…….A governor (or president) is measured in a large part by how successful he is in getting in getting his legislative agenda passed. That’s why I often thought former legislators make better governors. They’ve been in the trenches and not only know how a bill is passed, they have close contacts in the legislature to carry their water. Several of our more effective governors, Gaston Caperton for example, hired legislative liaisons that carried their water.
….. Our new Governor, Patrick Morrisey, is hitting a few snags in getting his legislative agenda passed. HB 2007, repealing Certificate of Needs for hospitals, died in House Health & Human Resources on a 13-12 vote. Morrisey supports a free market when it comes to hospitals or clinics purchasing high cost, equipment like MRI or CT scans. I was in the legislature when we put the Certificate of Needs in place believing that to have the same equipment three miles apart (Trinity and WVU-Weirton Medical Center) was duplication and would drive health care costs up. Can this bill be brought to life? Remember, nothing is ever dead in the constantly evolving legislative process, thus the saying coined by former Speaker Clyde See, “fat possums travel late at night.”
……..Morrisey also pretty much had one of the cornerstones of his agenda gutted. A bill to consolidate six departments in his Executive Dept. into three was amended with two consolidations deleted. Only one of his three areas to consolidate survived the Senate: the consolidation of the Dept. of Commerce and Development Department just made good sense. Their projects were overlapping and they even shared the same attorney. Morrisey’s attempt to merge the Dept. of Tourism and the Dept. of Art Culture & History failed and did the Dept of Homeland Security.
…..SB 460, to allow religious and philosphical exemptions to the mandatory vaccines sailed right through the Senate and was referred to Health and Human Services Committee in the House. I wrote last week, that Sen. Ryan Weld’s amendment to allow parochial schools to set a higher standards and allow only medical exemptions failed. I think the bill’s path in the House may be a little rockier. Roman Catholic Bishop Mark Brennan of the Wheeling/Charleston Diocese has sent a letter to Delegates explaining the Catholic Churches position. The letter reads:
………”The bill purports to create an exemption from vaccination requirements for all schools. But, the effect of the bill as written actually has the opposite effect forcing parochial schools to accept another religions teaching on vaccinations of children and therefore restricts religious freedom by limiting free access.”
…….It will be interesting to see whether the Delegates follow the House Leadership or their Church Leadership? I agree with Bishop Brennan on this one. I also think Governor Morrisey should have scoped out all the opposition to the bill before bill drafting started working on it. The WVEA and the Catholic Church are two pretty ominous opponents.
…….One thing that has changed in the years since I was in the legislator: only two delegates could sponsor a bill (ie: co-sponsor). That number increased to allow up to 10 co-sponsors on a bill, which is good if you have ten legislators working towards its passage, but its also bad if legislators merely allow their name to be used and invest no time or effort towards its passage.
…….Some bills I’ll be watching: HB 3012 deals with video lottery – Del. Mark Zatezalo (R-2nd) The bill removes certain language related to the percentage allocated for net terminal income. The bill modifies the allocation of funding for lottery revenues, Finally, the bill provides that certain monies received will not be affected by certain counties in the State.” Is this the bill to return 1 percent to Hancock Commission while keeping the municipalities 1 percent intact? I don’t see the specific language in there, but it does open up the code and could be amended to do just that.
…….SB 29 – Requires municipal elections to be held on the same day as a State election; SB 497- Removing reflexology from the definition of massage therapy; SB 546 – Banning artificial coloring in food; SB 591 – Making time spent on 4-H or FFA projects not be counted as absence from school.
Are you interested in a certain bill? Let me know and I’ll add to the list of bills we follow.
