The code reviser makes recommendations to the Legislature for correction or removal of deficiencies, conflicts, or obsolete provisions of the Revised Code of Washington (RCW). These are technical non-substantive amendments to the RCW to fix internal references, cross references, obsolete terminology, double amendments, or otherwise improve the form of the RCW. All proposed legislation must be annotated to show the purposes, reasons, and history.

De-codification stops the publication of a law in the RCW, but does not eliminate the law since it is not a repeal.  The code reviser recommends de-codification when a provision of law is no longer general and permanent which is the legal requirement for codification.

The following technical, non-substantive amendments are made:

• merges multiple amendments created when sections were amended without reference to other amendments made in the same session;
• removes references in the code to the department of community, trade, and economic development and replaces them with the Department of Commerce, or Commerce in accordance with renaming that department by laws enacted in 2009;
• adds an expiration date of June 30, 2016, for amendments to the vocational rehabilitation pilot program which expired June 30, 2016;
• repeals an expiration date of July 1, 2013, for two 2011 amendments to the Hospital Safety Net Assessment Fund—the repealed expiration date conflicts with the expiration date for the fund which is July 1, 2025;
• de-codifies the following work groups, committees, or task forces that have been terminated, expired, or are no longer active: School Bullying and Harassment Work Group; Hate Crime Advisory Working Group; Statewide Coordinating Committee on Sex Trafficking; Joint Select Committee on Healthcare Oversight; and the Task Force to Review Federal 2007 Race and Ethnicity Reporting Guidelines;
• reorganizes subsection numbering so that distinct criminal penalties are located in separate paragraphs related to restrictions on the carrying of firearms or dangerous weapons at certain locations such as schools, voting centers, and the capitol campus;
• corrects terminology relating to behavioral health disorders in certain sex offense statutes, including changing the term "person with a chemical dependency" to "person with a substance use disorder," and "developmentally disabled, mentally disordered" to "a person with a developmental disability or mental disorder";
• updates a reference to a federal law which was reclassified and renumbered in 2017;
• updates a subsection reference in criminal statutes related to intimidating a judge;
• replaces instances of the word "marijuana" with "cannabis," in accordance with 2022 legislation, in statutes related to criminal procedure, long-term care worker screening, and business and occupation tax;
• corrects an erroneous section reference to the student loan advocate within the Office of Student Financial Assistance;
• changes the term "apartment" to "lot" in a section of the Homeowners' Associations Act;
• corrects an erroneous subsection reference in a statute related to eligibility for community transition services; and
• replaces an erroneous usage of the word "county" with "country" in a statute related to nonresident vessel permits.

PRO: There are 40,000 sections of code in the RCW.  Sometimes they have errors.  This bill will make technical corrections to some of those sections.