Speaker of the House Frank Chopp will hold a media availability at 1:30 today. TVW will air it at 3 p.m. Update: And 5 p.m.

I can’t make it to the event, but will blog on what he says soonest.

Tags: special session

People across the state — from Gov. Chris Gregoire to rural school district administrators — are now thinking about the Legislature going into special session. The regular session ended at midnight last night, but the Legislature felt they have unfinished business, mainly in the form of policy bills required to implement some of the savings called for in the budget.

But how does a special session work? Here’s what we know so far.

The Legislature can vote to bring themselves into special session, but it requires a certain a two-thirds vote in both the House and Senate.

The other option: Gov. Chris Gregoire can call the Legislature back.

Either way, special session cannot exceed 30 days.

But: If the Legislature votes themselves into special session, they can limit the scope and time frame of the session. If it’s called by the governor, not so.

This special session, if and when it’s called, will be by Gov. Chris Gregoire. And that means all bets are off: She can’t place a time limit on the session (other than the 30-day limit, of course) and no one can restrict what bills can be brought up.

And, because any bill introduced this session is still alive — all the way through next session — that means lawmakers have another chance to try to revive the bills they’re fighting for.

But: Gov. Chris Gregoire and Sen. Lisa Brown have both said that they want to come into special session with an understanding of what’s on the table. That means they’ll work over the next few days to negotiate (levy lid lifts and illegal immigrant offender deportation, among others) before reconvening.

Both have indicated that they want the special session to last no more than a day or two. (I haven’t spoken to Speaker of the House Frank Chopp about it yet, but will update here when I hear from the House.)

That said: They’ve also both indicated that their priority bills are on their minds. Brown said the bill to amend Initiative 937 (which requires utilities to buy a certain amount of energy from renewable sources) is still on her mind, and Gregoire said her climate change legislation is still important to her.

What happens if session lasts until 12:01 a.m. on the 31st day? They would have to call another special session.

Tags: special session

Mary Selecky, on whether Washington has any greater susceptibility to swine flu: “People travel, people have traveled to Mexico from every other state … in terms of the fact that we have migrant workers, so do many other states,” she said. “If people are sick, no matter who you are, you should go to the doctor and get checked out.”

She said the state is “at the ready.” How can you be at the ready? “Cover your cough, wash your hands.”

“What we’re asking now is that our laboratories send us more of those kinds of (unidentifiable) flu viruses … if it’s one we can’t type, we sent it on to the CDC,” she said.

With that, the press conference ended. You can watch it at tvw.org.

Tags: swine flu

Mary Selecky, the state’s health secretary, is now talking about swine flu at the Governor’s press conference.

She said the state is well prepared and that there is some flexibility in the budget to be able to ramp up efforts.

“The Governor has already mentioned, there won’t be people who have healthcare insurance coverage … and it means that some families will be putting off some of the prevention things,” she said, on the subject of cuts to the Basic Health Plan and other public health initiatives. “It will take a while” she said, to see the impacts on the state.

Tags: special session, swine flu

Gov. Gregoire, on the subject of bonding capacity, said she thinks bonding is great, but not at the cost of the state’s credit rating.

“I couldn’t go as far as Rep. Hans Dunshee, but I did ask bond council … whether they’d be comfortable with $1 billion,” she said. They were. “Ultimately, though, you’ve got to have a source of revenue for that.”

Dunshee’s $3 billion bond plan did not have a revenue source and would have used energy savings from some of the capital improvements to pay down the first year’s debt. That bill failed.

Tags: special session

As to whether the Legislature would get another revenue forecast before reconvening, she said no.

“I’ll be happy to share with them what I can see right now with receipts, which will inform them, which will tell them: I expect another negative forecast in June,” she said. “And another one in September,” possibly, she said.

What does that mean? The Economic and Revenue Forecast Council has, over the past six months, lowered expectations for what the state will collect in taxes over the next two years. That’s how the Legislature determined that there was a $9 billion difference between what they expected to spend and expect to receive.

Now: The Governor has just said that March’s dismal forecast may not have been dismal enough.

Tags: special session

Gov. Gregoire said in the last five sessions, she’s learned that “You don’t talk about heavy-duty policy in the last 48 hours” of session, she said.

Referring to the bill that makes changes to Initiative 937, she said it included a lot of complex policy, and that the last two days of session weren’t ideal for getting it through.

Tags: special session

Gregoire said when she met with Legislative leaders last night for 15 minutes, “There was some sense of, We just need another hour, but to me it was, Go home,” she said. She said it was clear that they needed a break.

She said this is no different than other states going into special session across the country.

“To the people of the state of Washington, I’ll say that we are going to get the job done, but I will give nothing but credit to that Legislature” for addressing the shortfall.

She said she congratulates lawmakers and is “happy to help them finish it off.”

Tags: special session

Gov. Gregoire said she’s not bringing the Legislature back until they have a deal. She said she wants to avoid a 30-day, protracted affair. She said when they do come back, she wants an agreement on how long they’ll be there.

She said she had no idea why her climate change bill didn’t pass.

“By law, I can call them in for not more than 30 days. But I don’t, as the governor, have the right to dictate the length during those 30 days or the subject during those 30 days,” she said. But, she can negotiate beforehand on what is to be debated and how long they’ll take. “This is not an opportunity to start a new legislative session, this is the opportunity to finish.”

She said she doesn’t know how much a special session will cost, but “it’s not $8 million, which is one of the sentencing bills alone.”

She also said she’s not certain a special session will happen. “My goal is to say, let’s identify, let’s mutually identify the issues … and let’s have agreement on those before we come to Olympia,” she said. “I would hope that they could do it in a day.”

Tags: special session

Gov. Chris Gregoire quoted President Barack Obama, saying that persistence was an undervalued virtue. She said she agreed, and then said that she wished the Legislature had done a bit more in the way of government reform.

“Whatever we do when we come back, it’s done quickly, it’s done by agreement and its done so whatever we do is connected to the budget,” she said.

What’s that: The levy bill, offender deportation.

She said she talked to Legislative leaders at 12:30 a.m. and they said they needed a special session. She said fine, go home, “reconnect with your families” and think about the budget.

She said she hopes special session will last “a day or two.” “I’m not going to bring them back to spend days debating issues.”

Tags: special session