April marks the alleged last month of business in Olympia. Alleged, because here we are zooming into the beginning of April, just a few weeks away from the end of the regular legislative session on April 24, and still there's no agreement about how to deal with the thorniest issue: the mammoth $5.1 billion budget shortfall. A budget bill expected this week is most certainly alive. Meanwhile, several other nonbudgetary proposals have died while others hang on by a thread:
Medical marijuana: alive!
On March 23, the house Health Care & Wellness Committee passed its version of a bill to clarify state laws on medical cannabis, moving the measure toward a vote on the house floor. (The bill already passed the state senate on March 2.) The latest version of this bill would license medical marijuana dispensaries and extend arrest protection to medical cannabis users who don't want to be on a government registry, a key victory for medical cannabis advocates. Another victory: It allows doctors to have practices "primarily" devoted to evaluating patients for medical cannabis authorizations—just as long as they're not "exclusively" devoted to that.
Saving bus service: alive!
Funding for Metro Transit is also making progress, with the senate on March 7 passing a measure that would help the financially fucked Metro bus system by slapping a $20-per-car "congestion reduction charge" on King County vehicles. This bill could raise $26 million for a system that's currently $150 million in the hole—if the house agrees.
Saving lives: alive!
A bill to protect vulnerable roadway users—cyclists, pedestrians, and other non-car travelers—passed the house on March 3 and is now in the senate Judiciary Committee. Meanwhile, there are a slew of bills designed to help Washington State implement President Obama's health care reform law by doing wonky things like creating a health care exchange and consolidating Medicaid into a single state agency. They're moving beneath the radar and (don't tell the Tea Party!) have been passing chambers with near unanimous approval.
Pregnancy centers: dead.
A bill that would have required Christian-run pregnancy centers to be more honest with patients about the fact that they don't do abortion referrals or birth control and are not even real medical clinics is a goner. This bill made it out of the house Health Care & Wellness Committee but died for lack of Democratic willingness to put it up to a floor vote in the face of huge opposition from religious conservatives. 
