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We are coming to the end when citizens can use RTS to express their views about bills. This is the last week for Senate bills to be heard in their House committees (and vice versa) or be dead for the session. The Appropriations committees get another week.
This week many “striker” or “zombie” (bills that should be dead but have been resurrected from the dead only in a completely different form) have surfaced. There are more striker bills this year than during the past five years. These bills move fast and are often cloaked in secrecy until the last minute meaning, and lawmakers don’t have to share the actual text of the striker until two business days before the committee, i.e., Monday at 5 pm for a Wednesday committee. For this reason, check back on the Civic Engagement Beyond Voting website Monday at 6 pm for details and next steps on some of the Senate Finance Committee’s bad strikers.
Following are the bills coming up in committee this week.
Monday, March 22, 2021
1486 – SUPPORT – Legalizes test strips to detect fentanyl in drugs. Fentanyl has caused a spike in overdose deaths during the pandemic. Arizona is experiencing more drug overdoses in the last few months than during the 2017 peak of the crisis.
2014 – OPPOSE – Attack on Clean Elections.
2308 – OPPOSE – Makes it vastly more difficult to circulate recall petitions, mirroring “strict compliance” restrictions already in place for initiatives and referendums.
2570 – OPPOSE – Bans state agencies, cities, and counties from revoking a business’s license that defied an executive order unless they can prove the business was an actual cause of transmission. Allows businesses, such as bars, to open during a pandemic without consequences.
2717 – OPPOSE – Striker Bill (sponsored by Mark Finchem – need I say more?) It gives the legislature the power to ignore a court judgment that results in them owing money.
2770 – OPPOSE – Exempts businesses from enforcing mask mandates.
2001 – OPPOSE – Asks voters to limit initiatives in Arizona to a single subject or be invalidated.
2016 – OPPOSE – Asks voters to change the Constitution to require that any ballot measure get 55% or more of the vote to pass.
Tuesday, March 23, 2021
1433 – SUPPORT – An emergency measure the would address the $255 million COVID-related funding gap in public schools this year by temporarily funding distance learning students at the same level as in-person students.
1685 – OPPOSE – Specifically bans attendance boundaries for district schools.
1020 – OPPOSE – Asks voters to repeal the restrictive mandate that students be taught only in English.
1011 – OPPOSE – Striker Bill – Urges the federal government to complete the southern border wall.
1046 – SUPPORT – Striker Bill – Asks voters to make “dreamers” eligible for in-state college tuition.
2099 – SUPPORT – Extends the committee created in 2019 to study murders of indigenous women and girls, expand the committee’s work to all indigenous people, and identify targeted solutions to the problem. Murder is the third leading cause of death among Native American women in Arizona.
2123 – SUPPORT – Striker Bill – Anti-expulsion bill for grades PreK-4. Suspension and expulsion in early childhood disproportionately affect children of color, making this an equity issue.
Wednesday, March 24, 2021
For some of these bills, RTS is open for both Wednesday and Thursday. This is because the House Government’s agenda is so long the chair called a second meeting to hear any bills they don’t get to on the first day.
1010 – OPPOSE – Allows anyone with enough money to request a recount of an election. This bill is popular for those who still think Trump won the election!
1068 – OPPOSE – Requires the secretary of state’s elections rules to be signed off on by the Governor’s Regulatory Review Council, a partisan body of gubernatorial appointees, and Legislative Council – not a good thing if your party is not in the majority.
1084 – OPPOSE – Automatically ends any state of emergency after 21 days unless extended by the legislature and bans the governor from proclaiming a new state of emergency “based on the same or substantially similar facts and circumstances” without legislative approval.
1105 – OPPOSE – Increases the printed summary of citizen’s initiatives from 100 to 200 words.
1106 – OPPOSE – Voter Suppression – This one makes it a class 6 felony to register someone to vote who has no “intent to remain” in Arizona.
1119 – OPPOSE – Striker Bill – Allows any Arizona legislature member to demand that the Attorney General review a presidential executive order to declare it unconstitutional. Does this sound a lot like second-guessing the President of the United States when it serves your purpose to cause trouble when there shouldn’t be any?
