Arkansas Speaker holds off guessing session

Gillam addresses leaders’ meeting

The House speaker says he's constantly being asked what the regular session is going to be like.

But "it's a question that we can't answer," Rep. Jeremy Gillam, R-Judsonia, told the Arkansas Municipal League's annual conference at the Statehouse Convention Center in Little Rock on Wednesday night.

"I can tell you the men and women in the Arkansas Senate and the House of Representatives have convened starting Monday and they are here to do the people's business."

In a short speech to hundreds of local officials gathered for the conference, Gillam said he hasn't forgotten that he was sent to the House by the people of White County, Beebe, McRae, Judsonia and Bald Knob.

Don Zimmerman, executive director of the Arkansas Municipal League, said in an interview after the speech that local officials are especially focused on the implementation of constitutional amendments that authorize medical marijuana and expand local governments' role in economic development.

The league has written a bill to implement the economic development amendment.

"We're anxious to get that passed," Zimmerman said.

Local governments "just need to see there's adequate study and ... that taxpayer funds are going to be wisely spent," he said.

The league is not pushing any particular medical marijuana bills, Zimmerman said.

"We're anxious to see how the implementation of medical marijuana takes place and what the impact of that will see on cities," he said.

Gillam predicted that headlines will focus on highway funding, the budget, economic development, tax-cut proposals and tax policies.

"That'll be a few bills. The bulk of the thousand bills or so we'll deal with in the House of Representatives and in the Senate will not be ones that make the headlines," he said.

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"But, in my opinion, they have just as significant -- sometimes more significant -- impact on your lives."

Among other elected officials, Arkansas Supreme Court Chief Justice Dan Kemp spoke before Gillam.

"Each of you as elected officials have taken an oath of office within the past week and a half," he said at the conference. "In that oath, each person swears to support the Constitution of the United States and the constitution of the state of Arkansas."

He read the preambles of both constitutions to the assembled officials.

"In each of these preambles, the constitution is established by the people. We, the people, are the government of the United States. We, the people, are the government of the state of Arkansas," Kemp said.

"I think it's important that each of us as elected officials remember that."

Metro on 01/12/2017

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