Lawmakers Take More Time to Complete Special Session Work

Lawmakers will return for a second day in an extraordinary session after some called for more time to consider last minute legislation.

Senators considered and passed two bills Monday, one appropriating excess lottery funds to several state programs and a second modifying the funding mechanism for the state Courtesy Patrol, but stopped short of passing the four additional bills on the call.

Senate President Jeff Kessler attributed that to uncertainty from Republicans members of the House.

“We ran our bills, got them out of the way, through the committee process today, they came out clean and so we decided to run them,” Kessler said after the Senate’s evening floor session.

“I spoke to the Speaker and I think they have an agreement with the House Republicans over there to suspend the rules tomorrow after they’ve had a night to review the bills and sleep on them.”

House Minority Leader Tim Armstead said members of his caucus received draft versions of the proposed bills on Sunday and needed clarification on some of the language.

“We had a caucus this morning and there were some questions that needed to be addressed on those and so they were referred to the committees,” he said.

Armstead said sending them to committee allowed members to discuss the legislation more completely with staff counsel.

Lawmakers will go back into session Tuesday morning to further consider the six proposed bills.

Kessler expects to pass the bills fairly quickly, allowing legislators to return to their normal interim meeting schedules.