Latest news with #HouseBill378
Yahoo
19-03-2025
- Politics
- Yahoo
Idaho Legislature prepares highest number of bills in last five years
The Idaho State Capitol building in Boise as seen on Jan. 11, 2023. (Otto Kitsinger for Idaho Capital Sun) The Idaho Legislature has introduced so many new bills this year that some Republicans are trying to expand a state government office in order to handle the onslaught of new legislation. According to data compiled by the Idaho Legislative Services Office, the Idaho Legislature has prepared and introduced more bills this legislative session than any session over the previous five years. Through Friday, the end of the 10th week in the 2025 legislative session, staff had prepared 890 pieces of legislation this year. That compares to just 793 pieces of legislation prepared over the same 10-week time period in 2023 and 784 pieces of legislation from the same time period in 2022. SUBSCRIBE: GET THE MORNING HEADLINES DELIVERED TO YOUR INBOX House Minority Leader Ilana Rubel, D-Boise, said she has noticed a huge shift in the volume of bills since she was first appointed to the Idaho Legislature 2014. Rubel blamed an influx of out-of-state form legislation on the increased volume of bills. Form legislation, or model legislation, is where a group or an organization creates bill templates that could be shopped around different state legislatures all across the country once a lobbyist or legislator makes a few minor wording changes to localize a bill, the Sun has previously reported. Examples include bills that block transgender athletes participating in women's sports and the Texas-style immigration bill that surfaced as House Bill 83 in Idaho this year. Groups including the Alliance Defending Freedom and the Foundation for Government Accountability have been involved in form legislation in Idaho or worked with Idaho legislators. 'A lot of this is being driven, frankly, by these out-of-state bill mills,' Rubel said in an interview Tuesday. Rubel said she thinks the increase in out-of-state form legislation dovetails with the introduction of a new bill, House Bill 378, that seeks to increase transparency by asking legislators to self-disclose any out-of-state government travel for government purposes that legislators did not pay for themselves. 2025: 890 2024: 873 2023: 793 2022: 784 2021: 794 2020: 775 Source: Idaho Legislative Services Office 'The reality is a lot of people are going to these right wing think tank conferences where they have these cookie cutter boiler plate bills that they're trying to shop in every red state of America,' Rubel said. 'And you see the same bill, basically, that's introduced in Texas on Monday, in Arkansas on Tuesday, and Idaho on Wednesday, and Tennessee on Thursday. And they are not tailored to what we need in Idaho. They are not driven by any desires of the people of Idaho, or any needs of the people of Idaho. They are being driven by an ideologue, often 2,000 or 3,000 miles away, who are just cranking these bills out and just shopping them everywhere.' On Tuesday, Rep. Josh Tanner, an Eagle Republican who often tries to reduce budgets and spending, made an unsuccessful attempt to expand the Legislative Services Office to hire a bill drafting attorney. CONTACT US During Tuesday's Joint Finance-Appropriations Committee, Tanner tried to add one full-time position and $128,500 in additional state spending to the Legislative Services Office. Tanner's request was above what the Legislative Services Office and Gov. Brad Little requested. Just six days earlier, Tanner had led the effort to zero out funding to expand a popular physicians recruitment program to help doctors working in underserved Idaho cities and towns. Last Wednesday, Tanner asked, 'Where is enough enough within some of these programs?' But on Tuesday, Tanner said he had taken a close look at the increased workload bill drafters face and decided that the one new employee he requested probably still was not enough. 'I thought at least going with one was a necessary thing to make sure that our staff is being taken care of,' Tanner said Tuesday. 'Whether it is the workload that we are pushing on them, there is no law out there that says we cannot bring a bill forward or go ask questions to them.' Tanner's motion failed on a deadlocked 10-10 vote. Rep. James Petzke, R-Meridian, voted against the increased funding and the new bill drafting attorney position after saying JFAC should follow its own guidance to produce efficient, lean budgets. 'This is making me really uneasy,' Petzke said. 'I believe that we need to eat our own cooking,' Petzke added. 'We've done a really good job as a committee this year of limiting every budget. We've cut tens of millions of dollars, including we just cut a whole bunch out of (the Idaho Transportation Department). We've cut dozens of (full-time positions) out of all agencies across the state. We made (the Division of Financial Management) eat their own cooking on the 3% cap. I think that we need to hold ourselves to a similar standard.' Even as legislators hope to wind down the legislative session, new bills have been introduced this week. Republican leaders set a nonbinding target to adjourn the 2025 legislative session March 21. However, the Idaho Legislatures Joint Finance-Appropriations Committee has fallen behind and has not set many of the major fiscal year 2026 budgets for state agencies, delaying legislators from adjourning. There is no requirement to adjourn an Idaho legislative session by any certain date, but most last for 75 to 90 days. However, the 2021 legislative session – which was marked by extended recesses and a COVID-19 work stoppage – ran for 311 days, became the longest legislative session in state history and did not officially adjourn until Nov. 17. Tuesday marked the 72nd day of the 2025 legislative session. ProgressRpt (1) SUPPORT: YOU MAKE OUR WORK POSSIBLE
