Washington State Reps. Jesse Young, R-Gig Harbor, and Jim Walsh, R-Aberdeen, have released a plan to help kick start Washington’s economy when the state does finally reopen for business.

Young and Walsh are calling their plan the “BOISE” solution: a short-term, statewide dual moratorium on B&O taxes and Impact Statements on Everything – including permits and fees.

“As we approach May, the broader dialog continues to center around when to reopen the economy,” said Young. “I believe it is critical to take bold action now to get it flourishing again.”

They say the plan would helped closed businesses earn back lost revenue and increase short-term profit margins, while removing the need to wait for governmental reviews and permitting to begin their work.

“This plan will kick-start our local economic engine across all sectors of our state and impact working families and businesses immediately, without adding more government bureaucracy,” said Walsh.

The major tenets of the plan include:

Revenue Leveraging: The B&O tax accounts for roughly 18% of the state’s revenue while sales and use taxes account for about 50%. The BOISE plan would apply a short-term leverage on the 18% to help the 50% rebound and excel at a much faster rate. The net result, said Walsh and Young, is greater economic activity and state revenue growth.

Capital Liquidity: Due to the limits on governmental lending and its inability to cover all small business capital needs, the BOISE plan would pause B&O taxes to increase small business profit margins with the secondary goal of improving capital liquidity due to lowering the risk of restart-up failure, and increasing the ability for the banking industry to lend additional capital. The plan would also temporarily suspend governmental impact fees, which would improve profit by reducing regulatory costs due to higher-spend, business-restart activities, according to the two representatives.

Streamlining economic activity: BOISE also seeks to address the concern of businesses that are re-opened but forced to wait on regulatory permission before starting up. With savings depleted, local small businesses cannot afford to wait on permitting once they do reopen, according to Walsh and Young. The BOISE plan would suspend fees, permitting, and impact statement assessments to address this concern.

In situations involving long-term public safety issues, permitting and reviews could be done after the fact, but in either case, the fees associated with all would be eliminated until the economy is back up and running.

“This plan will position our state economy well from a competitive standpoint, especially from foreign and out-of-state competition, increase capital liquidity, and ultimately help regenerate our overall state revenue,” added Young.

“We’re confident we can overcome COVID-19 and its damaging economic effects, and we can offer real help to everyone who needs it,” said Walsh. “As your state lawmakers, we will continue to do everything in our power to find the right solutions to get Washington back on its feet and Washingtonians safely back to work. Let’s start by unleashing our local economy with BOISE.”

A bill is currently being prepped and finalized should there be a special session of the Legislature.