General Assembly Post-Game Wrap-Up/Pre-Game Show: Wednesday, January 27, 2021

A very rare Wednesday session, with full agendas scheduled in both chambers.  Oh, and some teaching opportunities for the masses. Woo-hoo!

Here’s yesterday’s Session Activity Report.

You will notice that the Sussex Tech bill has been replaced with an alternative that  ‘does not change the preferences for student admissions or the eligibility standards for accepted students’.   Does it fill anybody with confidence that the authors had previously inserted preferences for the families of board members?  Kevin O, what do you think of the substitute bill? BTW, it’s on today’s Senate Agenda, which otherwise is unremarkable.  BTWBTW, you will note the following designation on the Agenda in parentheses on certain bills on tomorrow’s agenda: (FM).  No, it doesn’t mean that there’s no static at all on the Senate feed of the activities.  FM stands for Floor Manager.  When a bill comes over from the House, someone, usually the chair of the committee that considered the bill, will run the bill on the floor. (FM) designates the senator who will run the bill.

Other than the last couple of weeks of June, the House rarely if ever runs an agenda on Wednesdays.  Committee meetings are generally the only order of business then.  However, with only two days remaining before the Joint Finance Committee break, the House is running this Agenda today.  You will see that there is a lengthy Consent Agenda scheduled for consideration.  You rarely see a consent agenda before the end of June. Meaning, yet another teaching opportunity for me! A Consent Agenda consists of a series of bills that are generally considered non-controversial and, as such, may all be passed with one roll call.  Any member of the chamber may object to any bill being placed on the consent agenda, and it will be removed w/o debate.  Having said that, the bills on this consent agenda all look pretty non-controversial to me.

It’s still Wednesday, and we do have committee meetings for ya.  Senate Committee meeting schedule.  House Committee Meeting schedule.  Here’s what I find intriguing:

HB 65 (Osienski).  This bill may well be on the Governor’s desk by tomorrow, as well it should. It ‘provides COVID-19 related relief to both claimants receiving unemployment benefits and employers who are assessed unemployment taxes, and extends the end date of the Secretary of Labor’s COVID-19 related rulemaking authority’.  Passed the House unanimously.  Look for a similar result in the Senate.  (Senate Labor).

SB 32 (Brown).  This bill ‘makes clear that race also includes traits historically associated with race, including hair texture and a protective hairstyle, which includes braids, locks, and twists’, and prohibits such traits as being used as vehicles to discriminate. (Senate Judiciary).

SB 27 (Sokola).  Not what it appears to be.  This bill simply removes unconstitutional sections of, yes, the Delaware Constitution.  Didja know that there was a time when all three counties had equal representation in the Delaware General Assembly?  The Supreme Court ruled that such provisions were unconstitutional, being violative of one-man/one-vote principles.   This first leg of a Constitutional Amendment (writing the word ‘constitutional’ so many times is challenging to my constitution)  simply removes this language from the, that word again, Constitution.  (Senate Executive).

HB 33 (K. Johnson).  This bill ‘changes the relationship between physicians and physician assistants from supervisory to collaborative, in recognition of the evolving role of physician assistants and reflecting the education, training, and experience required for licensing, which emphasizes the team-based practice model’.  Hey, it’s true, might as well codify it. I do have one question, however:  The bill ‘adds 2 physician assistants members recommended by the Regulatory Council for Physician Assistants to the Board of Medical Licensure and Discipline in lieu of 2 public members’.  I support adding two physician assistants to the board, but why eliminate the public members?  Why not simply increase the size of the board? (House Sunset Committee).

SB 42 (Townsend).  This one could well head to the governor’s desk tomorrow as well. It ‘suspends the educator evaluation system during the 2020-2021 school year and replaces it with an observation and feedback cycle that provides educators with coaching and support related to hybrid and remote learning practices’.  Passed the Senate unanimously. (House Education).

I’ll be back tomorrow as we find out what absolutely has to be done before the JFC hearings.  And, yes, the Governor will submit his proposed operating budget, which will inevitably betray his signature paucity of vision.