Author: delsandy

January 20 – A right, not a reward

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I usually wait until the floor debate to write my speech.

I try to respond to something another delegate has said. Even then I write my remarks only in my head.

Veto overrides tomorrow will be the first of many opportunities this session for the two parties to offer their different public policy approaches.

I’ve been asked to be ready to speak on the bill that would allow a person to vote who was imprisoned for a felony but is now free on parole or probation.

Voting “is something that should be a reward,” a Republican delegate asserted in today’s Baltimore Sun.

That is dead wrong.

“Especially since the right to exercise the franchise in a free and unimpaired manner is preservative of other basic civil and political rights, any alleged infringement of the right of citizens to vote must be carefully and meticulously scrutinized.”

I didn’t come up with that language. The Supreme Court did.

January 18 – All hands on deck

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It’s all hands on deck for the next 90 days.

If someone can help pass my bill, I need their assistance now – not to commiserate afterwards on what could have happened.

“I know the next 90 days will be crazy for you,” one friend wrote me, “but I hope we can connect afterwards.”

“Perhaps there will be an issue this session where we can connect during the next 90 days,” I responded.

It’s up to me now to suggest the issue where he can get involved.

After I wrote about my SLAPP bill last week, I heard from a friend who’s a journalist in another state.

“Our SLAPP protection is very good,” he wrote. “We have employed it successfully.”

“Appropriate for you to nudge your Maryland counterparts to get involved?” I suggested.

He did.

A third friend thought my bill “would be great. Keep me posted.”

“You should write [the key player] as well,” I urged him.

Gaining the necessary votes for a bill is cumulative.  Every positive contact helps.

January 14 – The Key Question

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Why do we need this bill?

That’s the key question a bill sponsor must answer.

It’s one thing that hasn’t changed during my 34 years in the legislature.

This afternoon, we were discussing my SLAPP bill draft.

Strategic Lawsuits Against Public Participation, for example, try to intimidate the little guy from participating in public debate over zoning issues.

They are also used in response to investigative journalism.

My SLAPP bills have a better history in the House of Delegates than they do in the State Senate.

“But don’t assume that at the House hearing we won’t have to explain why we need to improve our SLAPP law with this bill,” I said today.

“Answering that question is a given.”

January 13 – Our obligation is greater

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This is the prayer that I offered at today’s opening session.

Come now, and let us reason together, saith the Lord, wrote the prophet Isaiah.

Since we last came together, our city was aflame.

It is now our task to respond to those who hunger and thirst for righteousness.

To adopt policy and a budget that expand opportunity for those who are poor in both spirit and in material comfort.

The tired, the poor, the masses yearning to succeed.

Our differences are real but our obligation is greater.

After 90 days, may we leave here lifting a lamp for all whose honor and duty it is ours to serve.

January 12 – Policy matters

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Policy matters.

If you’re concerned enough to read this legislative diary, you know that.

And you know that policy is what motivates me.

Wes Moore spoke at the annual Democratic Party day-before-session lunch today.

Moore is a Baltimore native, Rhodes Scholar, and U.S. Army veteran.

Describing two instances in his life where the social welfare system played a crucial role, he declared, “Policy matters.”

“We fight for the others, for those who need a champion,” Moore said.

Me too.

January 11 – Bills and a prayer

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I spent my day drafting bills and a prayer.

There were 1,684 bill requests as of Friday. That’s an average of 9 per legislator.

I was above that mark before today.

My three additional requests deal with economic development and custody and visitation rights for blind parents.

Speaker Busch asked me to give the prayer for the Opening Day of the session on Wednesday.

My prayer draws upon the prophet Isaiah, Jesus’ Sermon on the Mount, Emma Lazarus’ poem at the base of the Statue of Liberty, and Republican Jack Kemp.

Ecumenical to say the least.

But I don’t share my drafts in advance – be they bills or a prayer.

Opening the right doors

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Every year, my goal is to introduce a bill addressing poverty or income inequality.

