Youth legislature reports ~89% turnout; leaders and initiatives for next session announced

Election results and initiative outcomes were announced at the 70th Washington YMCA Youth Legislature closing session, with program staff reporting strong participation and a full slate of winners for the next session.

Program official Sarah Ellen Howells, who announced results on the rostrum, said, “This year we had approximately 89% voter turnout,” the highest she has seen in four years of running the program’s elections.

Howells read the initiative outcomes: Initiative 7901 concerning adding name pronunciations to placards passed, while Initiative 7902 concerning changing the Capital Chronicles publication to Capital Capers failed. She then announced elected officers for the upcoming 80th session, naming Ronit Vade as chief lobbyist executive; Khadija So as editor in chief; Sloan Wells as postmaster general; Jackie Wentz as attorney general; Emmett Schultz as secretary of state; Zay Reid as speaker pro tem; Nate Hamm as speaker of the house; Donovan Hahola as president pro tem; Siri Moen as lieutenant governor; and Langley Foster as governor.

The announcements concluded with housekeeping directions from the reading clerk and a motion to adjourn sine die from delegate Visa Gasanova, which was seconded and carried by voice/placard vote. No numeric roll-call vote totals were recorded in the transcript; results were presented by the election announcer and accepted by the presiding officer.

The turnout figure and initiative outcomes were presented as final results to delegates at the session’s close.