Pros and cons
I'll start my recap of week seven with some good news: Idaho is getting better at vaccine distribution, and now ranks as one of the best states in the country when it comes to administering the COVID-19 vaccine. 175 million dollars in rental assistance passed, a measure I spoke in support of. Our Medicaid budget passed the House by a thin margin, ensuring thousands of Idahoans will continue to have access to affordable medical care.
On the flip side, some legislators continue to deny the seriousness of the pandemic - such as by proposing a bill to prevent employers from making decisions about whether or not their employees need to be vaccinated (I will vote no.). Rental assistance passed six weeks after it should have, while hundreds of millions of dollars in other needed aid continues to sit and wait for a decision. A Medicaid stabilization fund and tax relief for certified family homes serving disabled folks did not pass. Instead of diverting surplus and rainy day funds into much-needed long-term investments in education and infrastructure, the majority is proposing to use it to provide ongoing tax cuts to special interests. Bills targeted at diminishing the powers of other government agencies and the Governor, as well as those of the people, continue to take crop up. There are now 14 pieces of legislation aimed at limiting the Governor's powers to respond to an emergency. This move and others prompted Idaho Supreme Court Chief Justice Jim Jones to analogize the legislature to a power-sucking creature.
Putting differences aside, I worked to amend my first piece of legislation, S1088, the bill aimed at addressing excessive rental fees. In order to get this bill passed I had to negotiate it down quite a bit from what I originally proposed: that fees are capped at ten percent of the monthly contract rent, or that they're reasonable. Many legislators in the majority are reticent to regulate any private party contracts, including lease agreements, even though tenants have no bargaining power when they sign on the dotted line. The bill in its current form no longer limits fee amounts, but still requires any fees to be in writing so that tenants can plan and budget for what they're getting into.
Idaho continues to grow faster than most states and our housing market, as well as other basic services and resources, need to be higher up on the agenda. Last week I continued to do research on solving our housing crisis, and held meetings with County Commissioners and County staff to take some first steps at getting our state to invest in the housing trust fund. We came up with some initial ideas we hope to build into a comprehensive proposal with other legislators.
In the Resources and Environment Committee, I opposed an expensive bill - S1090 - that would have required the Department of Lands to hire private outside counsel in lieu of using the Attorney General's Office. I spotted some contradictory language in the bill, and it was likely unconstitutional. It was also confirmed that the bill did not come out of constituent or agency complaints and was legislator-initiated. The vast expense of allowing agencies to opinion-shop on the private market was a big concern too. Additionally, it would be unfair if an agency could use taxpayer dollars to hire private counsel to assert their position in disputes with citizens. H0101 is still on the table and would do the same thing but for all agencies - a proposal that would cost tens of millions of dollars. I'll be keeping a look-out to see if it makes it to the Senate floor.
We nearly had an uncomfortable conversation this week. S1085 would have prevented a woman from making the deeply personal choice of when, how, and if to have a child as early as six weeks into pregnancy. It runs counter to the laws that were established almost fifty years ago in Roe v. Wade, where the Supreme Court held that states cannot ban abortion before viability for any reason. The Supreme Court has repeatedly reaffirmed this decision and struck down similar six-week bans on abortion in several other states. S1085 has a "trigger" provision and wouldn't take effect until one federal court upholds a six-week ban, but the bill was sent back to the Senate State Affairs Committee and will most likely not be heard this year. At the same time, a bill that would defund any abortion providers in Idaho passed the House. On a more uplifting note, Senator Wintrow will soon propose a bill on the Senate floor which would extend contraception prescriptions to 12 months, S1050.
Special interest tax breaks continue to outweigh tax relief for citizens. The House GOP presented their tax plan - H0199 - which mainly benefits special and wealthy interests. Some early analysis showed that this bill would only provide about thirty dollars of tax relief to average Idahoans, with larger cuts going to businesses and people at the top of the income bracket. We are still also fighting for actual property tax relief for Idahoans. The only major bill related to property tax relief, S1108, that's received a hearing does not provide real relief, and instead cuts local government budgets and undermines their ability to pay for new growth. Unfortunately most other ideas that would provide real property tax relief have still not received a hearing, including a circuit breaker expansion, increase to the homeowner's exemption, and indexing, which would address the ongoing tax shift to residents. One bill, presented by Senator Wintrow, would have expanded the circuit breaker to certified family homes and, unfortunately, got voted down on the House floor.
Voting rights are an ongoing topic. There are now 23 pieces of legislation about voting. S1110 is still waiting to be heard on the Senate floor, the bill that would make it nearly impossible to get a citizen-led initiative on the ballot, giving any small rural district virtual veto power. There are also a series of bills moving through the House that would make it more difficult for Idahoans to vote:
H0223 passed on the House floor which makes it a felony to deliver any non family member ballots in drop boxes, aimed at addressing Idaho's non-existent ballot-harvesting problem.
H0219 would not allow students to use a school ID as identification when they vote or register to vote.
H0244 would prohibit college professors from giving extra credit to students for voting.
I will oppose any legislation which limits the ability of people to legally vote. It's pretty simple to vote in Idaho, and that’s a good thing. Democracy and government are at their strongest when everyone is able to actively participate.
This will be a busy week for education, with the university budget being decided on. I'm grateful that most lawmakers - outside of those who only act under the instruction of the Idaho Freedom Foundation - are committed to preserving the higher education budget. There are also a number of others bills that could affect students and our education system:
H0221 would diminish the quality of our teachers by allowing any school district to issue teaching certificates to anyone who's at least 18 and has a bachelor's degree.
H0122 would allow anyone with a concealed weapons permit to carry weapons on school property.
H0141 would require that any contract between Idaho agencies and public institutions be awarded by a competitive process.
Democrat lawmakers have been advocating for years to more fully fund public education. Idaho still ranks 51st in per pupil spending. Some of my colleagues including Senator Ward-Engelking have tried to move funds from the online sales tax account to the general fund so that it can be used to fund education. A majority of our school districts must run bonds and levies to cover basic costs, which greatly adds to the property tax burden. Many of those levies relate to funding districts' needs for full-day Kindergarten. There may be some movement on making Kindergarten full day state-wide, which would reduce levies and give teachers time to actually educate our kids!
