Back in Session

After two weeks of recess, the Legislature has officially reconvened. In the Senate, we worked our way through most of the third reading calendar. The House, in the meantime, refused to approve two important budgets. Budgeting is a long process and these actions will delay our end to session, especially as we delve into passing American Rescue Plan Act dollars.

Limiting the Governor's powers to respond to an emergency continues to be the top priority for the majority. 

While the House refused to pass basic budgets, the Senate passed S135 and S1136, which provide the Legislature more power to act during an emergency. The bills narrow the Governor's ability to declare an emergency to very limited circumstances, removing the ability to declare emergencies during an "epidemic." The bills limit emergency declarations to 60 days unless the Legislature extends them, and allow the Legislature to end an emergency by concurrent resolution.

I voted against both of these bills because I believe the office of the Governor - rather than 105 legislators - should have leeway to act during an emergency. This year's session alone has made it clear that the Legislature is not the appropriate body to efficiently respond to on-the-ground, immediate needs. I worry the haste to pass these short-sighted bills will hinder the Governor's ongoing ability to respond to COVID-19. The bills are also rife with legal issues, including overly broad and vague definitions and conflicts with other parts of statute and our Constitution. They will likely be challenged in court.

My first piece of legislation died on the House floor.

I ran for office to get our state legislature to recognize the seriousness of our housing crisis. My hope was to implement practical policies to keep homelessness from happening to our neighbors and state. My first piece of legislation - 1088 - would have brought Idaho Code up to the landlord industry's best practice standards, and was first aimed at ensuring fees are reasonable and transparent. It was opposed by the Idaho Freedom Foundation, which might have played a role in its defeat. The special interest group's subjective scoring system has much sway over many legislators in the majority. Nonetheless, we came close, and I'll try to bring this bill back next year in even better form.

As the cost of housing skyrockets, the cases we are seeing at my nonprofit, Jesse Tree, are becoming more complex, with hundreds of tenants each month being priced out with nowhere to go. At the same time, there are structural barriers to ensuring basic fairness in rental contracts, including the fact that landlords can charge any amount of fees to tenants when they can't pay. Changes to our landlord-tenant code, as well as serious investments and reforms that allow our communities to provide critical supportive and legal services and financial aid to tenants as we boost housing supply - will be critical in years to come. I hope our Legislature is up to the task. 

The House passed the bill that limits ballot initiatives in Idaho. 

S1110 would make it even more difficult to get a citizen’s initiative on the ballot, as it would up the requirements from needing the required signatures from 18 of Idaho’s legislative districts to all 35, giving any one district veto power over an initiative. I encourage you to call the Governor's office at 208-334-2100 to encourage him to veto this legislation.

One big tax bill passed out of my committee.

H332 got put to the amending order for some technical corrections and is moving on to the Senate. The bill provides little to no relief for low and moderate income Idahoans, with the largest cuts going to the top bracket. It will cost our state hundreds of millions of dollars per year on an ongoing basis, at a time when critical needs like education and infrastructure are severely and routinely underfunded by the state and passed on to residents in other ways, like through property tax. Idahoans will continue to pay $200 million in property tax each year to fund our public education system.

The House failed to pass critical budgets.

As you know, the House didn't pass federal early learning education funding a few weeks ago due to fears that Idahoan educators were pushing social justice curriculum - a conspiracy being pushed by the Idaho Freedom Foundation. That funding is on the Senate's agenda for the upcoming week. Last week, the House overwhelmingly killed the compromise higher education budget bill, also due to unfounded fears about higher education's social justice agenda; you can guess the source of that rumor. The budget will again be reworked in JFAC. The House also failed to pass the Division of Welfare budget allocating COVID relief funds to childcare centers. Sadly, full-day Kindergarten lost its momentum and will be put off until next year. Funding full-day Kindergarten would provide Idahoans with real property tax relief.

Banning abortion was a priority for our legislature right out of the gate last week.

The first thing on our agenda last week was a six-week abortion ban, which would prevent women from getting abortion as early as six weeks into pregnancy, when most women don't even know they're pregnant. The ban would bar most rape victims from accessing abortion as it requires them to provide a police report. Similar six week abortion bans have been struck down as unconstitutional in several states, including one in North Carolina just two weeks ago. This one will also be challenged in court.