Radio Report: Rep. Joe Schmick proposes cap-and-trade rebates to farmers

February 9, 2023

A state lawmaker has introduced legislation to provide fuel rebates to farmers hit hard by Governor Jay Inslee’s new climate policies. John Sattgast reports from the state Capitol.

SATTGAST: When the governor’s cap-and-trade bill passed two years ago, it contained an exemption for fuel used to produce and transport farm goods. But Colfax Republican Representative Joe Schmick says when the law took effect on January 1st, the Department of Ecology not only broke a promise to farmers but ignored the exemption.

SCHMICK: “I had one grower show me a tanker load of fuel – 4-thousand gallons. It was 40-cents a gallon for the Carbon Commitment Act. That’s 16-hundred dollars extra. That’s wrong!”

SATTGAST: Ecology was supposed to devise a way to shield farmers from those costs. But it hasn’t. So Schmick has introduced House Bill 1780 to provide monthly refunds to farmers who can document they paid the cap-and-trade surcharges.

SCHMICK: “I am giving Department of Ecology a bit of a nudge to do what they said they were going to do. And that is, come up with a way to get that money back into the farmers’ pockets.”

SATTGAST: Schmick says the state, not farmers, should be on the hook for exemption failure. John Sattgast, the state Capitol.