SB5395 – Mandatory Sex Education K-12 (Updated March 13th)

Update: March 13th. Hundreds of parents braved the weather leaving their homes as early as 4am to drive to Olympia so sign in to testify to the House Committee reviewing SB5395. Some 66 signed to testify with another 77 signing in but not testifying. Dozens of letters were turned in to the committee. The Planned Parenthood people were out in force. Each person got 90 seconds to speak and even then only part of the 66 signed up got to testify. The meeting started at 8am and didn’t start taking testimony until almost 8:12am closing at 8:57am. So the Committee didn’t make allowances for all the people who turned out!

Here is the letter I personally submitted: SB5395 Vote No WA House Reps March82019_Rylander

No vote has been taken. You can still share your thoughts via email. Here is the list of House Members sitting on the Committee. You can copy these email addresses and paste into the To: line; put SB5395 in thje Subject line and then simply ask them to vote NO on SB5395 and give them 1 or 2 reasons:

sharontomiko.santos@leg.wa.gov; laurie.dolan@leg.wa.gov; dave.paul@leg.wa.gov; mike.steele@leg.wa.gov; bob.mccaslin@leg.wa.gov; mike.volz@leg.wa.gov; steve.bergquist@leg.wa.gov; michelle.caldier@leg.wa.gov; lisa.callan@leg.wa.gov; chris.corry@leg.wa.gov; paul.harris@leg.wa.gov; christine.kilduff@leg.wa.gov; vicki.kraft@leg.wa.gov; lillian.ortiz-self@leg.wa.gov; skyler.rude@leg.wa.gov;
monica.stonier@leg.wa.gov; my-linh.thai@leg.wa.gov; javier.valdez@leg.wa.gov; alex.ybarra@leg.wa.gov

Here is the link to the recorded session. It is about 56 minutes long: https://www.tvw.org/watch/?clientID=9375922947&eventID=2019031119&fbclid=IwAR2VNfa6KXrlAShJ7YmKXK7NEt-WdlP1hmDrECgb1kOyfI3VtpN-EXI-aMw 

Update:

Update: As of Monday afternoon February 25, 2019, the bill goes before the Senate for a vote on the floor on Tuesday Feb 26th. If you have any desire to comment please email the entire Senate. Here are their email addresses:

Barbara.Bailey@leg.wa.gov; Randi.Becker@leg.wa.gov; Andy.Billig@leg.wa.gov; John.Braun@leg.wa.gov; Sharon.Brown@leg.wa.gov; Reuven.Carlyle@leg.wa.gov; Annette.Cleveland@leg.wa.gov; Steve.Conway@leg.wa.gov; Jeannie.Darneille@leg.wa.gov; mona.das@leg.wa.gov; Manka.Dhingra@leg.wa.gov; Doug.Ericksen@leg.wa.gov; phil.fortunato@leg.wa.gov; David.Frockt@leg.wa.gov; Bob.Hasegawa@leg.wa.gov; Brad.Hawkins@leg.wa.gov; Steve.Hobbs@leg.wa.gov; Jeff.Holy@leg.wa.gov; Jim.Honeyford@leg.wa.gov; Sam.Hunt@leg.wa.gov; Karen.Keiser@leg.wa.gov; Curtis.King@leg.wa.gov; Patty.Kuderer@leg.wa.gov; Marko.Liias@leg.wa.gov; John.McCoy@leg.wa.gov; Mark.Mullet@leg.wa.gov; Joe.Nguyen@leg.wa.gov; Steve.OBan@leg.wa.gov; Mike.Padden@leg.wa.gov; Guy.Palumbo@leg.wa.gov; Jamie.Pedersen@leg.wa.gov; Ann.Rivers@leg.wa.gov; Christine.Rolfes@leg.wa.gov; Rebecca.Saldana@leg.wa.gov; Jesse.Salomon@leg.wa.gov; Mark.Schoesler@leg.wa.gov; Timothy.Sheldon@leg.wa.gov; Shelly.Short@leg.wa.gov; Dean.Takko@leg.wa.gov; Kevin.VanDeWege@leg.wa.gov; Keith.Wagoner@leg.wa.gov; Maureen.Walsh@leg.wa.gov; Judy.Warnick@leg.wa.gov; Lisa.Wellman@leg.wa.gov; Claire.Wilson@leg.wa.gov; Lynda.Wilson@leg.wa.gov; Hans.Zeiger@leg.wa.gov;

Ok…Senate Bill 5395 has been passed from the Early Education Committee to the Rules Committee…bypassing the Ways & Means Committee. Why? No one seems to know as we publish. In Ways & Means there should be a financial analysis…but there is none.

What will this legislation do if it goes to the Senate floor for a vote and if it passes? Quite simply it forces an entire new Sex Education Curriculum on every student in the public school system. They claim there is an opt-out method but it appears to be so onerous as to be undoable by most parents. This is being done under the guise of State Superintendent Chris Reykdal’s claim that sex education MUST…SHALL… be taught to every student because the ways of the past are outdated and wrong. Parental choice? Nope. Your children need to be taught what Mr. Reykdal and his cabal think is right and just…no matter what parents think or want.

Mr. Reykdal testified in front of the Early Education Committee. His testimony starts at about minute 57:37  Click this Link

I listened to it multiple times and attempted to transcribe it as closely as possible with an emphasis on getting his claims and statements accurate. I took that transcript and then added comments and questions in-line (that is – after each of his comments I added mine). The document (as a pdf) can be read here: Chris_Reykdal testimony Feb 2019 SB5395

I then contacted the OSPI Communications Dept and asked for a copy of the “data” Mr. Reykdal referred to in his testimony. I received the following: SHE Research Brief_from OSPI_Feb_17_2019    In the pdf file I used the “comment” option to create small yellow “chat bubbles” which you can mouse over or click to read the comments/questions. This is the sum total of the “evidence” Mr. Reykdal offered. Please read it with a critical eye and see if you came away with the same impression I did…it’s hollow. Update: I finally got a response from the State Superintendent Chris Reykdal to my question about the cost of the “fact” brochure his department produced. Here is his response: “Mr Rylander, we don’t cost allocate each document we produce, that would be a collosal waste of taxpayer money.  This is routine work done by our staff as part of their regular duties.  Your question is tantamount to asking me how much money I have spent responding to this email.  My salary + benefits x the time it has taken to respond / 2080 hours per year.”

When one does an online search here is a 10 minute video that explains what they mean by Comprehensive Sex Education – is this what you want?

So what if you want to reach out to the members of the Senate Rules Committee to ask them to “kill” 5395 and not send it to the floor for a vote?

1.   You will need to email them FAST….
2.   The Rules Committee email addresses are:

Karen.Keiser@leg.wa.gov,
Mark.Schoesler@leg.wa.gov,
Randi.Becker@leg.wa.gov,
Andy.Billig@leg.wa.gov,
Reuven.Carlyle@leg.wa.gov,
Annette.Cleveland@leg.wa.gov,
Bob.Hasegawa@leg.wa.gov,
Curtis.King@leg.wa.gov,
Patty.Kuderer@leg.wa.gov,
Marko.Liias@leg.wa.gov,
John.McCoy@leg.wa.gov,
Joe.Nguyen@leg.wa.gov,
Jamie.Pedersen@leg.wa.gov,
Ann.Rivers@leg.wa.gov,
Timothy.Sheldon@leg.wa.gov,
Shelly.Short@leg.wa.gov

What would you say? Whatever come from the heart.

Dick Rylander