The legislature once again had a very slow week. Yesterday, both the House and Senate adjourned early and won’t be back until Monday.
The slowdown is largely attributed to the budget standstill, though there are some rumblings that the budget could pick up some steam in the next couple of weeks. One of the bigger developments for the budget was last week’s AZ Supreme Court ruling that rejected the November referendum related to last year’s income tax cut. This was one of the major budget hang-ups and now the courts have resolved it.
As for the two bills we are tracking — HB2123 (Funeral Board Extension) and HB2024 (Alkaline Hydrolysis)—they are just stuck like most other bills right now. HB2123 is still waiting to go to Committee of the Whole, and HB2024 still needs a Rules hearing. To give you an idea, the Senate only calendared 18 bills this entire week. For comparison, a couple of weeks ago the Senate calendared nearly 50 bills.
Jake Hinman, our legislative liaison, believes we are in good shape with getting HB2123 passed. Stakeholders at the Capitol all seem to be say the same thing about the bill and the Board: 1) They recognize that regulation is necessary for this industry; 2) lawmakers feel obligated to do something given the Auditor General’s report and the slow response in addressing the findings, 3) we will have an opportunity over the summer to sort all of this out.
As always, please reach out if you have any questions.