The Legislature managed to pass three bills through both chambers in January, and remarkably, none of them are awful.
Two of the three fast-passers are from the Secretary of State’s pile of mostly minor election reforms. House Bill 1049 makes law the Secretary’s traditional 300-word limit on Pro/Con statements in the official ballot question pamphlet published each year to educate voters about the laws they get to vote on. House Bill 1052 fixes one outdated reference to “secondary” elections, renaming them “runoff” elections. Both measures zipped through every committee and chamber with no opposition except for two nays in the House, from Rep. Spencer Gosch (R-23/Glenham) and Rep. Tom Pischke (R-25/Dell Rapids).
Even Gosch and Pischke were o.k. with House Bill 1005, which the Telehealth/Telemedicine Task Force worked out over the interim. The bill simply moves some legal language around to make it easier for health care professionals to provide care via interactive online platforms.
The Legislature can get some small good things done when it sets its mind to it. If Republican legislators weren’t so fixated on buying their tickets to Heaven (or at least the next donors’ ball) by fighting culture-war bogeymen, they might get even more done during our brief Legislative Session.
By my count, in the first 12 days of the 2020 Session, the Legislature has fully passed these three bills, killed ten, and seen three withdrawn by sponsors. That’s an average disposal rate of 1.33 bills per day. The Legislature still has 349 bills pending. With 24 working days remaining in Session (not counting Day 37, Veto Day on March 30), legislators will have to average a disposal rate of 14.54 bills per day. Legislators have four more working days to introduce bills under normal rules.