by Jerry Cornfield, Washington State Standard
April 9, 2026
A week after Washington Gov. Bob Ferguson signed a nearly $80 billion budget, questions remain as to why he vetoed two grants that amounted to a molecule of the spending plan.
Ferguson and Democratic lawmakers slashed millions of dollars from child care and education and siphoned hundreds of millions from emergency reserves to overcome a projected $2.3 billion shortfall and balance the budget that runs through mid-2027.
He agreed with those big-ticket pieces of a deal hammered out by Democratic budget writers and approved by the party’s majorities in the House and Senate. Ferguson, a Democrat in his second year, didn’t mess with much else in the 623-page document that he signed April 1.
That’s why his decisions to veto $300,000 for the Prime Time Family Reading Program and $500,000 for an organized retail crime enforcement effort baffled the intended recipients of those funds. Savings from those cuts amount to roughly 0.001% of the budget.
“We were just stunned. We were blindsided,” said Julie Ziegler, executive director of Humanities Washington, which runs the family reading program. “There was no outreach beforehand from the governor or his staff to learn about the program. Though it’s a small amount, it has an outsized impact on thousands of kids and families.”
Rep. Mari Leavitt, D-University Place, said she was “deeply disappointed and puzzled” by the governor’s axing of her funding request to fight retail crime.
“These resources would have addressed real and dangerous retail crime actions in local jurisdictions across the state,” she said in a statement.
Ferguson told reporters after signing the budget that no cut or veto is easy to make. “At the same time, we’ve got a budget to balance,” he said.
On Wednesday, a statement from his communications director, Brionna Aho, stressed “the important context” for each veto.
Financial support for the reading program expired, and the three-county pilot program ended when the last budget cycle concluded in June 2025, she said. Instead of providing additional one-time funding for each, Aho added, “the governor used those resources to protect core services for Washingtonians.”
‘Tough choices’
The Prime Time Family Reading Program offers a different approach to helping elementary students overcome their struggles with reading. It involves their families and typically takes place in public libraries, not school campuses.
During six weekly sessions, up to 20 families gather to share a meal, read stories, and talk about ideas such as compassion, justice, and empathy. By the end, Ziegler said, familial bonds are strengthened and students progress toward becoming better readers.
Nearly 3,000 families across the state have taken part in the last five years, she said. Among them were Russian and Ukrainian families in Redmond, Somali and West African migrants in Seattle, and Jamestown S’Klallam Tribal members. Programs have also been offered in majority Hispanic communities in Pasco, Spokane and Wenatchee.
Between January 2021 and December 2025, nearly every staff member reported seeing increased critical-thinking skills in students and adults by the end of the six-week sessions they conducted, Ziegler said.
The state supported the reading program with $1 million in the 2023-25 budget.
But last year, lawmakers did not pencil in any funds for the current budget. Ziegler said countless individuals and organizations supportive of the undertaking lobbied to get some amount restored and succeeded with the inclusion of $300,000 in the final budget deal.
Then the governor crossed it out with his red veto pen.
“Educational programs like these are important, but our state’s fiscal situation necessitates tough choices,” reads Ferguson’s veto message.
Sen. Annette Cleveland, D-Vancouver, sponsored the funding provision. She said she hoped this week to learn more of the rationale for the veto from the governor or his staff.
“I recognize the very difficult budget situation that we face,” she said. “When it comes to supporting something as fundamental as helping our young ones learn to read versus other programs, the decision is curious.”
‘Shortsighted and harmful’
In 2024, the Legislature earmarked $1 million for pilot programs that would coordinate efforts of law enforcement, prosecutors and businesses to combat organized retail crime in King, Snohomish, and Spokane counties. The goal was to get more retailers to report crimes, more cops to respond and more prosecutors designated to handle cases. Where possible, eligible offenders were to be steered to diversion programs.
This year’s $500,000 request sought to build on the work in Pierce, Skagit, Clark and Whatcom counties and the Tri-Cities region.
A January report issued by the state Department of Commerce concluded the grant program “was highly effective in strengthening the overall response” to organized retail crime.
In the first five months of 2025, the prosecuting attorneys’ offices in the three counties collectively received 5,868 retail organized crime reports from local retailers. Law enforcement responded to 402 instances. Nearly 1,200 people suspected of engaging in organized retail crimes were deemed eligible for court-ordered diversion programs and about 10% accepted, according to the report prepared by the Washington Organized Retail Crime Association.
Supporters of continued funding said the surge in local activity complemented the work of a special unit in the state attorney general’s office that targets high-dollar organized crime. Ferguson created the unit in his tenure as attorney general.
“We recognize there may be concern that this appropriation is unnecessary,” the Washington Retail Association wrote in a letter urging the governor to support the $500,000 request.
“This pilot program serves a distinct and complementary function by strengthening local coordination, supporting diversion-oriented interventions, and improving frontline responses to repeat offending and ongoing retail crime patterns,” the association argued. A coalition of organizations signed on in support.
To no avail.
“While preventing incidents of retail crime is important, our state’s fiscal situation necessitates tough choices,” Ferguson wrote in his veto message.
He told reporters that there are more resources today to bring cases against organized retail theft because of the separate task force he established.
Leavitt, in a statement, said the governor’s action “is short sighted and harmful to our neighborhoods. This veto will end up costing us far more than what was requested in the allocation.”
In response to the veto, the retail group issued a statement that it hoped to see the money reinstated in 2027.
“There are many areas we would like Washington to be the top in the nation — organized retail crime is not one of them,” the association said.
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