Mary Anito

Candidate for
State Representative Position 2
34th Legislative District

4.

Special education funding 

Seattle Council PTSA: Do you believe the current state funding formula, including the special education multiplier, adequately covers special education costs? What specific changes, if any, would you support? 

Mary Anito: No. Districts across the state spend far more on special education than the state provides, and they cover the difference with levy dollars or by stretching general education budgets. That is not full funding, and it is not fair to students with disabilities or their classmates. I’ve spoken to many parents (our family included) who deal with IEPs and the endless advocacy that comes with ensuring our kids get the support they need. Our support staff is stretched with seemingly ever growing workloads yet while our school almost doubled this year, our team who supports IEPs seemingly stayed the same. I will push to fully fund special education that actually serves our kids. That means aligning the state's funding with what districts really spend to deliver services required by students' IEPs, revisiting limits in the formula that leave real students unfunded, and making sure high-cost services are covered without forcing districts to choose between students.

5.

Materials, supplies, and operating costs (MSOC) 

Seattle Council PTSA: Do you believe the state's current MSOC funding formula adequately covers school districts' operating expenses, including utilities, insurance, and technology? What specific changes, if any, would you support? 

Mary Anito: No. MSOC should reflect real prices, and today it doesn't. Utilities, insurance, technology, curriculum, and security costs have all risen faster than the state allocation, and districts fill the gap with local levies. I support updating MSOC allocations so they match what districts actually pay and adjusting them regularly for inflation and cost drivers like insurance and technology. As an engineer and small business owner, I know operating budgets: you can't run anything well when you are paying today's prices with yesterday's numbers. The state also has control over utilities and continues to allow them to push along their capital improvements to rate payers whose rates keep going up - when do the users benefit from the investments we keep bankrolling? The state needs a more responsible approach and oversight on the ever rising costs of utilities which are drowning families, schools, businesses, etc. Our representative also shouldn't be taking money from all the major insurance carriers, as my opponent does - looks like a conflict of interest in looking out for our community members.

6.

Transportation funding 

Seattle Council PTSA: What is your assessment of the state's current STARS transportation funding formula? What specific changes, if any, would you support? 

Mary Anito: Getting kids to school safely is basic education. Bus drivers are among the school staff I believe must be funded at the levels students actually need. Districts are struggling to recruit and retain drivers, and that shortage shows up as late, cancelled, or consolidated routes that fall hardest on families without other options. I support a review of the STARS formula to make sure it reflects real costs, including driver wages and recruitment, fuel and maintenance, and routes that serve students with disabilities, McKinney-Vento students, and other legally required services. I would push for funding tied to measurable outcomes and regular reporting so we can see whether changes actually improve service.

7.

Student mental and behavioral health

Seattle Council PTSA: What specific funding or policy changes, if any, would you support to ensure schools have sufficient counselors, psychologists, social workers, nurses, and other mental and behavioral health professionals to meet students' needs?

Mary Anito: Counselors, nurses, and other student support staff should be funded at the levels students actually need, not a formula written a decade ago. I support increasing the state's staffing allocations for counselors, psychologists, social workers, and nurses in the prototypical school model so these positions are funded by the state rather than by levies or fundraising. Beyond schools, I will push to invest in mental and behavioral health beds, particularly for youth and young adults, so that when a student needs more than a school can provide, there is somewhere for them to go. I would also fund behavioral health crisis response and track outcomes so we know which investments are actually helping kids. In my campaign I continue to push that we need to solve universal healthcare at the state level. With that in place, paired with investment in our mental health provider pipeline, we can get folks the supports they need to be engaged members of our community, no longer in crises.

8.

School safety

Seattle Council PTSA: What does a safe school environment mean to you, and what specific policies or investments would you prioritize to create it? Please address both physical safety and the conditions inside schools, including discipline, student support, and staff capacity to respond to student needs.

Mary Anito: To me, a safe school is one where every student and staff member makes it home, and where every child feels known, supported, and able to learn. Physical safety and a positive school climate go together. On physical safety, I support common-sense gun laws, including secure storage requirements that prevent unintentional shootings, youth suicides, and the gun thefts that put weapons in the hands of young people; Extreme Risk Protection Orders that let families temporarily separate someone in crisis from a firearm; and universal background checks. I will also fund community violence intervention programs. Inside schools, safety depends on adults having the time and capacity to respond to students' needs. That means fully funding counselors, nurses, paraeducators, and other support staff, and investing in educator recruitment and retention so classrooms are staffed by qualified, supported adults. I will track outcomes with clear data, published regularly, so we know what is actually keeping kids safe. I’ve also been recognized by Moms Demand Action and Teachers Unify Acrion to End Gun Violence. As a mom of public school kids safety is a basic requirement for every family everyday and we need to do more.

