Legislative regular session rankings, 2014

And so the session is complete, save an unprecedented and would be miraculous veto override session being called. Thus, it’s time to compute the voting scorecard for the 2014 session. Sixteen issues were selected and weighed for computation, all but four having been voted upon in both chambers. These were chosen mostly from the watch list compiled throughout the session, along with others of some importance. For a bill’s vote(s) to be selected, in one chamber there had to be more than one legislator not voting for the winning or losing side.

Being that passage of bills depends upon the seated membership of a body, not voting is counted as a negative vote. However, if a legislator had a leave of absence granted for that day, his absent votes weren’t counted for bills voted on that day and the score adjusted to take that into account.

Here are the bills with votes for final passage in every case on which the scorecard was computed, with the conservative/reform position and the weighing indicated:

Legislative regular session through Jun. 28, 2014

And so we come to the final entry for this 2014 regular session, with the disposition of a few remaining bills and the scorecard for 2014.

THIS WEEK FOR THE GOOD: HB 663 was signed by the governor; HB 1013 was signed by the governor; HB 1076 was signed by the governor; HB 1079 was signed by the governor; SB 62 was signed by the governor.

FINAL SCORECARD:

Regular legislative session through Jun. 21, 2014

THIS WEEK FOR THE GOOD: HB 1176 was signed by the governor; HB 1262 was signed by the governor; SB 312 was signed by the governor; SB 468 was signed by the governor; SB 682 was signed by the governor.

THIS WEEK FOR THE BAD: HB 142 was vetoed by the governor; HB 249 was signed by the governor; HB 1097 was signed by the governor; SB 126 was signed by the governor; SB 322 was signed by the governor; SB 554 was signed by the governor.

SCORECARD:

Legislative regular session through Jun. 14, 2014

THIS WEEK FOR THE GOOD: HB 265 was signed by the governor; HB 305 was signed by the governor; HB 388 was signed by the governor; HB 1262 was signed by the governor; SB 337 was signed by the governor; SB 361 was signed by the governor; SB 432 was signed by the governor.

THIS WEEK FOR THE BAD: SB 60 was signed by the governor; SB 624 was signed by the governor.

SCORECARD:

Legislative regular session through Jun. 7, 2014

In a wonderfully wacky move, some of the text of HB 956, what had been a bad-rated bill trapped in a Senate committee, was read into previously unrated SB 359 by Sen. Jack Donahue. Most crucially, it incorporated a phrase which negated the negative effects of the bill (which actually had been added when in left the House). Thus, HB 956 is struck from the list of bad bills.

THIS WEEK FOR THE GOOD: HB 663 was sent to the governor; HB 874 was signed by the governor; HB 876 was signed by the governor; HB 1013 was concurred in and sent to the governor; HB 1076 was concurred in and sent to the governor; HB 1079 had the Senate reject it, the House accept the conference report, the Senate accept the conference report, and was sent to the governor; HB 1176 had the House accept the conference report, the Senate accept the conference report, and was sent to the governor; HB 1199 was signed by the governor; HB 1225 was signed by the governor; HB 1262 was sent to the governor; SB 62 was sent to the governor; SB 177 was signed by the governor; SB 312 was sent to the governor;  SB 394 was sent to the governor; SB 432 was sent to the governor;  SB 445 was signed by the governor;  SB 468 was sent to the governor;  SB 469 was signed by the governor; SB 682 was sent to the governor.

THIS WEEK FOR THE BAD: HB 96 was sent to the secretary of state; HB 111 was sent to the secretary of state; HB 187 was vetoed; HB 249 was sent to the governor; HB 322 was signed by the governor; SB 322 was concurred in and sent to the governor.