Committees Are Fun
It's true. Most of the juicy action of lawmaking takes place in committee. Sometimes the drama is big and draws huge crowds, media, and makes national news. Sometimes there's no one paying attention but the folks involved in passing the bill. As a member of the public you can attend any committee in person or listen online to live streams or past records. Getting the most out of a committee requires you to know what's going on during it.What Are Committees?
After a bill is introduced it is then assigned to a Committee of Reference by leadership. Committees are separated by chamber, Senate and House, and composed of several members from each party. For example, the House Judiciary committee has 11 members. The Democrats: Representatives Kagan, Lee, Buckner, Court, McLachlan, Patterson, Salazar, Wright. The Republicans: Representatives Gardner, Lawrence, Murray. A list of all the committees and who sits on what can be found here.Committees are meant to give a bill a thorough vetting. They deliberate on the pros and cons of legislation, hearing out each side's argument for why a bill should be supported or defeated, and act out a party agenda. For example, Republicans sitting on the Education committee historically tend to oppose bills that strengthen teacher's unions. If a pro-union bill is heard in Education, they will likely do whatever they can to defeat it. Frquently the voting decision on whether a bill passes or dies comes down to a party-line vote; sometimes the lines are blurred. Most of the time though uncontentious bills are voted up unanimously, and really terrible bills are voted down unanimously.
There are generally three times during the day when committees meet: 7:30am, 10:00am, and 1:30pm. Their duration is determined by what bills they hear and other pressures; sometimes they can go on for many hours, sometimes they last five minutes, and sometimes they need to quickly adjourn so that members on that committee can hustle back to the Chamber Floor.
The majority party of a chamber gets to decide who chairs each committee, but the parties themselves decide which members are assigned to which committees. Usually it's done by matching the strengths of a member to an appropriate spot. If one member is a lawyer, like Rep. Kagan, he will probably be on Judiciary. If a member used to be a nurse, they might be assigned to the Public Health Care and Human Services committee. A rancher might be on Agriculture Livestock & Natural Resources.
Members can sit on multiple committees, but never ones that meet simultaneously. They can't be two places at once. Attendance is not always mandatory, as members might need to go present their bills in other committees while the ones they usually sit on are running.
Each Committee is led by the Chair and Vice Chair who are members of the majority party from that chamber. In House Judiciary, the chair is Kagan and the Vice Chair is Lee. The Chair of a committee wields significant power because they control the tempo of the meetings. What order are bills heard in? How much time will be given to each witness who testifies? Will the bill be laid over? They control those things. They also keep other committee members in line. They are generally civil though and these factors aren't typically abused. When contentious bills come to their committee though, expect the Chair to step it up. A neat rulebook can be found here.
An Average Day
An average committee hearing begins with a roll call. When a majority of the members are present, more than half, a quorum is established and the committee commences. A schedule of bills to be heard looks something like this: |
| Example snippet of a daily calendar |
Witness Testimony
During most committee hearings there is a chance for lobbyists, experts, bystanders, other legislators, former legislators, state departments, even everyday citizens to offer their two cents on the matter. Telling the committee what you think it termed testifying.The Chair of the committee customarily asks the sponsor who they would like to hear from first, the opponents or supporters of the bill. A list of all the people signed up to testify is given to the Chair, and they are called up one by one. Witnesses give their name, affiliation, and present an argument for or against the bill.
A typical witness is usually a representative of the 'force' behind the bill. If it's a pro oil drilling bill, the CEO of an oil company might be there to explain why it's favorable. If the bill is about restricting teacher unions, the lobbyist for CEA might be there to explain why the teachers don't like it. The bill sponsor is responsible for rallying witnesses to help them persuade committee members. This includes bringing affected constituents too, such as with a higher education bill college students might be brought in to say a few words.
Sometimes the witnesses are not planned. I was present at a committee hearing when a member of the "Occupy Denver" movement showed up to say he hated the idea of turning coal mine methane into usable energy. Sometimes witnesses turn into a liability for the bill if they become unhinged or stray off topic in their presentation .
You could be a witness to any bill you'd like! It helps if you're informed on the issue though, otherwise you stand to embarrass yourself. Often random members of the concerned public will show up and participate (good for them), but only end up demonstrating how uninformed they are of the topic at hand and generally look silly in front of the committee. Witnesses are real people though. It can be especially moving when foreclosed home owners testify to a committee about the mortgage scandal that took advantage of them and how such-and-such a bill is needed to prevent it from happening again.
Witnesses do and do not matter. Quite often the fate is a bill has been predetermined because the sponsor took the time to discuss the bill with each committee member prior to the committee hearing the bill. Back to our example with SB13-118, if Hodge made sure all members of the Senate Business committee didn't have a problem with her bill ahead of time, it might pass through despite what opponents line up to say about it. Sometimes a member has issue with certain parts of the bill but the sponsor works it out with them ahead of time. Witnesses might bring to light crucial information that members of the committee were not aware of, forcing them to either delay the bill or vote against it. That sort of thing is rare though.
Amendments
After the witness phase the sponsor of the bill or committee members may offer amendments to it. Amendments are changes to the bill. They can be minor or major. They can render a bill useless, they can redirect the intent, they can even wipe a bill clean and start over dealing with separate but related bits of the law. Amendments are commonly proposed to the sponsor of the bill ahead of time as a courtesy, and an opportunity to gain support. Nearly all of the negotiation behind a bill or an amendment takes place out of committee; what you see in committee is the dramatized version. It can happen that a member will introduce 'surprise' amendments which the sponsor might not favor. And, it is possible for a sponsor's bill to be hijacked by a majority of other members. Some sponsors have been known to advocate for the death of their own bill which they no longer control.Here is an example of an important but simple change that was made to a recently heard bill, HB13-1008 "Preference in hiring for disabled veteran's spouse" by Rep. Su Ryden. Pay attention to the circled language.
The Introduced (Original) Bill
The Amended (Engrossed) Bill
The change to the bill was important. It made clear what it meant to be a spouse of a veteran, which is especially pertinent in light of the concurrent legislation on civil unions. The amendment was moved and adopted during second reading, known as the Committee of the Whole, where all members of the chamber participate in hearing the bill.
No comments:
Post a Comment