Author: delsandy

Past and future travel

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I thought we had already solved this problem.

Ken Birnbaum, a constituent, wrote me that one of his life insurance clients had been issued a policy denying coverage for future travel to Gaza or the West Bank.

I checked with legislative staff.

Ten years ago, we prohibited using an insured’s “past lawful travel” to deny coverage.

Ken was at the witness table beside me today, as was Muhammad Jameel, representing the Islamic Society of Baltimore. His mother lives in Pakistan.

Written testimony from Catholic Relief Services also helped us make the point that House Bill 352 would affect a broad group of consumers.

The bill would allow an insurance company to deny or limit coverage with respect to future travel where “there is an ongoing armed conflict involving the military of a sovereign nation foreign to the country of conflict.”

The life insurance industry proposed an amendment that would add “an active civil insurgency.”

The devil will be in the details.

“Mr. Sachs spoke for me.”

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This is why I wanted to become a lawyer.

At age 14, I read Gideon’s Trumpet, the account of Gideon v. Wainwright, where the Supreme Court decided that the U.S. Constitution guarantees the right to a lawyer if you’re accused of a felony.

I wanted to be a lawyer who protected people’s constitutional rights.

When the state seeks to deny your liberty, Gideon held, you are entitled to an attorney.

When the state seeks to deny you custody of your children, however, you are not.

House Bill 348 would change that.

The product of a task force that I served on, the bill would require the state to fund legal representation in contested child custody cases and in protective order proceedings in domestic violence cases.

In my testimony, I cited statistics that in these cases only 20% of the people involved had a lawyer.

The case for my bill was best made by someone who did not testify today.

Deborah Frase had conditions imposed on her custody of her son at the trial level. She did not have an attorney.

When she won on appeal, she was represented by Steve Sachs, former Attorney General of Maryland.

He told us today what Ms. Frase said after her case was heard by Maryland’s highest court.

“Mr. Sachs spoke for me.”

Listening and counting

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When a member of the committee hearing my legislation talks, I listen.

A member of the subcommittee reviewing my bill suggested that we needed an amendment detailing an employer’s legal defense to a harassment lawsuit.

That is not necessary, a civil rights attorney advised me yesterday, because it’s addressed by court decisions.

Nonetheless, I responded to my colleague, “If the committee feels that we should amend the bill, we can do that.”

The legislative process is not a courtroom or a classroom.

We’re graded on whether we get enough votes.

At another hearing, the committee chair asked when a report would be completed on a program that my bill would continue.

“Two to four weeks,” replied my expert witness.

“The sooner the better,” I told him afterwards. “The committee might delay action until it gets the report.”

A constant about changes

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Very few bills pass unamended.

Mine included.

Concerns raised at a public hearing are addressed, I hope, by the amendments we drafted for one bill.

Lowering the cost are the crux of amendments to two of my bills that will be heard this week. A pilot program in one or two counties is possible, but the price tag for a state-wide program will doom my legislation.

I’ve written the deputy general counsel at the Washington Post twice about issues raised about my bill that’s in a subcommittee. His legal advice has been transformed into amendments.

The Attorney General’s Office has informed me that a recent Supreme Court decision necessitates a change to another of my bills.

The amendments I will submit this week share one thing in common.

Changes will be made to them if my bills move forward.

A lesson learned

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“I am a beneficiary of the Jew Bill.”

That’s how I began my remarks after a lecture at the Jewish Museum of Maryland on the 1826 bill that allowed Jews to hold public office.

Here’s what I learned.

There were two versions of the bill.

The “universal version” would have prohibited any “religious test” for office holders. The three living former Presidents, John Adams, Thomas Jefferson, and James Madison, supported the bill.

Despite that impressive endorsement, the bill failed because it would have benefitted Jews, Muslims, and atheists.

Subsequently, several Jews became prominent in the local business community, including defenders of Ft. McHenry during the Battle of Baltimore.

The “specific version,” which became law, applied to “every citizen of this state professing the Jewish religion…[who believes] in a future state of rewards and punishments.”

This compromise was eventually followed by legislation that ended discrimination against other Marylanders seeking elective office.

The art of compromise is a legislative lesson I learned many years ago.

