The bill creates new law by adding sections to RCW chapters 35.21 (cities and towns), 35A.21 (code cities), 36.01 (counties), and 79.24 (state capitol lands) to require that any law or enforcement that regulates sitting, lying, sleeping, or “keeping warm and dry” outdoors on public property open to the public be “objectively reasonable” as to time, place, and manner. The bill defines “keeping warm and dry” as measures necessary to survive outdoors given environmental conditions and excludes measures that involve fire or flame. It treats city, county, and state laws, policies, rules, regulations, ordinances, or other official controls as covered “laws.” The statutory change is procedural and substantive: it sets an objective-reasonableness legal standard to be determined by a totality-of-the-circumstances assessment that must consider factors such as protection of public safety and health (including people experiencing homelessness), availability and accessibility of alternative shelter or housing, impacts on people experiencing homelessness (access to services, safety, basic needs), and proportionality. The bill creates an affirmative defense that a challenged law is not objectively reasonable, authorizes actions for injunctive or declaratory relief in superior court (local county courts for municipal or county laws; Superior Court of Thurston County for capitol lands), and permits courts in their discretion to award reasonable attorneys’ fees to prevailing plaintiffs who are not asserting a unique personal interest and who gave at least 90 days’ written notice of the challenge to the relevant governing body or the Attorney General. The sections explicitly do not create a private right of action for monetary damages. The new sections apply to causes of action commenced on or after the sections’ effective date and to all existing city, county, or state laws in effect on or after that date regardless of when the cause of action arose or the laws were enacted, to that extent making them retroactive. The act declares immediate effectiveness. The provided facts do not include the full county section text, the exact RCW placement for some county language, or any detailed definition of “capitol building lands,” so those items are uncertain from the extracted material.

If enacted, cities, code cities, counties, and the state on capitol building lands will have to make their rules and how they enforce bans on sitting, lying, sleeping, or “keeping warm and dry” outdoors defensible under an “objective reasonableness” test that weighs public safety, availability of shelter, effects on people experiencing homelessness, and proportionality. Practically, local governments and enforcement agencies will likely need to change or better document how and why they restrict outdoor survival activities to withstand legal challenges, face a greater risk of injunctions and declaratory suits (including in Thurston County for capitol lands), and could be liable for plaintiffs’ attorneys’ fees if they lose and the plaintiff gave 90 days’ written notice; individuals cited for such conduct gain an affirmative defense and a clearer path to challenge enforcement, while monetary damages remain unavailable under these sections. Some implementation details are unclear from the provided text: parts of the county section are incomplete and the bill’s full definitions (for example, what exactly counts as “capitol building lands”) are not shown here, though the act is stated to take effect immediately.