CHEYENNE — The Wyoming Legislature offered some dandy floor debates last week if you like that sort of thing.
One big one was over Senate File 69 — the 50 percent cut in property taxes. That bill is now in a joint conference committee with the senate.
I agree with Rep John Eklund, R-Cheyenne, who predicted the bill will die in the conference committee. Never fear. There are other property tax bills still alive and moving.
While there was of plenty of debate over that bill in the House last week, there was none over another much less interesting one, Senate File 168, which eliminates the Budget Reserve Account.
This bill had a free ride through the senate with unanimous votes all the way.
Not one single “no” vote.
The questions that brought everything to a halt in the House for awhile was — why are we doing this — what will it do — someone explain it to me.
The questions came from Rep. Landon Brown, R-Cheyenne, addressed to the chief House sponsor of the bill, Rep Ken Pendergraft, R-Sheridan.
Pendergraft was silent. So were three House leaders who also were sponsors.
Rep. Steve Harshman R-Casper, a former House Speaker and former chairman of the House Appropriations Committee, broke the silence.
He noted how odd it was for a bill like this that was a change in budget policy had not come from a committee, but only had individual House members as sponsors.
When Pendergraft remained silent, Harshman spoke up again. He told how the BRA, as it is called, was created in 1984 as an account for revenues from mineral royalties and severance taxes.
“That’s where, in good times, the money flows,” Harshman said.
But when no other sponsor came forward, other wise members had questions about this bill with many pages.
A couple of freshmen legislators mentioned that it referred to money for local governments and the like. They had questions.
Brown sort of lost it about this time and questioned as he had in the past why the hard right Freedom Caucus people refused to debate.
He questioned whether it was because they don’t know anything about the bills because they get their order by e-mail from the national Freedom Caucus in D.C.
Finally, the main sponsor Pendergraft, a retired Sheridan contractor in his second House term who is backed by the Freedom Caucus, spoke.
He said he was embarrassed because he could not answer the questions about the BRA. Instead, he suggested House members should should look to the more seasoned members for help.
Harshman, who fit that category easily, said he opposed the bill because it would funnel more money into the general fund thus making it easier to spend and result in less money in savings.
And finally one of the other sponsors, Rep John Bear, R-Campbell, chairman of the House Appropriations Committee, stood up and said the bill would simplify accounting and make it more transparent for citizens to understand. He also pointed to the unanimous support from the senate.
He said the change could ultimately result in less spending.
At any rate this was not the finest hour for the Wyoming House of Representatives
There are two lessons here. One was what Brown said; if you are the sponsor of a bill you have a responsibility to have some knowledge of what is in it and what it does.
Second, some House freshmen need help in learning how to read a bill.
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Contact Joan Barron at 307-632-2534 or jmbarron@bresnan.net
