Lawmakers settled in for Week #2 of the 2023 legislative session of the Indiana General Assembly, which as a short week due to the observance of the Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. holiday. Committees have started meeting and most of the work around the building was behind-the-scenes as legislators and lobbyists find themselves working to understand details of bills and “lobbying” Committee Chairs to hear the bills of interest. Bills trickled out slowly, with a substantial list rolling out Thursday with ~150 bills. We believe that nearly all filed bills are now public and any relevant bills included in your bill list. It has been a mixed bag for us to enjoy thus far in our review of lawmaker submissions, with everything from pork tenderloins being dubbed the state sandwich to the recreational use of throwing stars.
The Statehouse did see an increased police presence Thursday as the Indiana Supreme Court heard oral arguments on whether to lift a preliminary injunction imposed by a Monroe County judge on Indiana’s abortion ban, passed during this summer’s special session. SB1, which limits exceptions to rape, incest, lethal fetal anomaly, and the life and serious health of the mother, was challenged by the ACLU, questioning whether the ban violates a right to privacy. Even if the court throws out the privacy lawsuit entirely, a separate injunction against the law that involves a pending lawsuit based on Indiana’s Religious Freedom Restoration Act (RFRA) would remain in effect pending higher court decisions.
Your updated bill report is attached. It is about as “big” as it will get. As bills start moving through the Committee process, we’ll remove duplicate bills in cases where more than one legislator has filed the same/similar bill. The deadline for a bill to pass out of Committee is in late February, which will create a significant culling of the bill list to eliminate all those that did not clear the first hurdle. As always, let us know if you would like us to add or delete any bills from your tracking list.
Going forward, we’ll include dates for committee hearings for your bills that have been posted – remember that these hearings only require a 24-hour(ish) notice, so the schedule is constantly changing.
Important Dates:
Monday, January 23
– Senate Family & Children Services Committee, 9:45 a.m.
SB368 Early Childhood Care & Education Pilot Program (Donato)
– House Veterans Affairs & Public Safety
HB1312 Public Safety Funding for State Border Communities (Slager)
Tuesday, January 24
– House Local Government Committee, 8:30 a.m.
HB 1081 Residential Tax Increment Financing (Heine)
– Senate Tax & Fiscal Policy Committee, 9:30 a.m.
SB300 Residential Tax Increment Financing (Rogers)
SB344 Northeast IN Strategic Development Fund (Holdman)
SB349 Overlapping Allocation Areas (Baldwin)
– House Government & Regulatory Reform Committee, 10:30 am.
HB1005 Housing (Miller, D)
HB1179 Professional Licensing (Clere)
Wednesday, January 25
– Senate Pensions & Labor Committee, 10:00 a.m.
SB292 INPRS Investments (Holdman)
– Senate Judiciary Committee, 1:30 p.m.
SB324 Torts Involving Commercial Trucking Industry (Glick)
Thursday, January 26
– Senate Commerce & Technology Committee, 8:30 a.m.
SB8 Consumer Data Protection (Brown)
– Senate Local Government Committee, 10:00 a.m.
SB81 Community Intellectual & Developmental Disability Centers (Bohacek)