11 June 2008

Committee action, Jun. 11: SB 672, SB 232, SB 233, HB 1372, HB 988

DID YOU KNOW?
SB 672 would give a nice pay raise to legislators. Author Sen. Ann Duplessis gave little explanation since everybody knew what it was, reminding it had been amended further just to apply a salary increase, not that of supplements. House and Governmental Affairs Committee Chairman Rick Gallot moved for adoption, saying he’d hope votes would be forthcoming to at least get it to the floor for discussion. He got it, with Reps. Connick, Cromer, Ellington, Geymann, Henry, Jackson, Jones, Ligi, Marchand, Pugh, Ponti, Smiley, and himself voting in favor, while Barras, Danahay, Richard, and Smith voted against.

DID YOU KNOW?
SB 232 and SB 233 would place term limits on members of board and commissioners. Author Sen. Willie Mount explained SB 232 (a constitutional amendment) and welcomed amendments proposed last week defining the boards to be covered and that it would start the three-term limit clock on Aug. 15, for appointed positions only. They were adopted without objection, and the bill was adopted without objection.

SB 233, the enabling legislation, also was amended similarly and adopted without objection, and adopted without objection.

DID YOU KNOW?
HB 1372 is Rep. Mert Smiley’s annual exercise in ridding the state of boards and commissions that don’t seem to provide a whole lot. Smiley said the Legislative Auditor and legislative staff finds out some basic information about all of them and if they aren’t active, he puts them in the bill. Without any debate, it was reported favorably by the Senate and Governmental Affairs Committee.

DID YOU KNOW?
HB 988 by Rep. Wayne Waddell would prohibit allowing a legislator’s district offices to be leased from the legislator or his family. Without discussion, it was reported favotably without objection.

QUOTES OF THE DAY:
Let’s say that Sen. John … John Doe, I wanted to say Smith but he’s right here.
Rep. Nita Hutter in explaining her HB 906 which addresses anonymous ethics complaints, trying to come up with a hypothetical example of an ethics complaint.

I tell my constituents that there are 1.2 million John Smiths in the United States … and that number doubles on Saturday nights.
Sen. John Smith.

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

How self-serving this is to give a raise when people are struggling with high gas and food prices which they can't control and to hear that they can put their own value on their service. Wish everyone could do this. They are supposed to be there to be supporting us, but again they only are supporting their number one.