This bill reenacts and amends RCW 13.04.030 and adds a new section to chapter 13.04 RCW authorizing counties to permit courts of limited jurisdiction (county-level courts) to exercise concurrent jurisdiction with the juvenile court over certain misdemeanor offenses committed by juveniles. This is a procedural jurisdictional change to existing law, not the creation of a new crime or an explicit change to penalties. The new authority is limited by specific conditions: the offense must be a misdemeanor; the juvenile's standard range disposition for the offense must not include a term of confinement (per RCW 13.40.020); the county legislative authority must authorize concurrent jurisdiction; the court of limited jurisdiction must have an agreement with the county juvenile detention facility to allow ordering juveniles into detention; and the court of limited jurisdiction must have an agreement with the county juvenile court to access the same community supervision and restorative justice programming used by juvenile court. Under the provision, juvenile court retains jurisdiction if the youth is also charged with another offense from the same incident that the juvenile court would otherwise have jurisdiction over. Exercising jurisdiction under the new section does not count as a decline or transfer of juvenile court jurisdiction under RCW 13.40.110. Cases handled by courts of limited jurisdiction under this new section are subject to the procedural and dispositional standards of chapter 13.40 RCW, and any adjudications entered by those courts must be included in the juvenile’s criminal history as provided in chapter 13.40 RCW. The bill also reenacts the list of matters that remain within exclusive original juvenile court jurisdiction under RCW 13.04.030 (such as dependency, termination of parent-child relationship, interstate compacts, and specified juvenile offenses). The text references definitions, standards, and procedures found in other statutes (for example chapter 13.40 RCW and RCW 9.94A.030) that are not included in the provided material, so the full meaning of several provisions depends on those external sections. The bill does not detail the process by which a county legislative authority must authorize concurrent jurisdiction, the specific content or operational mechanics of the required agreements with detention facilities or juvenile courts, or the exact nature of the community supervision and restorative justice programming to be provided; those details are therefore uncertain from the provided text.

If enacted, counties could choose to let their local county courts hear some juvenile misdemeanors that are not expected to result in confinement, so those low-level cases may be handled faster at courts of limited jurisdiction while still following juvenile procedural and disposition rules and being recorded on the youth’s juvenile criminal history. Juvenile court would still keep cases when the same incident includes other charges that only juvenile court would normally handle, so this change mostly affects standalone, nonconfinement misdemeanors. The biggest practical impacts fall on county legislative bodies (which must authorize the change) and on county courts, juvenile courts, and juvenile detention facilities that must negotiate agreements for detention access and the same community supervision and restorative programming; those negotiations and any new programming access could create administrative work and potential local costs. Prosecutors, youth, and defense attorneys will face cases proceeding in different forums, and adjudications from county courts will count in juvenile records. The bill leaves unclear how counties must approve concurrent jurisdiction and what specific supervision or program access must look like, and several key definitions are in other statutes not provided here.