The right man

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“Hi, I’m Sandy Rosenberg.”

That’s how I introduced myself to a freshman delegate on the House floor this morning.

He didn’t know my name and truth be known, I wasn’t sure of his.

Before I introduced myself, I asked a more senior colleague from the delegate’s county if I had the right man.

What I did know was that he serves on the Election Law Subcommittee and I wanted to talk to him about my two bills that he will be voting on.

A commitment in the law and money in the budget

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Same strategy, different bills.

House Bill 348 would provide for legal counsel in certain areas of family law – protective order, custody, or visitation proceedings.

House Bill 367 would require that a 24/7 behavioral health crisis response system be established state-wide to assist people with mental illness.

The annual cost to fully implement each bill would exceed $10 million.

Unamended, the bills will die.

However, an amended bill could put into law the state’s commitment to provide these services on a pilot basis in one or two counties.

That’s the compromise I proposed when I met with advocates and interested parties.
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Success in the court room and the emergency room would make the case for expansion of these programs and the dollars needed to fund it.

Concurring with Justice Ginsburg

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Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg was interviewed on MSNBC last night.

MSNBC: You’ve been a champion of reproductive freedom. How does it feel when you look across the country and you see states passing restrictions that make it inaccessible, if not technically illegal?

Ginsburg: Inaccessible to poor women. It’s not true that it’s inaccessible to women of means and that’s the crying shame. We will never see a day when women of means are not able to get a safe abortion in this country. There are states – take the worst case, suppose Roe v. Wade is overruled – there will still be a number of states that will not go back to old ways.

             Maryland is one of those states.

If you’re older than 40, you’ll remember that in 1991 we passed a law adopting the holding of Roe v. Wade.  The next year, the voters approved it on referendum, 62-38%.

Consequently, if Roe is overruled, nothing will change in Maryland because that law will be on the books.

That other states did not follow our lead demonstrates how poorly organized liberals are.  Contrast that with the voter ID laws in more than a dozen red states.

I shared the Ginsburg quote with my colleagues who were the pro-choice floor leaders in 1991, as I was, (Senators Barbara Hoffman and Paula Hollinger and Delegate Larry LaMotte) and with the leading lobbyist for the bill.

“Saw the interview & it sounded like she was on the floor with us when we fought the good fight!” responded former Senator Hollinger.

“I glow with pride at what we were able to do together to secure and strengthen reproductive rights for all women in Maryland,” wrote Steven Rivelis, the lobbyist for Planned Parenthood.

For me, it’s the bill that will touch more lives than any other legislation I’ve worked on.

And I’m sending this blog to my niece, Rachel, because it’s her generation and the ones that follow that will benefit from knowing that we fought and won this good fight.

Personalize and diversify

| by delsandy | Sandy's 2015 Legislative Diary | No Comments

You always want to personalize your testimony.

Sometimes you also need to diversify it.

This summer, a constituent told me his life insurance company would not provide coverage for travel to Gaza or the West Bank when in Israel.

After researching the issue, I introduced House Bill 352, which is modeled on laws in several other states.

It would prohibit a life insurer from denying coverage “for reasons associated with an applicant’s or insured’s future lawful travel plans.”  It’s already illegal to do so because of someone’s “past lawful travel plans.”

Excluded from this protection would be travel to areas where the Centers for Disease Control has issued a highest level alert or warning or where “there is an ongoing armed conflict involving the military or a sovereign nation foreign to the country or conflict.”

I will ask my constituent to testify.  That will personalize the issue.

I will also seek testimony from people of different faiths or whose jobs take them to countries where my bill would benefit them.  That will diversify the issue.

On the whole, I’d rather be in…

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“Yes, the schools are still a problem, crime is still a problem, gun violence is still a problem,” said a statewide elected official who has watched the city evolve over several decades. “But people have much more optimism about the future now.”

“While its public school system remains a mess, its crime rate elastic and its poverty rate high,” adds the reporter, “Philadelphia has been revitalized over the last decade and a half, with celebrity chefs, a vibrant technology sector and thriving art scene, all boxes to check for cities on the move these days.”

Could the same be said about Baltimore? If not, what needs to happen for that to be the case?

  • My Key Issues:

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