House and Senate committees worked on numerous bills Wednesday, while awaiting today’s main event: the House floor debate on the budget. Several of those bills were previously featured here on Capitol Access.
Jack Donahue’s Senate-approved bill to uncouple TOPS from college tuition found favor with the House Education committee, helped along by the widow of the program’s founder, Phyllis Taylor.
“I would never stand here and support anything that limited the TOPS program,” Taylor told the committee. “We are seeking certainty, not limitations.”
Donahue’s companion legislation, giving colleges autonomy to raise tuition and fees, is also headed to the House floor.
J.P. Morrell’s bill permitting New Orleans students to take the full national Youth Risk Survey – including answering questions on sexual activity – made it through House Education as well. After several members of the public voiced concerns about the survey questions being given to elementary students, Morrell told committee members that was “fear mongering of the worst kind.”
“The survey is only administered to high school students,” Morrell stated. ”It’s created by the Center for Disease Control.”
A Senate bill to let the sun shine on the governor’s records—removing the “deliberative process” privilege—continues to move forward. Carl Redman, retired editor of The Advocate newspaper, said it’s needed to curb abuse of the exception, granted in 2009.
“If an agency is going to close down a service to the public, the public really has a right to know this.”
The bill defines budget documents as public records, available immediately, instead of making them unavailable for six months, as is currently the case. But if SB 190 is ultimately approved by the full House, the law won’t take effect till next January—when there’s a new administration under a new governor.
The juiciest exchange of the day came between Sen. Dan Claitor and Rep. Walt Leger—over a bill to make charter schools serve a more proportional number of students with disabilities. Leger wanted to push the effective date back for another year.
“Why would we further institutionalize discrimination against kids with disabilities?” Claitor asked.
“You’re going to have to check with the Governor on institutionalization of discrimination. That seems to be his forte’,” Leger responded, referring to Gov. Jindal’s response to the legislative failure of HB 707 on Tuesday.
“Is he here?” Claitor asked, turning to look around the committee room, making his own reference to the governor’s frequent out of state travels.
“I’d be concerned that if your bill doesn’t make it through the process, that he may do an executive order or something to overrule it,” Leger, a Democrat, came back at Claitor, a Republican.
Claitor’s SB 267, amended to begin in the 2016-17 school year, won unanimous favor and will next be heard by the full House.