Gov. Jay Inslee on Wednesday announced a proposed $70.9 billion for his 2024 supplemental budget, including $464 million in funding for behavioral health in Washington to combat the opioid epidemic and the homelessness crisis.
The governor released his budget plan weeks before the state’s legislative session starts in early January.
“We need more housing encampments removed and people getting housing,” Inslee said in a news conference Wednesday at the state Capitol. “We need more young people getting mental health treatment. We need more fentanyl recovery systems to get people off of drugs.”
Along with behavioral health, Inslee’s budget focuses on fighting homelessness. The supplement budget also carves out funding for education and transportation. Earlier this week, Inslee also asked the Legislature to spend nearly $1 billion next year to mitigate climate change.
Here are a some of the key spending proposals announced by Inslee Wednesday:
Behavioral health
Inslee’s proposed $464 million behavioral health spending would fund 110 new beds in state behavioral health facilities along with the purchase and operation of the newly-opened Olympic Heritage Behavioral Health facility in Tukwila.
“In this past year, we’ve opened about 120 beds at three facilities,” Inslee said, “and now we have hundreds more in the pipeline.”
The behavioral health money would also support a state diversion program that serves people who would otherwise be in jail to await competency services.
Inslee proposed $21 million of the behavioral health budget go to the state’s 988 Crisis Lifeline unit, a 24-hour behavioral health hotline. The new money would help the program build infrastructure to allow 988 dispatchers to directly connect callers to local mental health providers and help schedule appointments.
Inslee’s total behavioral health package would add to the current $1 billion in the 2023 — 25 budget.
Homelessness
Projections show a million homes will need to be built in the next 20 years to accommodate the Washington’s growing population, Inslee said .
The governor proposed $100 million of the supplemental budget be used to continue funding a state shelter and affordable housing program and support 1,200 housing units.
“We’re going to get hundreds of thousands of people housed,” Inslee said.
The state’s Rapid Capital Housing Fund was created in 2021 to help move people out of homeless encampments along state highways and into shelters and housing units. The program is “essentially out of money” and needs more funding to keep going, Inslee said.
Since its creation, the rapid housing program has helped more than 1,000 people get into housing, the governor said.
Fentanyl and the opioid epidemic
In 2022, more than 2,000 people died of opioid-involved overdoses in Washington That’s more than twice the number who died of the same cause in 2019. Indigenous communities face death rates four times higher than the statewide average.
The governor’s budget proposes $64 million to fund fentanyl and opioid prevention and treatment, particularly for children and tribal communities in the state.
Studies show that early exposure to drugs leads to a greater risk of dependence. Fentanyl is cheap, potent and incredibly addictive. One pill is enough to cause an overdose. One pill can cost less than $1 — sometimes less than 50 cents, law enforcement has reported.
Inslee’s budget would fund four new community engagement health hubs, all-in-one locations for people seeking substance use treatment. Hubs are designed to be accessible spaces that offer counseling, medication, overdose education and social services.
The money also would pay for naloxone distribution to combat opioid overdoses and would fund 20 “Smart Health Machines” be installed around the state, stocked with naloxone and other health supplies.
$2.7 million of the budget also would be allocated to fund law enforcement tracking drug rings in the state.
Education
Inslee proposed the Legislature fund a $3 per hour average wage increase for the state’s 32,000 paraeducators.
He also proposed an increase in the state’s special education funding cap to invest $17 million in school districts that serve students with special needs.
Transportation
Inslee’s budget proposed the state spend $16 million to staff ferry boats and expand crew training. He proposed that $52 million from the state’s Climate Commitment Act be used to install electric vehicle charging stations along state highways and to purchase electric ferries.
The governor proposed the state spend $150 million from the supplemental budget to do culvert work and treat stormwater runoff from state highways.
A full copy of Inslee’s proposed supplemental budget for 2024 can be found on the state Office of Financial Management website.
The Washington Legislature convenes for its first day on Jan. 8. This year, the session is scheduled to last 60 days.
