The improving economy led the Joint Legislative Budget Committee this week to revise upward the official estimate of state revenues for the coming 2005 fiscal year beginning July 1, 2004. The 14-member committee, comprised of seven House members and seven Senators, heard from state fiscal experts that the economy is stronger now than when the FY 2005 revenue estimate was first established last Fall. On the strength of this expert opinion, the committee voted to add $44 million to revenues available for FY 2005 appropriations, bringing the General Fund budget to a total of $3.655 billion. The state’s overall budget, including Federal funds and special funds created through agency fees, special taxes (such as fuel taxes) and other means, will be over $11 billion. Governor Haley Barbour urged the Legislature to use all of the newly-found $44 million to help fund the K-12 education budget: "Thanks to a strong economy, we will be able to boost funding for education," said the governor. "This is not ‘funny money.’ This is a projection set by our state experts, and not by politicians."

A major positive event this week in the House was the passage of HB 1827 to require voter identification at the polls in every election. Persons born before January 1, 1940, would be exempted from the proposed new law. Prospective voters may use any number of forms, such as a driver’s license and even a bank statement, in order to identify themselves to poll workers. If the voter whose name appears on the rolls is unable to produce a valid I.D., he or she nonetheless may vote if they first sign a sworn statement as to their identity. Any person falsely swearing to an identity for purposes of voting can be prosecuted as a felon and be fined up to $5,000, sentenced to a year in jail, or both. HB 1827 also provides that certain first-time convicts of non-violent crimes who have completed their sentences and paid their fines and all restitution may be re-enfranchised to vote upon their release. The bill also requires Circuit Clerks to issue all voters a registration card by January 1, 2007. The new Voter I.D. provisions contained within HB 1827 will go into effect on January 1, 2005, if the United States Department of Justice pre-clears the legislation as envisioned by the Federal Voting Rights Act.

Tort reform continues as an issue of great contention in the Legislature. On Wednesday evening, Rep. Ed Blackmon (D–Canton) exercised his prerogative and declined to bring SB 2763, which had passed in a much weakened form out of the Judiciary A committee which he chairs, to the House floor for consideration. Had Chairman Blackmon called the bill up for floor debate, the bill likely would have been strengthened through amendments offered by tort reform proponents -- something Rep. Blackmon apparently was unwilling to chance. Because it was known that the bill would die if not acted upon by midnight, many members of the House resisted the routine motion to adjourn for the day, because adjournment necessarily would kill the bill. A little after 8:00 p.m., the House voted to adjourn by the extraordinarily close tally of 61-58, seen by many observers as the first real tort reform vote on the House floor this year. Lauderdale County Representatives casting a "no" vote on adjournment included Rep. Eric Robinson (R–Quitman), Rep. Greg Snowden (R–Meridian), and Rep. Steve Horne (R–Meridian). With adjournment, SB 2763 died for the Session.

A second tort reform measure, HB 1323, a House banking bill in which the Senate had inserted a strong tort reform package similar to the original (not weakened) SB 2763, met with a highly unusual fate when the bill was returned to the House for concurrence or nonconcurrence. Typically, the bill would have been placed on the House concurrence calendar and assigned to Rep. Danny Guice (R–Gulfport), the Chairman of the House Banking committee which had originally handled the bill in the House. However, Rep. Guice, a tort reform supporter, had made it known that he intended to move that the House concur (accept) the Senate additions to HB 1323, and had a majority of the House agreed, as most expected, the bill with its strong tort reform provisions would have gone straight to the governor. Unwilling for the full House membership to have a vote on whether simply to concur on HB 1323, Speaker Billy McCoy (D–Rienzi) took the unusual step of reassigning the bill to Rep. Ed Blackmon (D–Canton), who now, rather than Rep. Guice, will make the decision as to whether to make a motion that the House concur or invite conference on HB 1323 (considered unlikely, because making either motion would give the full House membership a vote), or, as is most probable, simply to allow the bill to die on the House calendar by failing to call it up prior to the April 29 deadline for concurrence or nonconcurrence. If HB 1323 dies, there will be no further opportunity for tort reform in the 2004 Regular Session unless the House and Senate suspend the rules (2/3 vote being required) and bring up a new bill after the deadline, as was done last week in the successful effort to revive Voter I.D. after the deadlines otherwise had passed. Nothing is ever "dead, dead, dead" until the Legislature adjourns sine die and goes home, but the prospects of obtaining a floor vote on tort reform in the 2004 Regular Session appeared very dim at the end of the week. Governor Barbour has all but vowed to call the Legislature back this summer in a special session to deal with tort reform if no progress is made during the Regular Session.

A remarkable debate occurred on Tuesday morning relating to House Resolution 51, brought forward by the House Rules Committee, chaired by Rep. Joe Warren (D–Mount Olive). Unlike a bill, a resolution has no force of law, but simply is an expression of the consensus of the House of Representatives on a particular subject. HR 51, authored by Rep. Bennett Malone (D–Carthage), urges Congress to call for an amendment to the Constitution of the United States to provide as follows: "Neither the Supreme Court nor any inferior court of the United States shall have the power to instruct or to order a state or political subdivision thereof, or an official of such a state or political subdivision, to levy or increase taxes." This proposed "Judicial Taxation" resolution was debated heatedly for more than an hour, with liberal members of the House bemoaning the very idea that the Constitution be amended so as to restrain the power of an unelected judiciary to usurp the authority of elected representatives to make taxing decisions. In the end, however, HR 51 passed handily, putting the Mississippi House of Representatives on record as favoring a constitutional amendment to limit the power of the courts to order states to impose taxes as a remedy to cure such various and sundry ills as the courts may choose to identify.

