04/05/06


During the two weeks I was out of action, Cindy continued the work on the Hill by lining up co-sponsors for the ROW legislation and building support for the helmet bill. She's also well on her way to getting our outreach program of motorcycle awareness written, funded by the Dept. of Safety, and into the schools.

We spent two days this week lobbying for the helmet bill among the members of House Budget Subcommittee and the Senate Finance, Ways and Means Committee. By the way, the legislators are at Legislative Plaza and available only on Tuesdays and Wednesdays. They are there on Thursdays for half a day but they are generally either in Session or out the door to go to their home districts after Session.

A fiscal note on a bill details the State's opinion of how much a bill will cost the taxpayers of Tennessee. The fiscal notes and the Budget Sub Committee have been used for years as a way of killing bills that the leadership of the House didn't like or don't want. A bill with an expensive fiscal note is virtually guaranteed to fail in Budget Sub. For that reason, the Committee is commonly known as "The Black Hole."

The important action this week was at 9 AM this morning (Wed) when we sat down with Jim White, Executive Director of the fiscal review committee, one of his assistants, Crista Lee, with whom I had had the pleasure of working last year, and Rep. Gene Davidson, our House sponsor for the helmet bill. This was a crucial meeting. If we can get the fiscal note substantially reduced or down to zero, we will have a much better chance of getting the bill favorably passed by the Budget Sub Committee. We presented a 15 page document gently pointing out some of the inconsistencies, facts that don't square with other documents we have, and what we believe to be simple errors of the logic. Writing that document was "How I spent my summer vacation."

Mr. White, who is an attorney, is like us in that he is sincerely seeking the truth and he was genuinely happy to get the results of our research and the new facts that have come to light since the fiscal note was written back in May of 05. This is now the third time that we have gotten the fiscal review Director to reevaluate the fiscal note. Getting fiscal review to open a fiscal note to scrutiny three times is unusual and we appreciate the fact that they have honored our requests.
Rep. Davidson is a very persuasive guy.

The helmet bill, HB0456/SB0807 is scheduled to be heard by the Senate by Finance, Ways and Means at 8:30 AM on Tuesday, April 11.

It is scheduled to be heard in the House Budget Sub on Wednesday, April
12 at 11:00 AM.

Both of those schedules are subject to change but the final schedules will be available Monday morning. When they come out, I will notify you on Yahoo.

Let the Games Begin

jp