CHEYENNE — The Legislature’s interim studies are a great way lawmakers can get educated on the basics of established programs like education and property taxes.
The interim meetings are more relaxed, with a slower pace than the sometimes hectic committee gatherings during the short sessions in Cheyenne.
The legislators are not under stress and have time to ask a lot of questions and discuss complex issues, how they work and how they’re financed.
So it is good to see education regarding big questions on elections, electricity policy, property taxes and the financing of public and charter schools on the list of proposed committee studies.
This is of particular value for the high number of new legislators who were elected in 2024 and showed their need for more education in the recent session.
The legislative leaders who sit on the management council, the administrative arm of the Legislature, will meet next week to sift through the committee requests and assign them their studies by priority with a budget for two or three days of meetings during the spring, summer and fall.
The leaders this year may be more judicious, more cautious in their assignments, given the recent Legislature’s lack of support for committee work.
Out of 131 committee bills numbered in the 2025 session, 116 were introduced and 62 were enacted – for only a 53% success rate.
According to the record on interim committee bills from the Legislative Service Office, that was the lowest success rate in the last two decades.
There seems to be animosity against committee bills from the hard right wing Freedom Caucus group that controls the House and half the Senate.
I cannot explain why that is.
It is unfortunate given all the time, talent and effort that goes into a committee bill, including public hearings, to guarantee a bill is vetted when it is introduced.
One committee pushing education of issues is the Corporations, Elections and Political Subdivisions Committee. Its main priority is to study election bills that were not passed in 2025. Much of this effort, the committee report said, will be educational.
The corporations committee’s second priority will be continue its effort to educate everybody on issues related to electricity and to work to develop electricity policy for the state.
The Appropriations Committee’s top proposed topic is a comprehensive look at everything about wildfires including the state’s involvement, prevention, response and management funding.
The committee’s second priority is a study of local governments’ streams of money. The committee also will look at alternative to current income and of “foregone income revenue from excise and ad valorem tax streams.”
This means the money local governments will lose because of the reduction in property taxes. That will be an interesting study.
Two interim committees want to study public school and charter schools, including the costs of facilities and the like.
And there are petitions from individual legislators for a two-year study on revenue and to continue the task force on mental health.
It appears overall, however, that the major impetus is on maternal health care.
Various groups are pushing for a solution on this one.
It is the top priority of the Joint Labor, Health and Social Services Committee. The proposal said the committee will review the recommendations of a previous task force for possible legislation to be presented at the budget session.
Maybe we will see some action this time.
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Contact Joan Barron at 307-632-2534 or jmbarron@bresnan.net
