local measures on the ballot. Seattle will decide on a special election for a city council seat and a transportation levy on the ballot.

You can check out the Cascade PBS Voter Guide to learn more about the candidates and issues. To check your ballot status, you can look at the voter portal at the Washington Secretary of State’s website. If you don’t receive your ballot by mail, you can contact your county elections office. If you haven’t yet registered to vote or need to change your registration, you can do it online or through the mail by Oct. 28, or in person at your local county elections office by election day, Nov. 5.

Public health officials are responding to a pertussis outbreak at Washington State University.  

There are 18 reported cases of pertussis — also known as whooping cough — in Whitman County as of Oct. 8, officials from Whitman County Public Health said in a news release. All but one of those came from WSU.  

The agency advises those with diagnosed cases to isolate themselves until they complete a five-day course of antibiotics. Isolation involves staying home from work, school or other public places.  

The public health agency said there is no outbreak occurring outside of WSU but has advised residents to take preventive measures, including talking to a health provider after close contact with someone diagnosed with pertussis, staying updated on pertussis immunizations and practicing good hygiene, including covering the mouth and nose when coughing and sneezing and washing hands frequently.  

Pertussis is a respiratory illness caused by the Bordetella pertussis bacteria. The disease spreads through small drops of saliva from one’s mouth or nose when one sneezes. Spread is more likely to occur among those who live together or spend a lot of time outdoors.  

The sponsor behind several initiatives on the November ballot faces a $20,000 fine from the state’s Public Disclosure Commission after the agency said it determined the sponsor, the political action committee Let’s Go Washington, violated state campaign finance laws by failing to maintain and produce necessary records regarding the use of subcontractors to gather signatures for the initiatives. 

In a statement issued Wednesday, the commission noted that half of the fine could be suspended if Let’s Go Washington meets certain conditions, including paying half the amount owed within 30 days. 

The commission held a hearing on Oct. 3 to weigh any fines against Let’s Go Washington over delays in providing required details about campaign finance reports. Additionally, PDC staff alleged that Let’s Go Washington was not clear about whether the five contractors tasked with gathering signatures for the initiatives had hired subcontractors. Under state campaign finance laws, the commission can issue fines of up to $10,000 for each campaign violation.

“LGW has an obligation to inquire and confirm whether its contractors have used sub vendors,” the commission wrote in its order. “Failing to ask or failing to follow up on a contractor’s non-response or refusal to provide the information is insufficient. If this were the standard, any committee could simply ignore the issue and argue it has no knowledge of its contractor’s actions and nothing to report.”

The commission’s final order did note, however, that Let’s Go Washington “properly reported the allocation of its expenditures” totaling more than $12 million. 

Brian Heywood, the Redmond-based hedge fund manager and sponsor behind Let’s Go Washington, said in a statement Wednesday that the organization is evaluating its options with the PDC order and claimed that PDC staff were “gaslighting” in their press release.

“PDC staff never asked for full books of account until August, which we promptly turned over,” Heywood noted. “We were fined for not disclosing sub vendors even though we had no knowledge of any use of sub vendors, and even if we again prove no sub vendors were used, we are still fined $5,000.”

Heywood added that the political action committee has filed its own complaints “based on this new standard” with the PDC against the six groups who first filed the complaints using the same grounds and that Let’s Go Washington expects a prompt investigation before the election on Nov. 5.   

The three initiatives in question would impact current state laws in different ways: I-2117 would repeal the state’s cap-and-invest program and prohibit lawmakers from imposing any similar measures in the future; I-2104 would allow Washington residents to opt out of the state’s long term care program; and I-2109 would repeal the state’s capital gains tax.

UW professor David Baker wins 2024 Nobel Prize in chemistry

a 62 year old man in a black t shirt sitting at a kitchen table in his home smiles while holding his smart phone in front of him

At his home in Seattle, Nobel Laureate David Baker talks with Demis Hassabis and John M. Jumper of Deepmind, co-recipients of the 2024 Nobel Prize in Chemistry, announced Oct. 9. (Ian C. Haydon/UW Medicine Institute for Protein Design)

With two other researchers, University of Washington biochemistry professor David Baker received the Nobel Prize in chemistry Wednesday for his work in computational protein design. 

Translation: He is a pioneer in designing and creating artificial proteins. His co-recipients are Demis Hassabis and John Jumper, artificial intelligence researchers at DeepMind Technologies Limited, a British-American research laboratory and subsidiary of Google. 

“Let’s be honest. This is as good as it gets. He’s a local kid. Garfield High … Now he has a global impact,” said UW president Ana Mari Cauce at a Wednesday press conference at the university. “Other scientists cite his work as critical to their work.”  

“He has created proteins that we have never seen before,” said Timothy Dellit, CEO of UW Medicine and the University of Washington School of Medicine. 

Baker, 62, has been a UW School of Medicine researcher since the early 1990s. 

“The idea that you could make new [proteins] was a crazy idea … It was kind of the lunatic fringe for many years,” Baker said. “We’ve learned a lot about designing proteins with new functions … We are just at the beginning of the impacts.”  

Proteins are strings of amino acids that occur in nature. Proteins support other biochemical structures, act as catalysts to help form hormones and enzymes, and affect cells. “Proteins are the workhorses for all living things,” Baker said. 

The artificial proteins leading to the Nobel Prize could be used to create new vaccines, block infections, aid Alzheimer’s and cancer research and help break down plastics at the molecular level, among numerous other applications. 

Baker’s lab is on the UW campus. Half of the lab houses many graduate and post-doctoral researchers designing proteins on computers. A glass wall separates them from a biochemistry lab where the materials are mixed to see if new proteins work as intended. 

“You have to have very precise movements and structures,” said post-doctoral researcher Florence Hardy.  

“It’s very exciting. Intense,” said Ph.D. candidate Avi Swartz.  

Post-doctoral researcher Yujia Wang is designing proteins to speed reactions in enzyme research. Ph.D. candidate Stephanie Harris is designing a protein to be used as a tool to study how cells signal each other. “I think it’s cool,” she said. 

Baker has published more than 640 peer-reviewed research papers and been awarded over 100 patents, while co-founding 21 biotechnology companies. 

Cauce noted that the 62-year-old Baker is young for a Nobel Prize winner, adding that for him “The best is yet to come.”