A 30-day cut in terror?

Last year, Delegate Mark Fisher did what only three others in the decade of my monoblogue Accountability Project have done: compiled a perfect 25-for-25 vote score. Unfortunately for him, 2016 brought two such scores and based on his overall record and other factors my Legislator of the Year was fellow Delegate Warren Miller, who compiled the other perfect mark.

But Fisher has put up an interesting proposal that reflects a desire to limit government, at least as part of an e-mail I received. Here are a couple excerpts:

Each year, Maryland has a 90-day Legislative Session.  Over 3,000 bills are proposed each year that seek to limit your freedoms and stifle prosperity.  And so the question arises:  How does Virginia, a much larger state, survive with only a 60-day Session during even years – and a 46-day Session during odd years?

The answer is simple – Annapolis elites believe that your prosperity comes from government.

(snip)

But, it doesn’t have to be this way.  A shorter, 60-day legislative session combined with a modest salary of $18,000.00, like Virginia, is a good start.   When a legislature has less time to meet, there’s less time to meddle.

It’s true that other states have differing rules on their legislative sessions, as does Congress. But in all honesty, the state legislature really has just one job, and that’s to approve the budget. Instead, they do meddle in a lot of things and more often than not, they remove county authority in favor of the state. While there’s a stated goal among many to be “One Maryland,” the reality is that the Annapolis perception of “One Maryland” is a lot different than the reality we live with. Our Maryland is slower-paced, doesn’t rely on the federal government for employment, and would prefer local control of many entities, such as planning and zoning and our schools. We also have competition that’s unique to our part of the state for business and retail establishments, as those across the Mason-Dixon and Transpeninsular lines in Delaware toil in a state known for being business-friendly and without a sales tax.

Yet if Fisher wants to cut into the sum total of legislation, he doesn’t necessarily need to shorten the session. Perhaps there needs to be a regulation in place that creates a sunset date for all new bills so that they need to be revisited every few years. (Some bills already feature this, so they have to be dealt with at appropriate times.)

I think he has the right idea on this one, but I’m sure it’s an idea that goes nowhere given the state of our state.