9.

Early learning

Seattle Council PTSA: What is your view of the state's responsibility to expand access to quality early learning, and what would you do in the 2027-29 budget to address unmet needs in communities like ours?

Mary Anito: I believe the state has a responsibility to build an education system that starts with early learning and continues through career and technical education, dual credit, and apprenticeships. Quality early learning sets kids up for success and makes every later investment more effective. In the 2027-29 budget I would protect and work to expand access to quality early learning, prioritize communities with the greatest unmet need, and support the early learning workforce. I would also support wraparound services for families before they fall through the cracks and push for clear data on access and outcomes so we can direct dollars where they make the biggest difference. For our family, I’ve seen how our current Seattle Preschool Programs (SPP) are sometimes more expensive than the private preschools. We need to ensure we’re not making licensing so onerous and pricey that we continue to have shortfalls in meeting community needs. We’ve also gotten involved in the cooperative preschool model with our third child and the state and community colleges changed funding this year, deciding parent education is not a career oriented program and dropping funding. The cooperative model has served our state more than 80 years, is one of the most cost efficiently run programs, and one of truly few affordable early ed options in the Seattle area. We’ve had the support of our Senator and one of our Reps, but my opponent (a dad of two tots) hasn’t taken action to close this gap. I would work to ensure we have adequate early ed options for all families, not through bureaucratic red tape but by implementing and growing programs we know deliver results.

10.

Prototypical school funding model

Seattle Council PTSA: The state calculates school funding through the prototypical school funding model, including staffing allocations and student-to-staff ratios. What specific changes, if any, would you support?

Mary Anito: The prototypical model's staffing ratios no longer reflect what schools need. Schools need teacher with reasonable classroom ratios, counselors, nurses, paraeducators, and other staff funded at the levels students actually need — not a formula written a decade ago. I support updating the model's staffing allocations for student support roles, including counselors, nurses, social workers, psychologists, and paraeducators, and building in regular reviews so the formula keeps up with real needs. I also support transparent, school-level reporting so families can see how state allocations translate into actual staff in their child's school. Prototypical funding feels like a knee jerk reaction to McCleary that isn’t work. It’s time to evolve and fund actual schools in the modern day.

11.

Millionaires' Tax Revenue

Seattle Council PTSA: Do you support Washington's Millionaires' Tax? Why or why not? If you support it, how do youbelieve the revenue should be allocated, particularly for K–12 public education, and whatspecific changes, if any, would you propose? If you oppose it, what alternative revenue sourcesor funding changes would you propose to meet the state's K–12 education funding obligations?

Mary Anito: Yes. Washington has one of the most regressive tax codes in the country, and working families pay a far larger share of their income than the wealthiest residents do. Asking those earning more than $1 million a year to contribute more is a fair step toward sustainable funding for our paramount duty. I don’t support the current allotment of funds to the general fund vs directly linked to K-12. I believe a significant share of the revenue should go to K-12: fully funding special education, updating MSOC to real costs, and increasing staffing ratios for counselors, nurses, and paraeducators so districts can rely less on levies. Because collections don't begin until 2029, I would plan carefully for that transition, and I would require clear, public reporting so families can see where every dollar goes. I do not think this tax alone will close our budgetary shortfalls and I do not see a clear reprieve for working families coming from it so, while it seems like a step in the right direction, I don’t see a decrease in our current regressive model. This is just a step along a necessary journey of overhauling our antiquated tax system, which we should do transparently and with clear numbers and results to build and repair public trust.

12.

Family and student participation & accountability

Seattle Council PTSA: How would you ensure that students and families have meaningful opportunities to participate in education policy decisions at the state and district levels? What specific steps would you support to ensure that adopted policies are implemented effectively and that districts are held accountable for following them?

Mary Anito: Community is built through open government, transparent data, and inviting constituents into the budgeting and policymaking process. I know families can't participate if information and meetings aren't accessible to them. I feel like recent efforts for more community meetings in SPS are improving community engagement and buy in so continue to scale those sorts of efforts. I would support multilingual outreach and services, meeting times and formats that work for working families, and real seats at the table for students and families in state and district policy decisions. On implementation and accountability, I believe in clear goals, quarterly progress reports, and transparent, school-level reporting so families can see progress for themselves. Pilot programs should be evaluated before they are scaled, so what works grows and we make changes to programs that aren’t serving us.