KCLL Klues: Washington State Legal Research

In the flurry of the last few days of consideration of the King County budget, numerous proposals were heard to change or add fees for services provided by various County agencies.  You can go the King County Council’s Legislative database and search for the proposals passed by the Council.  Click on the Advanced search link under the Search box.  In the Matter Type box, select ordinances, and in the Final Action Date box, type in 11/17/2008.  Click on the Search button and you will retrieve a list of 15 ordinances passed on the 17th.  If you click the ordinance title, you will see the legislative history of the ordinance, plus links to other documents such as fiscal notes or staff reports.  Coverage of Council’s actions begins in 2001.

The Washington Office of Secretary of State’s Digital Archives, in a partnership with Microsoft Research, is making available over 30,000 cassette tapes of committee hearings of the State House of Representatives for 1973-2001.  This partnership allows for an innovative way to search through the audio recordings of these hearings.  Approximately 6,000 hours of hearings are currently searchable.  Over the next two years, the House will add approximately 10,000 more hours.  The search engine allows you to search testimony given during a hearing.  You can narrow your search by selecting specific committees and by selecting a date range.  To access these tapes, go to Washington State Digital Archives detalied search screen.  In the drop down box titled Record Series, select Audio Recordings.  A search on the word audit brings up about 40 entries from various committees. 

 This tool can be an important adjunct to your state legislative history research.

A frustrated patron came into the library recently looking for an affidavit of support.  He had been to several deparments and no one seemed to know where to find this affidavit.  In the course of the conversation, he mentioned that it was required to bring his children into the United States.  The proverbial light bulb went off.  The website for Immigration and Naturalization Serice has a tab for forms and Affidavit of Support is listed here.  INS has an extensive listing of forms available to download from their website.  The moral of the story, if immigration issues are remotely involved, check their website first.

There are several resources in King County to assist those with immigration issues.  The University of Washington School of Law has two immigration clinics:  the Immigration Law Clinic and the Refugee and Immigrant Advocacy Clinic.   A visit to their websites will describe the scope of services they offer.

The Northwest Immigration Rights Project provides comprehensive immigration legal services and community education to advance the human rights and well-being of low-income immigrants and refugees.

Finally, the King County Bar Association provides the Newcomers Resource Project.  This project deals with various legal issues such as wage and employment, estate planning, housing, welfare, and consumer law.  Visit their website to see a description of services offered.

What’s your favorite legal movie?  In the August issue of the American Bar Association Journal, the editors listed their favorites in “The 25 Greatest Legal Movies”.  On their website they invite the readers to vote for their favorites.  One of the interesting features of this article is the comments at the end from readers listing their favorites that didn’t make the list.

The King County Law Library’s Legal Eagle DVD collection has over 200 movies, documentaries and television shows that are about the law, contain famous legal scenes, or are written by lawyers, judges and prosecutors.  The ABA’s “25 Greatest Legal Movies” are included in this collection.  Legal Eagle subscribers may borrow any of these movies for a nominal annual fee of $25.

We recently received a new shipment of books from the American Bar Association.  Of interest is Disability Discrimination Law, Evidence and Testimony: A Comprehensive Reference Manaul for Lawyers, Judges and Disability Professionals.  The authors have written this book so that the laws “can be utlized to minimize the current problems and to create better legal remedies”.