This week, the House met to agree (or not) on Senate amendments to House bills and set up Committees of Conference on those we want to either learn more or compromise between the House and Senate positions. SB 200, congressional redistricting, went to Committee of Conference, as expected.
My committee asked for a conference on HB 230, about child care licensing; the Senate made a number of changes and we want to go over them together. We agreed to Senate requests on SB 358, which was completely rewritten to revise the administrative rules process, and SB 313, where we added a new oversight committee for the office of professional licensure and made a number of other changes. All should be amicably resolved (I hope!)
There were very few debates; the only real one was on HB 1022, allowing pharmacists to dispense ivermectin by a standing order. The Senate had included a two-year sunset and a study commission; the debate was that ivermectin had not been proven to cure COVID. Well, no, but it has been proven to be safe to use, and if nothing else the placebo effect should be helpful. The House accepted the Senate changes, 157-148.
Most of the real action will be on the House bills the Senate loaded up with their pet positions. They had killed most of the House attempts to load up Senate bills, including SB 227, first responder death benefits with asset forfeiture reform; SB 299, increasing the penalty for escape plus cannabis legalization and home grow; SB 329, housing study commission with a revised procedure to override a local tax cap; SB 333, licensure of case management agencies, with a 7.5% state contribution to local retirement costs; and SB 438, “buy American” steel, with niche beauty services attached.
We’d like to thank Carol McGuire for this state house update. As a reminder, authors’ opinions are their own and may not represent those of Grok Media, LLC, GraniteGrok.com, its sponsors, readers, authors, or advertisers. Submit Op-Eds to steve@granitegrok.com
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