Senate lawmakers voted unanimously Wednesday to approve a measure that would require the Washington State Office of Superintendent of Public Instruction to store certain records with precedential value for 20 years, after a report by The Seattle Times in July revealed that the agency was only retaining those documents for six years.
The records are known as Special Education Community Complaint decisions and are used by parents of students with disabilities to advocate for better services. Parents rely on past complaint decisions to see how similar issues were handled, sometimes using them to inform their interactions with schools or to create individualized education programs — legally mandated plans — for students with disabilities. Attorneys also rely on the decisions to advocate for clients.
Sen. Paul Harris, R-Vancouver, sponsored the legislation after seeing The Times report, which noted how OSPI quietly changed the retention policy without public input, concerning parents and disability advocates.
On the Senate floor Wednesday, Harris said the bill “strengthens transparency and ensures that families and educators can gain information” through an online portal that shows how past disputes were resolved.
In a statement released in July following publication of the report, Harris said it was “unacceptable that OSPI does not place more importance on retaining records related to complaints, especially those dealing with special-education students.”
“A policy that allows these records to be deleted after only six years hampers efforts by parents and advocates to improve the special-education system for students,” Harris said.
Sen. Lisa Wellman, D-Mercer Island, said Wednesday it is a “very confusing” process to make sure students have what they need. Having results of current and past complaint decisions available for 20 years in an online portal would be a resource to families, lawyers and school providers across the state,” she said.
The legislation passed by the Senate on Wednesday also notes that if OSPI does not have complaint decisions from the prior 20 years after the bill takes effect, they must provide online records of final decisions “for the longest period of time available.”
Many disability advocates spoke out against the updated policy to The Times in July, with one lawmaker comparing the destruction of the records after six years to the destruction of police misconduct records, which hampers efforts to find patterns of civil rights violations.
Julie Gunter, a Seattle parent of a student with disabilities, discovered the issue after searching for older hearing decisions.
In an email Wednesday, Gunter said she was grateful to Harris, who pledged to support parents and families the same day The Seattle Times published its piece outlining the issue.
“For months I had tried to advocate with agencies directly without receiving a meaningful response, but Harris' words were the opposite of that — I felt heard, valued, supported,” Gunter said, noting that she believed the bipartisan legislation protects “access to records of historical and legal value that until 2020 were designated as having archival-permanent retention status.”
At the public hearing for the proposal in January, Tyler Muench, advocacy and external affairs director for OSPI, said the agency supported the bill and that it would strengthen transparency and accountability in the special education system.
"Parents navigating special education often face complex systems with limited visibility into prior outcomes," he said. "This bill addresses that gap by making decisions readily available, promoting informed advocacy, consistent enforcement of student's rights and public confidence in the complaint process.
If passed by the House and signed by the governor, the bill would take effect 90 days after the legislative session ends on March 12.
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