State Agencies & Govt'l Affairs-Senate

Stay or go is up to you just to make sure people knew that an audience. With that H. B. thirteen thirty eight represent Lundstrum and Senator Bledsoe you're ready present the bill you can present at your leisure all right thank you so much Mister chairman I have today with me representatives Lundstrum and she is going to explained the Bill. Thank you colleagues many of you remember the election just frequently we just passed and I'm sure all of you walked into the voting booth and realize that we had thirteen different presidential candidates and you probably all got of come from collar to from constituents that were confused and frustrated and wondered why we have president thirteen presidential candidates I also wonder that turns out we haven't updated the Arkansas law since the early seventies in order to run for president you only need a thousand signatures the Republicans and Democrats set a little higher bar. And since that law has been updated all this bill is asking is that we change that to five thousand signatures just to give you a little perspective if you run for Supreme Court in the State of Arkansas you have to have ten thousand signatures plus play a filing fee so we've changed or were asking for the. Agreement to change this to five thousand signatures and make the running for president just a little bit more important with that'll entertain questions any questions committee. I want to listen you really change anything else the same process same process everything just updated by a few thousand votes to be on the road or. With that I believe we have one person speak against it injure Waldron Mr Waldron you're allowed to come for the can make room form either move over to the side. Roldan you're recognized you can say your name and your affiliated with any association or group for the record. Thank you chair my name is Andrew Waldron I am here today representing the Green Party of Arkansas. we object to this bill because. First and foremost in our in our per purview we have not seen any such confusion with of ballots with the ballot from people that we have talked to a second we believe that this is an in his. This is unnecessary raising of the of the bar for the presidency because of the high profile of the presidency of itself of candidates. Kenitzer generally what more well known about when. On the presidential lying down and any other line on the ballot and. As such when. When voters approach it they are more likely to know about who is about who they're going to vote for regardless of their if there's two or thirty candidates on the ballot and the third of all signatures. Gathering signatures is not a cheap process current the. Billing for signatures is about three fifty for signature and that's. And there's some very able to that because of the scene because sometimes the right first gathering signatures depending on how long the current pandemic extends into could affect the prices. In the upcoming election cycles as well and as a result our objection is also that we do not want to Quinn topple are expected budget for the positioning process in the upcoming election. A I believe that is all I initially have I am open to questions thanks Sir any questions committee. See non Sir dismissed thank you thank you. With that back to Senator Bledsoe represent of Lundstrum. You already to close your bill. We are closed. Mr. Thank you now they closed bill do we have any motion from committee. Most to pastor Senator Hester we have a second from Senator English all's fair say aye opposed. The bill is passed thank you ma'am thank you so much thank you colleagues. Next believer moving to SP three eighty three by Senator Tucker I believe you have some amendments but don't Sir. Patient Mister chair. I'd like to run three eighty four first saw it'll become clear as I'm explaining it okay Sir let's make sure I get the right amendment for the three eighty four the second bill yes Sir. Without objection we will adopt the amendment for Senate bill number three eighty four. Thank you Mr chair you may present the bill as amended all of that amendment does change the Act title because the bill are today they realize that it needs a two thirds vote and so it just reflecting that in the Act title. In any event what this bill does your remember the the Bill at center Dismang brought to this committee a couple times actually saying that what you could do with your campaign funds that you race when you switch campaign offices that you're running for in the course of that committee discussion at one point Senator Ballinger raised appointed I thought was very insightful Center boundary of a dry run a bill together for for several years now and when he said that I thought to myself I've got the bill for us because I know will be an agreement on this the point that he raised is basically that under current law you could be running for one office receive a Max contribution from a donor spend all of it you're basically incentivized to spend all of it and then you switch to a different office and you could raise another Max contribution from the same donor in the same election cycle just by virtue of running for two different offices so all this bill does is it says that as a candidate you're capped at whatever the Max dollar amount is for that election even if you run for more than a one off centre Tucker can I interrupt you for one second sure this is a follow to cheer previously we adopted the amendments without objection Staffa said It for formal member like this we need to have a first and second motion so as to make sure we do that for proper movement and that's that's full of cheer we have a motion for Senator Ballinger we have second from Senator Hester all of Thursday I. Thank you yes or go to any thank you so that was I was pretty much wrapping up I just says that you can only receive a Max contribution from one donor per election even if you're running for more than one office that's it but I'd be happy to entertain any questions. The question committee. Also I'll add this to Mister chair. just to be clear I'm this legislation is not attempting to target any campaign for the twenty twenty to election cycle so we have an effective date in here that it's it's not even effective until the next cycle so there's no question about how it will affect any on going campaign right now. Sure any questions committee. Sir has to recognize. One five if I was running for a state rep received twenty hundred dollars from somebody then I gave it back. Ninety because the room for state Senate then could I get it yes Sir you give that's right. Any more questions committee. C. nine we have anybody speak for against the bill would have been by signed up soon are you closing your bill yes Mister chair with that I will accept any motion committee have the most from center calendar we have a second. Senator Hester although they say aye opposed the Bill pass as amended now we're going to SP three eighty three thank you Mr on by director Sloan to set up a table with me on this one with your permission yes Sir. So on this bill in the course of working on that bill you can see in there there is why I want to handle this one second because I want to be signed into law second you can see in that bill. And by that I mean three eighty four Page one line twenty eight it has the Max contribution at twenty seven hundred and we all know that in the twenty twenty cycle the Max contributions twenty eight hundred and. So my first inclination so I'm I'm I'm really speaking on the amendment