Lots of elections reforms proposed, but none make the cut

The general government area this session was heavy in elections policy ideas, but light on elections bills that could make it through. A few non-election general government bills were also considered.

Regarding elections, the legislative session focused primarily on two issues: 1) ranked choice voting, and 2) even-year elections for cities. None of the bills passed, though we expect the discussion on these issues to continue in 2025. HB 2250 and SB 6156 would have established parameters for local elections using ranked choice voting with a goal of ensuring statewide consistency when ranked choice voting was used. SB 5993 would have established onerous public education standards for jurisdictions using ranked choice voting and created a new private right of action if a jurisdiction failed to meet those educational requirements. HB 1932 would have allowed cities to switch to even-year elections. As originally introduced, the bill would have mandated that cities make the switch in certain situations, but we were able to successfully advocate for amendments to make it entirely an opt-in option for cities. However, the bill ultimately failed to move forward given concerns from county auditors about the costs and workforce issues, concerns about ballot fatigue and whether allowing more items on an even-year ballot was good policy, as well as political concerns.

On the liability front, AWC engaged on two bills. The first was SB 5059, which would have imposed costly prejudgment interest on cities and other civil claim defendants by starting interest on the date the injury occurred, rather than the date of final judgment. AWC and a coalition of other private and public sector organizations opposed the bill, and it died at cutoff. The second was HB 2022, which passed. Among other things, it requires cities to consider the time it takes to safely assemble or disassemble a construction crane when making permitting decisions for developers and requires cities to develop a permitting process that includes providing notice to neighbors when a crane is being assembled or disassembled.