Yahoo
13-03-2025
- Politics
- Yahoo
Idaho House debate over legislative travel transparency bill quickly breaks down
The door to the chambers of the House of Representatives at the Idaho State Capitol building in Boise on Jan. 11, 2023. (Otto Kitsinger for Idaho Capital Sun) As the Idaho House of Representatives was about 16 minutes into debating a bill that would've required state lawmakers to disclose out-of-state travel they didn't pay for, the chamber erupted into procedural chaos. Rep. Kent Marmon, R-Caldwell, who is serving his first term in the Idaho Legislature, said several lawmakers had left the floor, and moved the House recess — essentially stop doing business — until lawmakers return to vote on the bill. Idaho Legislature's budget committee operating under two different sets of voting rules Third-term lawmaker Rep. Lori McCann, R-Lewiston, objected, saying lawmakers can leave. Then Rep. David Leavitt, R-Twin Falls, who is also serving his first term in the Idaho Legislature, made a hardly used motion, called a 'Call of the House.' If ordered by one-third of lawmakers present, the move would prompt the House doors to be locked, require all lawmakers present to remain and be tallied, and let the House Sergeant at Arms — if ordered by the majority of members present — to arrest House lawmakers who weren't on the floor and bring them to the floor. Several lawmakers sighed. House Majority Leader Jason Monks, R-Meridian, who was filling in for House Speaker Mike Moyle, R-Star, as the presiding lawmaker over the Idaho House, swiftly called the House at ease. When the House resumed around 12 minutes later, House Assistant Majority Leader Josh Tanner, R-Eagle, moved the House to adjourn until Thursday morning — without voting on the bill. McCann objected. Then Monks announced the voice vote for adjournment — which is typically a daily, swift motion as the House wraps up work for the day. House lawmakers shouted 'aye' and 'nay.' Rep. Stephanie Micklelsen, R-Idaho Falls, who sponsored the legislative travel transparency bill, House Bill 378, shouted to request a roll call vote. Monks did not acknowledge her motion, and said the motion to adjourn passed. Then several lawmakers shouted again. House Bill 378, sponsored by Rep. Stephanie Mickelsen, R-Idaho Falls, would require all Idaho legislative officials to report out-of-state travel, paid by another individual or entity, that is 'reasonably related to a legislative or governmental purpose or to an issue of state, national, or international public policy.' Legislative travel paid through personal funds or campaign funds would not be subject to the bill. 'In this body, we scream and yell about having transparency: transparency in our schools, transparency by every government agency,' Mickelsen said in the House floor debate on her bill Wednesday. 'So today, this is the transparency bill for us as legislators — to show that we walk the walk and talk the talk. If we ourselves are unwilling to be transparent about what we are doing, how can we expect anyone else to do anything less than that?' Several lawmakers — including Rep. Lori McCann, R-Lewiston — spoke in support of the bill, but several lawmakers also felt like the bill was unfair by only requiring reporting for travel that lawmakers don't pay for themselves. 'The biggest thing for me is the fact that the good lady didn't mention that this excludes people who use their own money,' Rep. Clint Hostetler, R-Twin Falls, said in the House floor debate on the bill. 'So if it's really about transparency, shouldn't everybody — whether they can buy their way out of transparency or not — have to declare that? To me, this creates kind of a transparency caste system, right? If you can afford it, you don't have to be transparent. But if you can't afford it, or someone else pays — all of a sudden, you're liable for transparency.' SUBSCRIBE: GET THE MORNING HEADLINES DELIVERED TO YOUR INBOX Immediately after the House adjourned, Monks approached reporters on the House floor and said the Call of the House motion had not yet been seconded. 'So I was able to take another motion. Which I did. Adjournment is higher in ranking as far as motions we take than a Call of the House. So I had to take the adjournment before I could take the Call of the House,' Monks told reporters. Asked about Mickelsen's motion for a roll call vote on adjournment, Monks said he had not recognized her. 'I don't have to recognize people,' Monks told reporters. Asked about McCann's objection, Monks said she can't object to a lawmaker making a motion. Minutes later, McCann approached reporters on the House floor, saying she wished the House would've voted on Mickelsen's bill. 'I don't know if they think that there's something funny going on, that leadership is gone, that Mike left. I don't know,' McCann told reporters. She said she believed the House would have rejected the Call of the House motion. She also said she didn't see a lot of lawmakers leaving the House floor. Mickelsen also approached reporters on the floor after the House adjourned. She said the bill, if passed, would let Idaho voters 'know who is influencing our elections (and) who's influencing our legislation.' 'If you want to talk about why we're where we're at right now with people running the kind of bills that they're running, it has to do with this out-of-state influence. It's the very same people that came in and bought Idaho for ($)2 to $3 million that we're trying to with our other campaign bills that are up to try and at least shed light on what's going on,' Mickelsen told reporters. 'And I gotta tell you, mold grows in deep, dark places. But as soon as you expose it to light, it stops. And they're wanting to pick it apart here, pick it apart there, because they know that this is one of those things that they have all participated in.' SUPPORT: YOU MAKE OUR WORK POSSIBLE