to the amendment ultimately do you want to talk to Amendment forty two center Tucker sure all accept a motion to adopt the amendment have motion Ballinger seconds from center Davis all the things I the opposing now your doctor go ahead Sir thank you. So my first inclination was which was in the bill without the man wishes to change it for twenty seven hundred twenty eight hundred with that directors on a bridge means the center if you're going to do that you might as well go ahead moved to twenty nine under because sixty change next month but the really the better approach would be to change the code so you're not having to. Change the dollar amount every year or every other year when when that changes and so what the amendment does is we put language in. A with the amount that it changes every year is really established by federal law and ethics committees what directors long can speak to more intelligently than I can but the ethics commission follows the same calculation that federal law does and so I just put the method of calculating whatever the Max contribution is into the code so that's it the only time I will ever change in the future is if we want to change the way that the Max contributions calculated we don't have to go into the code every other year and change the Max contribution so that in a way this is almost like a technical cleanup bill but I'll I'll turn it over to the Director salon. Correct please say your name and title for the record Graham Sloan director there so at this commission. Senator talkers correct the I believe it was in twenty fifteen the General Assembly amended campaign finance laws and task to the ethics commission every two years with looking at some federal consumer price index type numbers and ended the legislation had a formula and it but basically every two years the commission. Look at those federal numbers applies a formula and then. The yield the number and then it's rounded to the nearest hundred that's the campaign contribution limit it didn't go up and twenty seventeen within in twenty nineteen application of the formula of. Cause it to be rounded up to twenty eight hundred and then the numbers are out for the current you know. Terms so to speak and it's going to go up to Twenty nine hundred were in the process of doing that by rule but you know so you just kind of had this. Orphan twenty seven hundred dollar provision in the code that You know it was wrong in twenty eight hundred would have been better and that then you know it would are able to you would that be outdated by the time this became all the twenty nine hundred so the. I think this is the best method to fix and that which is just a you know for the statue to referred to the rule that the commission promulgates in accordance me what are we had this is the formula of the General Assembly prescribed we follow it so there's really not any discretion in there but that's that's all out and say. Thank you that was my question before the amendment because I said it would change every year we have to come back and do this I think this is cleaner way to do it based on my understanding how the Max donation changes any questions committee. See no questions we having by sign up against that Ford buying audience is nobody here thank you Sir are you closing your bill yes Mr without entertain a motion to committee we have a motion do pass as amended from Senator Bledsoe a second Senator English all those in favor say aye opposed. Thank you Sir thank you members committee thank you Mister Committee listener hammer text me and said he's an insurance commerce you should be on the way here if you don't come the next minute or two will adjourn but on that argument or to try to come in run this bill. If I have any opposition. No. Senator have a right on time. Seminary recognize ready SP three eighty your thank you Mr members of the committee Been working on this bill for a year probably you may remember some of you all that we're committee that to we have some employees that work hand what happens to their time is that and you notice that this bill deals with critical need employees analysts that specifically which departments have the critical need employees what this does is the with their annual time that they have greater harm in ramps stairs. If they have At the end of the calendar year because that's how other times track not the fiscal year with the state if they have greater than forty five hours this will buy them out to give an idea of the revenue impact and I think the total cost what we're talking about as it is right now we're tracking like eight thousand dollars right talk about a lot of money right now but what this would do is allow for anything over forty five hours for critical need employees and the reason we got into this is because we have a lot of critical need employees that are not able to use our annual time and what happens now when it goes above the limit it just falls off one of the things in the bill is that that annual time will automatically be put into the catastrophic leave bank because right happens right now that you just vanishes and so this is going to direct and lessee employee says no I don't want to go there which they say no I don't want to go there it just goes off into never never land never get you so this is actually going to help also build the hours in the creek in the in in that bank so that you may remember I think Senator Irvin may be given wrong person crib it seem like she ran a bill about the a critical bank where women on maternity leave to take extra time so that's the long and short of it work real hard with Katie and all those over there in the lesser come up to pose mental thank your potion is because we've really worked hard together on this that's what it's all about Mr yes Sir any questions committee. Okay. Senator Hester recognized can you tell me the name. Name a critical employee sure Arkansas health service center down in Haskell that's really where this all Charlotte three years ago because had much nurses and people working over that and and the scenarios says an employee wants thank you bring that up because it brings up another point point in the bill a employee wants take off of the supervisor said man I'd love like chocolate we're short handed right now like a DHS case worker or a CNA or nursing and they said read love let you off but I can't well we're actually basement forced free labor is what we're doing and then it right but one of the things that this does too is it says that the agency can require the employee to take off but they have given two weeks notice and here's why I put that in there I don't think it be right for me to walk in at four forty five on afternoon so you know what you're all for the next two weeks we haven't had time to plan anything and and really your time that you're working for the state and so that was just a fairness factor but I could see in a nurse DHS primarily is what I'm thinking about a given a good example of the meat inspectors this last time around during last year with CO would love the meeting spectres had work and they got their time but they were gonna pay so that our those hours will roll off. Anymore questions committee. C. nobody's signed up to speak for against and Senators rebuilt I'm close review and I appreciate it do pass members I'll entertain a motion from Senator Bledsoe do pass we have a second from center Ballenger all their C. I. any oppose gradually center thank you military members meeting with that we are adjourned. No no no. I was typically like Senator. Ritter has.