Vet­er­an Demo­c­ra­t­ic leg­is­la­tor June Robin­son will take the place of now-retired State Sen­a­tor John McCoy in the Wash­ing­ton State Sen­ate, while Emi­ly Wicks will take Robin­son’s place in the House, the Sno­homish Coun­ty Coun­cil decid­ed today.

The Coun­cil’s actions restore the 38th Leg­isla­tive Dis­tric­t’s rep­re­sen­ta­tion in Olympia to its full strength. The 38th is a safe Demo­c­ra­t­ic dis­trict locat­ed whol­ly with­in Sno­homish Coun­ty. It is the City of Everett’s home leg­isla­tive dis­trict, and also encom­pass­es the com­mu­ni­ties of Marysville, Tulalip and Smokey Point.

McCoy had ably rep­re­sent­ed the 38th Dis­trict in the Sen­ate until his retire­ment sev­er­al weeks ago. The much beloved and wide­ly admired Sen­a­tor was one of Wash­ing­ton’s high­est pro­file Native Amer­i­can elect­ed lead­ers; he also served in Sen­ate Demo­c­ra­t­ic cau­cus lead­er­ship as Cau­cus Chair.

Robin­son, six­ty, was a can­di­date for Speak­er of the House last year along with NPI’s Gael Tar­leton (D‑36th Dis­trict), Lau­rie Jink­ins (D‑27th Dis­trict), and Mon­i­ca Stonier (D‑49th Dis­trict). The posi­tion ulti­mate­ly went to Jink­ins, who recent­ly com­plet­ed her first ses­sion in the role, suc­ceed­ing Frank Chopp (D‑43rd District).

Tar­leton is now run­ning for Sec­re­tary of State. Robin­son decid­ed to seek appoint­ment to the Sen­ate after McCoy’s announce­ment, and was the top choice of the Demo­c­ra­t­ic precinct com­mit­tee offi­cers in the 38th to suc­ceed McCoy. (The Sno­homish Coun­ty Demo­c­ra­t­ic Cen­tral Com­mit­tee, as required by the Wash­ing­ton State Con­sti­tu­tion, also sub­mit­ted two oth­er names.)

The Sno­homish Coun­ty Coun­cil con­curred that Robin­son was the log­i­cal choice, and vot­ed to appoint her at a meet­ing held this afternoon.

State Sen­a­tor June Robin­son is sworn into her new posi­tion while observ­ing phys­i­cal dis­tanc­ing guide­lines (Cour­tesy photo)

Sen­ate Democ­rats wast­ed no time in rolling out the wel­come mat.

“June Robin­son has ded­i­cat­ed her life to mak­ing the lives of oth­ers bet­ter,” said Sen­ate Major­i­ty Leader Andy Bil­lig (D‑3rd Dis­trict: Spokane).

“Through­out her career, she has com­mit­ted her­self to the improve­ment of pub­lic health for diverse pop­u­la­tions both here in Wash­ing­ton and in oth­er parts of the world,” Bil­lig’s state­ment added. “Her pub­lic health back­ground, bud­get expe­ri­ence and exper­tise in afford­able hous­ing are espe­cial­ly impor­tant now to the leg­is­la­ture and the entire state. The Sen­ate is for­tu­nate to wel­come a pub­lic ser­vant of June Robinson’s cal­iber and experience.”

Robin­son’s move to the Sen­ate left a vacan­cy in the House, which the Coun­cil filled by appoint­ing Emi­ly Wicks. Wicks will serve out the remain­der of Robin­son’s unex­pired term and must earn the con­fi­dence of vot­ers to remain in the House of Rep­re­sen­ta­tives beyond the end of the year. (She is a can­di­date; hav­ing filed her paper­work on Mon­day with the Sec­re­tary of State.)

The Sno­homish Coun­ty Demo­c­ra­t­ic Cen­tral Com­mit­tee, act­ing on the rec­om­men­da­tion of its PCOs in the 38th, also nom­i­nat­ed activist and lob­by­ist Charles Adkins and NPI board­mem­ber Mario Brown for the position.

Adkins was ranked first, Wicks sec­ond, and Brown third on the par­ty’s list.

(The Wash­ing­ton State Con­sti­tu­tion does not require or even sug­gest that lists of nom­i­nees should be ranked, but the major polit­i­cal par­ties are in the habit of doing it any­way in an effort to influ­ence who gets picked to fill a vacancy.)

Wicks has pre­vi­ous­ly worked for Gov­er­nor Jay Inslee (when he was a can­di­date) and Lieu­tenant Gov­er­nor Cyrus Habib (when he was a state legislator).

She is cur­rent­ly the Pres­i­dent of the Wash­ing­ton chap­ter of the Nation­al Wom­en’s Polit­i­cal Cau­cus, and has been involved in the Marysville YMCA and the Marysville School Dis­trict Foun­da­tion as well as Lead­er­ship Sno­homish County.

Wicks is a grad­u­ate of Wash­ing­ton State Uni­ver­si­ty, with a B.A. in Polit­i­cal Sci­ence and a B.A. in Pub­lic Relations.

Below is a copy of Wicks’ cur­ricu­lum vitae and ques­tion­naire respons­es, if you’re inter­est­ed in learn­ing more about her polit­i­cal positions.

Con­grat­u­la­tions to Sen­a­tor Robin­son and Rep­re­sen­ta­tive Wicks on their new respon­si­bil­i­ties! We look for­ward to work­ing with them to advance pro­gres­sive caus­es dur­ing this impor­tant pres­i­den­tial elec­tion cycle and beyond.