The weather wreaked havoc on much of last week’s work at the Legislature. Though some committees met up to the bitter end, many were cancelled and will likely reschedule bills for this week.

The House must pass out all policy bills by January 31 and the Senate must move all policy bills no later than February 3.

The House Higher Education Committee took up several bills last week ranging from student advising to establishing a new state-level entity to coordinate education in Washington. The Senate took up similar legislation focusing both on a new entity as well as providing financial literacy to students who receive state financial aid.

This coming week committees, especially policy committees, will be moving several bills as deadlines loom in Week 4.

This week the focus of the appropriations committees (i.e. Senate Ways & Means ,  House Ways & Means, House Education Appropriations) will be to review the Governor’s 2012 supplemental capital budget and to consider several bills that would restructure aspects of the current budget process.

In addition, the higher education related committees (i.e. House Higher Education and  Senate Higher Education & Workforce Development) will continue to hold public hearings on several pieces of legislation introduced this session ranging from open courseware to student involvement on campus.