FISCAL NOTE REMINDERS Becka Johnson Poppe Assessments are policy reviews and opinion gathering; separate and distinct from fiscal impact

WHAT IS A FISCAL NOTE? An objective estimate of a bill’s fiscal impact 6-year projection Based on least expensive way to reasonably implement the bill Tied to a specific version of a bill Helps legislators evaluate a bill’s costs and merits Informs legislative staff, journalists, lobbyists, etc. An objective estimate of a bill’s fiscal impact. Usually it’s an analysis of a proposed bill, but occasionally it’s a bill amendment or a bill that’s already been enacted. Provides a 6-year projection of impact, each year shows incremental change from current law/budget Has assumptions based on the least expensive way to reasonably implement the bill Is always tied to a specific version of a bill—meaning, each time it is revised, a new fiscal note is requested Help legislators evaluate a bill’s costs and merits before deciding whether to pass, reject, or amend it Inform legislative staff, journalists, lobbyists, and others involved in the legislative process

WHY SHOULD YOU CARE ABOUT FISCAL NOTES? They inform legislative decisions that impact the UW … Thus, we need to be responsive and accurate The tricky part is We have less than 72 hours to respond Fiscal notes cover a huge variety of topics … Thus, we need your help! -They inform the legislative decisions that impact the UW. In fact, fiscal notes are sometimes used to determine how much funding the UW will receive for a particular initiative, so they can have a direct impact on our state appropriations. -Thus, we need to be responsive and we need to be accurate in our response. If you don’t respond, we can’t respond, and the legislature will assume the bill doesn’t impact us That could be a big problem because if a bill actually does have costs associated with it; the legislators won’t know to amend the bill in a way that mitigates that impact, or to provide funds to offset the fiscal impact. We also want to be accurate in order to maintain our credibility. If we submit something that’s way off-base, the legislature might not take our submissions seriously in the future. -The tricky part about being responsive and accurate is… -We usually have <72 hrs between the time we get a fiscal note request from Olympia and the time we need to get our fiscal note back to Olympia. -To complicate matters, the fiscal note requests we receive cover a huge variety of topics since the UW is engaged in a huge variety of activities and programs -We, your fiscal note analysts in OPB, try to be familiar with as many UW-relevant topics as possible -But, that can be challenging when we get fiscal note requests on everything from “shellfish aquaculture” to “interest arbitration for uniformed personnel.” Thus, we need your help to quickly prepare accurate fiscal notes

THE FISCAL NOTE PROCESS < 72 Hours OPB receives FN request from OFM OPB adds FN to BillTracker, notifies assessors Assessors prepare FN response OPB reviews FN for accuracy and completeness So that you can see how your role as an assessor fits into the bigger picture, here’s a quick overview of the fiscal note process… As you can see, a lot needs to happen in less than 72 hours… This is the part of the process that directly relates to you, which is what I’ll focus on for the rest of the presentation. OPB adds FN to OFM’s system and submits it Occasionally OFM sends a revision request OFM distributes the final FN to legislators

THE FISCAL NOTE PROCESS < 72 Hours OPB receives FN request from OFM OPB adds FN to BillTracker, notifies assessors Assessors prepare FN response OPB reviews FN for accuracy and completeness This is the part of the process that directly relates to you, which is what I’ll focus on for the rest of the presentation. OPB adds FN to OFM’s system and submits it Occasionally OFM sends a revision request OFM distributes the final FN to legislators

TO RESPOND TO A FISCAL NOTE REQUEST… Check the due date and time in the email notification Check the due date and time in the email notification from Bill Tracker. At the bottom of the automatic emails from Bill Tracker, you’ll see a box that looks like this. If there is a line that says “Fiscal Assessment” with some red text next to it, then it’s a fiscal note request. Otherwise, no fiscal analysis is required and you’re being asked to provide a general assessment of the bill. The info in red is the date and time by which you must have your response submitted via Bill Tracker. Fiscal analyses should always take priority over general assessment. The due date will typically be less than 72 hours from the time you receive the email since (as you saw on the last slide) there are a number of other things that need to happen during those 72 hours. Sometimes it will be far less than 72 hours if there is a hearing for which they need the fiscal note.

