Legislative checkup, March 2007 (Maryland)

Early this a.m. I did the federal side, so now it’s time to check in on our local state legislators. This time, I’ll format things a little differently because a lot of this ground was covered the last time I did this.

District 37A Delegate Rudy Cane is now up to 119 co-sponsorships, which leads the local pack. As far as status of these bills go, 3 have passed the House (HB62, HB303, and HB416 – all passed with identical 136-0 votes), 3 have passed through committee, 1 was defeated in committee, 4 withdrawn, 34 have been heard with no further action, 45 are on the hearing schedule, and 29 have no hearing scheduled.

In District 37B, Delegate Addie Eckardt is listed as a sponsor on 108 bills, of which 3 have passed the House (HB62, HB303, and HB670. I want to know who voted “no” on the 134-1 vote passing HB670!). Of the rest, 1 passed committee, 5 lost in committee, 3 were withdrawn, 31 have been heard with no future action, 35 are slated for hearings, and 30 are not on the hearing docket yet. Counterpart Delegate Jeannie Haddaway has 99 bills under her name, with the same set passing. Also like Eckardt, 1 bill has passed committee (same bill), but 3 have lost committee votes, 3 were withdrawn, 21 have been heard but not acted upon further, 40 have hearing scheduled, and 28 bills have no hearing set at this time.

Delegate Page Elmore in District 38A is second to Cane with 115 bills bearing his name as sponsor or co-sponsor. Along with the aforementioned HB303, he also had HB164 passed with a 137-0 vote. One bill has made it through committee, 5 lost in committee, and 5 were withdrawn. As far as hearings go, 33 of his subject bills have been heard with no further action, 44 are on the hearing docket, and 25 are still awaiting a hearing date.

In my district of 38B, both Delegates Norm Conway and Jim Mathias are listed on 59 bills (but not the same ones.) Both sponsored HB303, but after that things are a bit different. For Conway, the scorecard has one bill through committee, 2 withdrawn, 17 heard without further action taken, 19 bills to be heard, and 19 with no hearing date. Mathias is a little less complicated – 2 measures bearing his name have been withdrawn, 15 have been heard and nothing else, 19 are on the hearing schedule, and 22 aren’t on the slate. No bill co-sponsored by Mathias has either died in or passed committee except HB303.

Senator Rich Colburn of District 37 will be a busy guy. This is because of 107 bills he’s lent his sponsorship to, a whopping 60 have hearings scheduled. 28 others have been heard, and just 13 await a hearing time. Of the rest, one was re-referred, 2 withdrawn, and three have passed their second reading so they should be acted on early this upcoming week.

On my side of the lower Shore, District 38’s Senator Lowell Stoltzfus is only on 50 bills. One of these (SB374) is completely through the process, having passed 47-0. Another one is through its second reading. Seventeen of his bills have been heard without any action taken, 26 are still awaiting a scheduled hearing, and just 5 languish with no date set yet.

Last time I went through this, I had a laundry list of bills of note. Here’s an update.

HB44/SB51 was one version of the Maryland Clean Cars Act. But the version that actually passed was HB131/SB103. Locally, voting yes on that bill in the 122-16 House vote were Cane, Conway, Elmore, and Mathias; on the flip (and correct) side were Delegates Eckardt and Haddaway. In the Senate’s 38-9 vote the local delegation split as Lowell Stoltzfus voted yes (and was quoted in the Sun), Rich Colburn voted no.

HB148/SB634 has had no action since its hearing.

HB225/SB211 also has had no action (aside from media coverage, it’s the death penalty repeal) since its hearing.

HB273 has a hearing set for Wednesday (the 7th) at 1:00 p.m.

HB288/SB207 have now been heard but no further action taken. Big tax increases tend to be slipped in late in the session.

HB289, the bill concerning the Civic Center, has been withdrawn.

HB312/SB373 will have hearings March 12 at 10 a.m. (Senate) and 11 a.m. (House).

HB359/SB91 (the “Clean Indoor Air Act”) has a House hearing on March 7th at 1 p.m. and a Senate hearing March 15th, also at 1 p.m. Look for those news stories Thursday.

HB365 had its hearing, and that’s the status of it. Same for the next one down on my list, HB 400.

HB430, the “living wage” bill, also sits in limbo after its hearing.

After my previous post, commenter “Georgia” brought up HB445/SB37. This also had its hearings but no further action.

HB537, a GOP-sponsored bill regarding driver’s licenses for illegal aliens, now has a hearing set for March 14 at 1:00. I’m sure CASA of Maryland has that date circled on its calendar.

HB620/SB494 just had its Senate hearing Friday, so both hearings are complete and that’s the status of this bill.

HB754 has progressed no farther than the hearing stage.

HB890/SB409, the global warming bill, had a Senate hearing but awaits a House hearing this coming Friday at 1:00 p.m. So look for a big snow or ice storm to hit.

HB909/SB674 has had that same treatment – Senate hearing complete, House hearing scheduled for March 14 at 1:00 p.m.

Jessica’s Law, known in this session by the moniker HB930/SB413, will have hearings on consecutive days starting with the House March 13 at 1:00 p.m. The Senate has its turn the following day at that same time.

That same pattern applies to the combo HB994/SB475, except one week earlier. The House hearing is Tuesday at 1:00 p.m. and the Senate is Wednesday at that same time.

I didn’t hear a large rumbling about this in the media, but SB564, an act to place a Constitutional amendment to declare marriage as solely between one man and one woman on next year’s ballot, did have a hearing and awaits more action.

The Voter ID act, SB597, will be heard by the Senate on Thursday at 1:00.

Finally among the older bills, SB598 had its hearing and awaits a new move.

I also found a few new bills of interest. Awhile back I posted about my morning listening to the Holly Center’s legislative agenda. Their pet bills were introduced recently as HB1358, the Freedom of Choice Act, an act allowing state institutions to be on the menu for care for individuals with developmental disabilities; and HB1359/SB920, which repeals the sunset provision of respite care for these individuals. Respite care is allowing a state institution to care for a developmentally disabled person for a short amount of time in order to give the primary caregiver a break. These were introduced last week so no hearing is set yet.

Another combination bill I didn’t catch the first time through is HB885/SB943, allowing the state to recognize English as its official language. Of course the GOP is behind it, so of course there’s no hearing scheduled for it yet.

Finally, there are two gun control and crime prevention items that were introduced, and surprisingly both of these have a hearing scheduled for March 21 at 1:00. SB761 “(authorizes) a person charged with a specified crime to assert a claim of self-defense even though the person failed to retreat or seek safety by escape”, and SB762 repeals “the requirement that the Secretary of State Police find that a person has a good and substantial reason to wear, carry, or transport a handgun before issuing a handgun permit to the person.” In other words, shall-issue. Both are sponsored by Republicans, so unfortunately I doubt either of these have a hope in hell in the not-so-free state we live in.

So another few weeks has passed in our 90 days of chaos in Annapolis. I’ll probably do two more of these updates for the state session, one may be a Maryland-only update since their session is so compressed compared to the federal one (which gets an Easter break sometime in early April anyway.) The count for the state is now a shade over 2,400 different items introduced with most of them flying under the radar. It’s a shame how government works sometimes – fortunately we do have a pretty good system of tracking these things. I have to put out a big “thank you” to the folks who run the General Assembly website, without whom this post would’ve been impossible.