2024 Nurse Lobby Day

2024 Nurse Lobby Day WSNA’s Nurse Lobby Day in Olympia took place on Jan. 24 with around 70 WSNA nurses and staff who met with their legislators about WSNA’s four legislative priorities this session.

This year, the government affairs department brought in great speakers from partner organizations leading our 2024 legislative priorities. The speakers brought these bills to life and offered great information.

Those speakers were:

• Louise Kaplan, PhD, ARNP, FAANP, FAAN — a former WSNA president, an associate professor at Washington State University College of Nursing, and a family nurse practitioner — spoke on ARNP Payment Reimbursement Parity (SB 5373). Kaplan started Nurse Lobby Day at WSNA.
• Erica Hallock — contract lobbyist for the School Nurses Organization of Washington (SNOW) — spoke on Standing Order for Epinephrine for School Nurses (HB 1608).
• Jessica Hauffe — WSNA’s director of government affairs — spoke on Updating the Property Tax Cap to Support Public Health (SB 5770).
• Lorena Gonzalez — legislative director for the American Civil Liberties Union of Washington — spoke on the Keep Our Care Act (SB 5241).

Nurse Lobby Day is an annual event and a great hands-on experience for members to learn how to engage with legislators and influence public policy within the legislative process. Members learn how to talk about bills to legislators. They also get an opportunity to practice with each other using supportive data and personal stories. Before they meet with their legislators, members are given their professional biographies and voting records to see how they have voted on WSNA priorities in the past.

For those legislators who have been champions for nurses, members thank them. For those legislators who have not been as supportive of our past priorities, members can engage with them on how we might gain their support