House inaction on HB 657, as sent back from the Senate with language which would have extended the school districts' statutory teacher nonrenewal notification deadline to May 15, led directly to many teachers unnecessarily receiving "pink slips" from some school administrators concerned that K-12 funding will not eventually be forthcoming. In actuality, however, the educational budgeting process is taking its normal and regular course, and the House and Senate conferees are expected to craft an acceptable budget on schedule in early May which will fund K-12 education, always the Legislature’s top funding priority, to the very highest levels possible within the state’s means. Governor Barbour and Lieutenant Governor Tuck, flanked by legislators of both parties from both the Senate and the House, held a joint press conference Wednesday afternoon to denounce the political scare tactics employed by those who have fostered apprehension and anguish among Mississippi educators through the utilization of a popular "pro education" mantra in an effort to avoid making difficult decisions on the state budget as a whole. "Teachers should not be used as political pawns, and they should not be the first place to look to for cost-savings," said Governor Barbour. "Instead of scaring our teachers with ‘pink’, Mississippi should be focused on getting out of the ‘red’," he said.

On Friday morning, SB 3177 was brought to the House floor from the Ways and Means Committee.  Rep. Greg Snowden (R–Meridian) offered an amendment which would have created a back-to-school sales tax "holiday" during the first weekend in August.  The Snowden amendment would have exempted from sales tax articles of clothing and footwear priced at less than $100 from 12:01 a.m. on the first Friday in August through 12:00 midnight on the following Saturday.  Designed mainly to provide families with a much-needed tax break to assist in the purchase of school clothes (but available to all citizens regardless of age or circumstance), the sales tax "holiday" also would been a powerful retail marketing tool to entice out-of-state shoppers and would have been particularly beneficial to retail merchants in the peripheral areas of the state, such as Meridian, Southaven, Vicksburg, Greenville, Columbus, and along the Gulf Coast.  Rep. Erik Fleming (D–Jackson) joined the bipartisan support for the Snowden amendment, correctly pointing out in the floor debate that the sales tax "holiday" would be particularly helpful to needy families with school-aged children.  Many states have adopted such sales tax "holidays" with minimal negative impact upon overall state revenues, in part because shoppers (many of whom are enticed from out-of-state) invariably use their tax savings to purchase additional, non-exempt items, and also because higher gross sales inevitably lead to greater employment and more income taxes eventually paid into state coffers.  Nevertheless, continuing concerns about tight revenues in Mississippi during the current budgetary process undoubtedly led to the defeat of the Snowden amendment by a close vote of 54 to 63, but SB 3177 has been held on a motion to reconsider, and there is at least a chance the House may reconsider and adopt the sales tax "holiday" for Mississippi when it reconvenes early next week.

Among the bills passed in the House this week was an amended version of SB 2892, which increases various fees in order to set up a method of funding drug courts statewide, and also to partially fund the eight Department of Mental Health crisis intervention centers around the state, most of which have been constructed, but only one of which (near Corinth) presently is staffed. The House also approved SB 2370, limiting potentially misleading advertisements for legal services by notaries public; SB 2446, awarding honorary high school diplomas to Vietnam War veterans who dropped out to fight in the war; and SB 2727, nominating the Pascagoula River and Bear Creek as scenic streams, part of an ongoing state conservation program.

The House observed a moment of silence on Tuesday to honor a Lauderdale County hero, U.S. Marine Christopher Dale Mabry, of Clarkdale, who was killed in action in Iraq on April 7. The House also honored retiring Mississippi Area Methodist Bishop Kenneth L. Carder for his service to the state, and passed various commending resolutions honoring individuals and groups such as Viking Range CEO Fred Carl Jr., of Greenwood, football legend and East Mississippi Community College coach Tom Goode, and award winning actress Tonea Stewart, of Greenwood. The House will have a brief ceremony in the chamber on Tuesday, April 20, to honor all the Mississippi National Guard units that have been activated during the war against terrorism, and urging Mississippians to send greetings and thanks to all of her brave warriors in the cause of freedom.

Late last week, the full House of Representatives approved bills on several subjects that have been at the forefront of the session almost since it started. Among these were SB 2063, allowing the state to contract with private companies to construct toll roads in areas of high need, such as on the Gulf Coast with a connecting road between state ports; SB 2853 to allow the drilling for natural gas in the Mississippi Sound, with a prohibition in the area closest to Alabama waters for environmental reasons, and with an amendment that mandates counties receiving severance taxes must reduce local property taxes by an amount equal to 50 percent of the tax proceeds; and SB 2436, to include language favorable to seniors and the disabled in the bill that spells out how the state’s massive Medicaid program is to be operated.

Representative Greg Snowden (R––Meridian) maintains a legislative web site to aid constituents and other interested persons in obtaining information about state government. The web site address is www.gregsnowden.com. Rep. Snowden may be reached by e-mail at greg@gregsnowden.com, or by telephone at 601-693-5700 (Meridian office) or 601-527-5350 (cell phone –– a local call from anywhere within Mississippi).

EDITORIAL NOTE: Most of the facts and much of the organization of the above summary is due to the fine work of Mac Gordon, of the House Information Office. However, although Mr. Gordon provides this information weekly to all House members, each member has the privilege of using it however he or she sees fit. Rep. Snowden has taken the liberty to re-write much of the standard summary, and to include his own comments and expressions of opinion. Accordingly, while Rep. Snowden gratefully acknowledges the work of the House Information Office in organizing and supplying reliable and timely information as to the workings of the House, all comment and all opinion contained in this summary is that of Rep. Snowden alone, and not that of Mr. Gordon or any other staff employee of the House of Representatives.