Government efficiency bills fly, but with grease, grumbles

The weight of the House speaker was needed to pass identical versions of a so-called government efficiency bill out of a Senate committee and through the House on Friday.

Sen. David Burnett, D-Osceola, was the deciding vote in the Senate committee. He had an interest in a separate bill -- designed to benefit Nucor Corp. -- that allows localities to decide how earthquake-resistant new buildings should be.

Burnett denied Thursday night that he had reneged on an earlier commitment to vote for the efficiency bill -- Senate Bill 10 -- in the Senate State Agencies and Governmental Affairs Committee.

But House Speaker Jeremy Gillam, R-Judsonia, saw the situation differently, and by late Thursday, the committee was scheduled to meet again early Friday morning.

"We're going to give him the opportunity to follow through and vote the way that he'd indicated he wanted to vote," Gillam said. "I signaled that we might have to re-evaluate our priorities on the [House] calendar tomorrow ... on which bills we took up."

On Friday, Burnett voted for the efficiency bill during the Senate committee meeting and helped send it to the Senate.

"Representations have been made to me that I will get a favorable vote on the Nucor bill if I give a favorable vote on the efficiency bill," Burnett said Thursday. "That's about the size of it."

He declined to comment after the Senate committee meeting on Friday.

During the meeting, Sen. Linda Chesterfield, D-Little Rock, said that even though "Sen. Burnett had already agreed to vote yes on this bill because [of] the powers that be," she had problems with the process.

"I know that the train is rolling, but we're about to get run over by the caboose," she said.

She, along with Sen. Bryan King, R-Green Forest, said the debate was too short and the bill too long.

The bill -- 105 pages long -- eliminates some committees and task forces, sets expiration dates for others and changes the way some entities function. It also moves the Arkansas History Commission from the state Department of Parks and Tourism to the Department of Arkansas Heritage. Legislators saw the bill just before the start of the special session Thursday.

"I agree with the bill overall. I'll vote for it, but the process part allows the people to say the things [they] need to say," King said. "When you just file bills right before you walk in here ... to me that's disrespectful to the people. The way this whole special session's been branded, handled, I don't know, that anything needs to be voted out, to be honest with you."

Gillam, along with Sen. Missy Irvin, R-Mountain View, defended the omnibus legislation.

"I believe this is an excellent bill," Irvin said. "I understand that it's long, but it's aimed at evolving our state government and state agencies to where they need to be compared with other states."

The bill is a conglomeration that was put together to reduce the number of bills the Legislature would consider in the special session, Gillam said. During a speech before the General Assembly on Thursday, Gov. Asa Hutchinson told lawmakers that this special session contained fewer bills than in years past.

The Bureau of Legislative Research said the legislation won't save the state money, though there are "potential minimal savings due to the elimination of payments to members of task forces scheduled to expire."

The bill consolidates the power of the seven-member board that oversees the History Commission into the director of the Department of Arkansas Heritage. It renames the commission the Arkansas State Archives.

It reduces the number of legislative committees and, in some cases, changes how people are appointed to serve.

It eliminates a requirement, made during the 2015 regular session, that requires the Children and Family Services Division to print and distribute copies of all documentation from their computer system to parties in child-welfare lawsuits. Parties may still request and receive the information.

It expands the Governor's Mansion Commission from eight to nine members to include the Department of Arkansas Heritage director as a voting member and require the members to serve at the pleasure of the governor. The governor still would designate one member as the chairman, but that member would no longer serve for the rest of his term as the chairman.

The desire to transfer the Arkansas History Commission, which has proved controversial, came from the governor's office, Gillam said, and his interest was primarily in reducing the number of legislative committees that don't meet.

On Wednesday, Gillam deferred questions about the transfer to the governor. Thursday evening and Friday, he defended it.

"This transfer is appropriate. ... No bill is ever going to be perfect," he said. "It's a good, good start to where we need to go."

The debate in the Senate committee spilled onto the House and Senate floors.

"The commission itself -- those seven members -- are going to be brought over to form an advisory role to the director of the Department of Heritage. Now those commissioners themselves, understandably, don't want to give up their independence and autonomy," Gillam told the House. "Part of the thought behind this was because you have almost $2 million in general revenue -- taxpayer dollars -- having someone over their shoulders ... is not a bad idea."

Rep. Reginald Murdock, D-Marianna, said he didn't believe legislators could make a good decision about the bill because they don't know what's in it.

"We need time to go back, confer with others that this bill affects," he said. "We just don't have the time."

But Rep. Bob Ballinger, R-Hindsville, argued that the format of a special session gave the changes contained in the bill special attention.

"I think that the scrutiny that's been given to this bill is pretty clear and pretty direct and probably multiple times more than if it had been thrown into the mix in 2017," he said. The next regular session starts in January 2017.

The House voted 62-19 to approve House Bill 1006.

In the Senate, Chesterfield again questioned how many legislators have read the bill and contended it was too large to be considered in the special session.

Lawmakers are sacrificing good policy for expediency, she said.

But Irvin said the bill would save money and that's why there is an urgency to pass it. She had helped introduce the provision in the bill for the Children and Family Services Division.

Senate Democratic leader Keith Ingram of West Memphis questioned why the bill changes the law governing the Governor's Mansion Commission.

There must be problems, but lawmakers are not aware of them, he said.

Hutchinson later told reporters he doesn't recall why the law is being changed. He said there weren't problems with individual commissioners.

The Senate voted 21-9 to approve SB10. The chamber had already approved, 30-1, Senate Bill 5, the legislation sponsored by Burnett and aimed at helping Nucor. Burnett voted for both bills.

According to a statement from Mark DiGirolamo, controller of the Nucor mill in Mississippi County, the bill allows localities to choose whether they require structures to be built to a 500-year event standard or a 2,500-year event standard. The local option had been removed in 2014.

"We already have construction challenges due to our location on the New Madrid fault. It is more expensive to build in our area of Northeast Arkansas than in many areas where Nucor has operations," DiGirolamo said. "But under the previous building codes, we have still managed to offset these increased construction costs in the past with other benefits of being in Arkansas."

The legislation keeps Arkansas in the running for future expansions, he said.

Sen. Stephanie Flowers, D-Pine Bluff, said she fears lawmakers are emphasizing economic development at the expense of human lives under the bill.

But Sen. Jim Hendren, R-Sulphur Springs, said the bill will not endanger any lives. The state must be reasonable in its regulation of private industry and not overburden industry to attract industry, he said.

A Section on 05/21/2016