After reading about this idea in a speech by Congressman Paul Ryan last July, I emailed the Secretary of Human Resources, “To what extent do we now inform eligible individuals at intake or subsequent contacts with DHR of the various programs that could benefit them?”

I shared his response with Regan Vaughan, a lobbyist for Catholic Charities. She and other advocates for the poor suggested that we pursue a No Wrong Door pilot program. Individuals with a range of needs that cross departmental lines would be assisted by one case worker.

That idea became House Bill 66.

We had a good public hearing before the Appropriations Committee on February 3.

The chair of that committee and the chair of the relevant subcommittee sit near me on the House floor. The day after the hearing, I told both of them that either favorable action on my bill or language in the budget would be acceptable.

There is a provision in the budget bill requesting that the Department of Human Resources provide the General Assembly with an analysis of additional steps that could be taken to ensure that when Marylanders attempt to access the social safety net, they are able to access a full range of services from multiple entry points.

That report is due December 1.

I will work on this with DHR and the advocates between now and then.

Staying on top of what’s going under ground

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You can get a lot done with your laptop and knowledgeable staff.

The Red Line would run through the neighborhoods in the Edmondson Avenue corridor of the 41st District.

A Sun editorial yesterday indicated that the tunnel under Cooks Lane is a potential target for cost savings.

Cooks Lane is only two lanes wide on each side, and in many places it’s just one lane because of residential parking. Several years ago, we worked with the community to have the line run underground instead of on the surface.

I asked the General Assembly’s budget staff to find out the status of the tunnel.

The Mass Transit Administration replied:

“We’ve not yet started to consider cost savings for Red Line, so I can’t confirm or deny [whether Cooks Lane tunnel will be impacted]. Eliminating either tunnel or otherwise changing an aspect of the project that would change the environmental or community impacts [and] would require” [approval from two federal agencies]. “This could delay construction by several years.”

On behalf of my 41st District colleagues, I shared this information with the neighborhood president, assuring him that “We will do our best to keep the tunnel in the plans if the line goes through Cooks Lane.”

All politics and tunneling are local.

The objective, not the name

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Crossfiles can be very helpful before crossover.

A crossfile is an identical version of your bill that has also been introduced by a senator.

Crossover is the deadline (next Monday) to pass your legislation to the other house and avoid having it delayed in the Rules Committee.

A friendly lobbyist wrote me this morning that a crosssfile had gotten a favorable vote in a Senate committee.

There were two amendments that the House committee staff “could surely get” so that they could be added to my bill before next Monday’s deadline.

No need to hurry, I responded. “I will discuss with the House committee chair after crossover when the committee can move both bills.”

If that happens, it’s likely that my bill would be referred to the Rules Committee but still make it to the Senate floor for enactment soon after the Senate crossfile.

But even if only the Senate bill passes and not mine, I’m ok.

I will have achieved my policy objective.

Having my name on the bill doesn’t matter.

Choice and access, yet again

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This may have been the 33rd time I spoke on this issue on the House floor.

The subject was abortion, specifically the circumstances when the Medicaid program will pay for the procedure.

The language in the budget bill is a compromise that was reached before I was elected in 1982.

Every year, it seems, there’s an attempt to change it.

Pro-choice members tried to broaden the language when I first got here but failed.

Not any more…

“This has nothing to do with access to abortion,” declared a supporter this morning of an amendment that would severely limit when the state would pay for an abortion.

“It has everything to do with access,” I responded.

“As Justice Ginsburg has pointed out, women of means will always be able to obtain an abortion,” I continued. “Poor women, on the other hand, must overcome obstacles to having the procedure.”

There were knowing responses on the faces of several women legislators as I spoke.

The amendment failed, 55-83.

  • My Key Issues:

  • Pimlico and The Preakness
  • Our Neighborhoods
  • Pre-Kindergarten
  • Lead Paint Poisoning