OLYMPIA -- On the last day of the first special session and the eve of a second special session, Senate Republicans released their latest proposal for a 2015-17 operating budget that increases spending on salaries, health care and tuition. It meets many of the Democrats' requirements without raising taxes, the GOP budget leader Andy Hill said.

The need for raising taxes "went out the window" with a new forecast that estimates the state will collect an extra $400 million in revenue over the next two years, Hill, R-Redmond, said. Any argument to the contrary is just taxes for the sake of taxes, he said.

"That's just silly," House Majority Leader Pat Sullivan, D-Covington, responded a few minutes later. The Senate GOP budget still relies on "gimmicks" like shifting money out of other accounts, special one-time expenditures and unspecified reductions in certain programs, and finding new sources of revenue is a better option, Sullivan said.

The Senate GOP budget, dubbed Budget 2.0 because it is the second one released to the public, moves toward House Democrats' position on certain points. It segregates money from marijuana taxes for programs the voters approved with Initiative 502 rather than funneling it directly into the general fund, as well as sending $12 million of it to local governments to help deal with the effects of marijuana legalization. It pays for cost-of-living increases negotiated in contract talks between the state employees unions and the governor's office, under the condition the Legislature passes a law to open future contract talks to legislators and the public.

Sullivan said that condition might meet with resistance in the House, although there may be a way to provide more coordination between the governor's office and the Legislature during contract talks. Senate Republicans weren't concerned about opening up contract talks during the recession when unions were making concessions, he added.

Republicans have also proposed adding nearly $100 million in the higher education budget to move up the pace of their planned tuition reductions at the state's public colleges. Their first budget would have cut tuition by 25 percent over two years; this plan cuts it that amount in the first year of the budget and provides extra money for state need grant recipients attending private schools.

Among the other shifts in the budget is an increase in spending for medical education in Spokane. The University of Washington would get $9 million for its WWAMI program, requiring it to have 60 first year medical students and 20 second year students next year, and 60 more first-year students in 2017.  Washington State University would still get the $2.5 million proposed to seek accreditation for its proposed medical school.

The budget proposal, which was released to the public about 11 a.m., will get a hearing -- and a possible vote -- in Senate Ways and Means Committee meeting that starts at 1:30 p.m. The first special session ends today, and Gov. Jay Inslee is expected to call a second special session to start Friday; the budget could come up for a vote in the full Senate early in that second session.

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