General Assembly Post-Game Wrap-Up/Pre-Game Show: Thursday, March 11, 2021
Difficult to turn this into anything but a ‘just the facts, ma’am’ edition.
Here’s yesterday’s Session Activity Report. If you can turn these lemons into lemonade, you should be writing for Delaware Liberal.
Here are today’s Senate and House Agendas.
Let’s talk a little bit about HB 31, which eliminates language in the Delaware Code that is no longer applicable. Matt Bittle explains the purpose of the bill:
The proposal, which cleared the House Health & Human Development Committee and now goes to the full chamber, would make the criminal section of the code consistent with legislation passed a few years ago. It essentially would ensure that abortion is treated like any other medical procedure, House Majority Leader Valerie Longhurst told the committee.
“The language in the code is unenforceable, and that’s why we are removing it,” said Rep. Longhurst, a Bear Democrat who introduced the bill.
No doubt the usual suspects will conjure up the usual ‘horribles’. But the bill merely resolves incompatible sections of the Delaware Code. The bill cleared committee in the House yesterday. It could pop up on an agenda as early as next week.
Here’s a bill that interests me. HCR 10 (Shupe) requests ‘the Division of Research, the Office of Management and Budget, and the Delaware Department of Technology & Information to cooperate in creating a detailed and implementable plan to stream audio and video of all floor and committee action of the House of Representatives and Senate; record all such material; and make these recordings available to the public via an online archive.’ Any bill that increases public access to the legislative process is a bill that I can support. It has some bipartisan sponsorship. Perhaps unfortunately, it has been assigned to the House Administration Committee. So I guess it depends on how Our PAL Val is feeling on any given day as to whether it escapes the committee’s clutches. I hope it does.
That’s about all the lemonade I can squeeze out for today. Don’t forget to Spring Ahead this weekend.
Remember what I wrote yesterday about Bill Bush and the minimum wage?:
“Of the eight participants (at the Kent County Chamber forum), only two expressed support for a bill filed Tuesday that would raise the minimum wage from $9.25 to $15 over four years. The proposal has significant Democratic support, but passage is not guaranteed.
“I just think it’s the wrong time to bring this,” said Rep. Bill Bush, a Dover Democrat. “We have businesses that are still hurting. We’re in the middle of a pandemic.”
Rep. William Carson, a Smyrna Democrat, agreed, leaving Sens. Ennis and Trey Paradee as the only ones backing the measure during the forum. Sen. Paradee, a Dover Democrat, also stood out as the only participant to support repealing the lower youth and training wages, as well as the sole legislator who said he is willing to consider establishing paid family leave for the private sector.
“I think it’s a lofty aspiration, but we’ll have to see what it looks like,” he said, adding that that proposal has not yet been formally introduced as legislation.”
As I mentioned on Tuesday, the bill would not take effect until 2022. Bush needs to be primaried in 2022. So does Ol’ Lump and Andria Bennett. They are impediments to Democratic legislative priorities.