Legislative Report: Feb. 22, 2021

This week Senate Appropriations finished up policy bills that either have appropriations in them or they affect the revenue/expenditures of agencies. We are also continuing our subcommittee work on agency budgets, so it was a very busy week.

The committee heard SB 2256 which would provide for a study of the Developmental Disability Division of the Department of Human Services. The question is not whether the study should be conducted, but how the funding requested ($150,000) would be distributed. Should there be a firm hired, or should the Department conduct the study? We still have this bill in our committee for a vote.

My subcommittees on agency budgets completed most of our work and have the following budgets either on the calendar for the full Senate to vote or are waiting to be placed on the calendar: Judiciary, Council on the Arts, Legislative Branch, Department of Transportation, and Career and Technical Education.

My remaining subcommittees with work to complete include Judicial Branch, Highway Patrol, Commerce, Agricultural Research and Extension, Information Technology, and two other bills, one addressing the University System Challenge Grant Program, and one on child support.

SB 2201 was voted on this week in the Senate. This is a bill to make daylight savings time the time zone for all the state year around. This would cause a lot of problems for those communities sitting on state lines. The first vote was 23 yes and 24 no and the bill failed. The next day, it was reconsidered with an amendment offered. That amendment stated that when the surrounding states moved to permanent daylight savings time and the U.S. Congress approved the permanent change for states, North Dakota would then adopt daylight savings time year around. The bill passed with a vote of 36 yes and 11 no. This bill has many benefits but also many problems. I would doubt that all the contingencies necessary to change North Dakota permanently to daylight savings time will ever be met.

SB 2311 was heard this week. I sponsored this bill with help from Kennedy Gjovik from Pekin. This bill would have required schools to include education for student in grades 7-12 on mental health awareness and suicide prevention. The Senate Human Services Committee turned this into a review of health education contents standards and curriculum used in our schools. The Department of Public Instruction will be tasked with this review. This change will enable the legislature to ensure that best practices are being followed, what is being taught on this subject in all grades, and if there is instruction in identifying warning signs and risk factors as well as at-risk peers. This bill is on its way to the House. Thanks, Kennedy, for bringing this important issue forward.

Several gaming bills were heard in the Senate over the past two weeks and all of them have been defeated. One of the contentious bills was a bill to reduce the number of e-tab machines in the state to 2,000. Currently there are 3,400 machines. That bill was also defeated on a vote of 1 yes to 46 no. I voted no on that bill.

This will be our final full week of session until cross-over time. The Senate should complete its first half of work by February 24 and be on break until March 3. That time is needed by staff to retool the systems for the second half of our session when the House hears the Senate bills that were passed, and the Senate hears the House bills that passed.

During our week ahead, we will be spending more time in our floor session debating and voting on bills out of committees. Our voting sessions this coming week will most likely still stay at 1 p.m. But February 22-24, we will spend all our time in the Senate voting on bills.

Remember that all committee work as well as all voting session in the Senate are live and you can tune in by going to http://www.legis.nd.gov.

I appreciate all your contacts on bills. You can continue to reach me at [email protected] as well as by phone at (701) 302-0355.