TO RESPOND TO A FISCAL NOTE REQUEST… Check the due date and time in the email notification Read the bill Coordinate your response with others (as needed) Fill in the “Fiscal Analysis” fields in BillTracker Read the bill – We talked earlier about how to access the actual text of the bill. When you log into Bill Tracker, you’ll see who else has been asked to assess the bill. Please coordinate with these other individuals, to ensure your response is comprehensive. Fill in the “Fiscal Analysis” fields in BillTracker as thoroughly and accurately as possible

PLEASE FILL OUT: Summary: overview of how the bill impacts the UW One or more of the following areas of impact: Cash Receipts: estimated tax or fee collections Expenditures: estimated cost to implement bill FTEs: detailed list of additional staff time needed Capital: acquisition and construction costs In fiscal notes, we always include a Summary, which provides an overview of how the bill impacts the UW. And then, depending on the bill, you may need to fill out one or more of the following “impact” narratives and tables. Cash Receipts: This section is typically only relevant to bills regarding the collection of a tax or fee. For the UW, that would be things like tuition or library fees. Expenditures are often associated with bill proposals and thus, many of our fiscal notes include estimated expenditures. We need you to include all assumptions made in your estimate and show your work as much as possible. OFM needs to be able to duplicate your work and understand why you calculated things the way you did. We also need you to call out what the workload drivers are. In other words, why does the bill cost money and what’s driving that cost?—is it the need for upgraded software? Is it additional personnel? FTE: If additional staff time would be required to implement the bill, please list that in the FTE section. What’s confusing is the cost of additional staff time (salaries and benefits) should actually be shown in the Expenditures section, the FTE section is more of a list of the number and type of FTE that would be needed. OFM’s method of reporting FTE and related expenditures is not the most intuitive. But we have a number of resources to help you out with this. Capital: Lastly, there’s the “Capital” section, which is very rarely used. Most capital costs (like a new printer, or new software) actually belong under “expenditures,” so chances are you won’t use this section.

PLEASE FILL OUT: Which look like this…

TO RESPOND TO A FISCAL NOTE REQUEST… Check the due date and time in the email notification Read the bill Coordinate your response with others (as needed) Fill in the “Fiscal Analysis” fields in BillTracker Save your work (at least every 3 hours) When done, check “this is my final response” and hit “Submit Feedback” Again, you can save your work in BillTracker by hitting “submit feedback”, but we do recommend saving a copy of your work on the side, just in case there are technical glitches. To let us know you’re done, select “This is my final response” before you hit “Submit Feedback”

WHAT IF THERE ARE TOO MANY UNKNOWNS? You can say impact is “indeterminate” HOWEVER, we still need you to: Explain why the impact is indeterminate AND Either give a rough estimate or provide a range of scenarios

TIPS & REMINDERS Fiscal notes must take priority over general bill analysis Write for a general audience, avoid jargon and acronyms Identify and explain ALL assumptions Report the bill’s incremental impact over current law Report current dollars, don’t build in inflation Identify costs/receipts as one-time or on-going Consider implementation dates Separate cost of benefits from cost of salaries Respond! please  Regarding responding, if we don’t submit a response by the due date, legislators have to assume the bill has no impact on us… although that’s true for some bills, many bills have HUGE financial implications for the UW.

RESOURCES On the OPB website, under “State Operations” there is a page dedicated to fiscal notes. It has a copy of this fiscal note presentation and a full fiscal note example. There are also tips for responding to fiscal note requests, including the list of reminders that was on the last slide.

RESOURCES In addition, when filling out the fields in BillTracker, there are pop-up windows next to each field to help guide your response. For example, if you’re at the Expenditure table and you click on “What to enter in the table”…

RESOURCES You’ll see a description of what to enter into the table and, since the salaries and benefits lines tend to cause the most confusion, we’ve given some extra details about how to calculate those.

RESOURCES Becka Johnson Poppe Jed Bradley Sharyl Morris jbecka@uw.edu (206) 616-7203 Jed Bradley jedbrad@uw.edu 206.616.4684 Sharyl Morris sharylb@uw.edu 206.543.4679

Questions?