1241 – OPPOSE – Voter Suppression – Requires in-person voters to get a paper receipt stating if their ballot was accepted or rejected, and if rejected, why.
1273 – OPPOSE – Expands the use of School Tuition Organization tax credit vouchers to a laundry list of new expenses such as extracurricular activities, band uniforms, lab materials, even out-of-state school trips. Really? Charter school kids need out-of-state school trips while Public School kids read photocopied books because they don’t have enough “real” books to go around.
1280 – OPPOSE – Striker Bill – Gives transportation money to parents who send their children to “choice” schools.
1382 – OPPOSE – Redefines firearms and ammunition stores as “essential businesses.”
1392 – OPPOSE – Tax cut similar to one the Trump tax cut provided to wealthy business owners.
1408 – OPPOSE – Voter Suppression – Would change the law retroactively to allow lawmakers to get their hands on confidential ballots by banning them from being considered privileged or confidential.
1459 – OPPOSE – Subjects the Corporation Commission to the administrative review process. This is a sneaky way to do an end-run around the Corporation Commission’s rules.
1498 – OPPOSE – Expands the county boards of supervisors based on population.
1531 – OPPOSE – Requires petition circulators to read the descriptions on initiative and referendum petitions aloud to signers.
1613 – OPPOSE – Requires all election results to remain in the US and not be transferred or stored to any other country and for all elections equipment, including computers, paper, and other supplies, to be made only in the USA. Is that even possible in our global supply chain?
1713 – OPPOSE – Voter Suppression – Requires voters to send their early ballots back with proof of their eligibility to vote. It puts an undue burden on early voters.
1714 – OPPOSE – Requires “paid for by” disclosures on campaign ads to disclose what percentage of contributions came from out of state.
1783 – OPPOSE – It creates a new tax category for small businesses whose income passes through to the owners, using pre-Prop-208 tax rates. Only individual income taxpayers above $500K annually would benefit.
1003 – OPPOSE- Asks voters to allow the governor to declare a state of emergency for 14 days, and anything beyond that time would have to be authorized by the legislature.
1034 – OPPOSE – Asks voters to allow the legislature to amend voter-approved measures with a simple majority if courts find something illegal or unconstitutional in them. The bill effectively creates a loophole to weaken the Voter Protection Act.
2005 – OPPOSE – Striker Bill – Blocks large companies like Google and Apple from restricting the purchase and download of apps to only their proprietary stores.
2427 – MONITORING – Striker Bill – The verbiage is not available at this time, but it will likely be similar to SB1685 which specifically bans school districts’ attendance boundaries.
2433 – MONITORING – Striker Bill – Actual amendment will be released Monday. The short title is “businesses; firearms; unlawful acts.”
2879 – MONITORING – Striker Bill – Actual amendment will be released Monday. The short title is “DOR; administrative rulings; procedures.”
Thursday, March 25, 2021 – Finally!
2098 – SUPPORT – Requires law enforcement to submit missing child reports to the National Center for Missing & Exploited Children.
2462 – OPPOSE – Forces people to take extensive training (at least 80 hours) before serving on civilian review boards. The added cost of this requirement could shut out the communities most affected by police misconduct and would likely preclude many Arizonans (think people of color) from serving.
2792 – OPPOSE – Makes it a class 5 felony to send someone a ballot if they didn’t explicitly request one.
RTS: Bills in House and Senate Rules Committees
Rules meets only to determine if bills are constitutional and in proper format. Positions on Monday’s bills must be entered before 9 am. These bills have all appeared on the Cheat Sheet, and you have probably already weighed in on them.
1127 – OPPOSE
1135 – OPPOSE
1377 – OPPOSE
1409 – OPPOSE
1457- OPPOSE
1793 – OPPOSE
1019 – OPPOSE
1024 – OPPOSE
2310 – OPPOSE
2366 – OPPOSE
2395 – SUPPORT
2569 – OPPOSE
2840 – OPPOSE
2023 – OPPOSE
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