Tag: Alabama Legislature
Lawmakers Question Prison Department’s $1.5M PR Contract
A panel of state lawmakers on Thursday questioned an Alabama Department of Corrections public relations contract worth up to $1.5 million and criticized communications from the department during the COVID-19 pandemic.
“I just don’t see the need,” Sen. Tom Butler, R-Madison, said about PR work for prisons. “We’re not marketing resort hotels. Everyone has a pretty good concept of what a prison is.” Read more.
Alcohol Delivery and Wine Delivery Pass the House
Bills that would allow the home delivery of beer, wine and liquor passed the House of Representatives Thursday.
Senate Bill 126 from Sen. Jabo Waggoner, R-Vestavia Hills, would allow customers to have alcoholic products home delivered from grocery or liquor stores and restaurants. A separate bill, House Bill 437 from Rep. Terri Collins, R-Decatur, would allow customers to have wine shipped directly from wineries to their homes. Read more.
Transgender Athletes, Mandatory Kindergarten, Medical Pot, Double Voting, Police Database, Habitual Offender Laws Debated in Committees
MONTGOMERY — It was committee day in the State House Wednesday as several House and Senate panels met to consider proposals moving through the legislative process. Read more.
Open Records Bill Clears Committee, Lawmakers Want More Work on It
Legislation to strengthen Alabama’s open records law and create penalties for government agencies that don’t comply in a timely manner cleared a Senate committee on Wednesday.
But Republicans, Democrats and bill sponsor Sen. Arthur Orr, R-Decatur, said more work is needed before the legislation gets a full Senate vote.
“We’re 51st in the country on this issue … we can do better,” Orr told his colleagues about the current law that does not specify a response timeline or set fees for records requests filed by citizens and members of the media.
After a public hearing Tuesday morning, Orr said he’d continue to work with groups that expressed opposition to his bill, including the Association of County Commissions of Alabama.
Read more.
Advancement and Technology Fund Could Send $282M to K-12, Higher Ed
Alabama K-12 schools and colleges could receive about $282 million this year separate from the state education budget or any federal relief money flowing to them.
Senate Bill 193 would allocate money through the state’s Advancement and Technology Fund, which can be spent on one-time purchases in tech, capital improvements and a few other select expenses. The proposal that passed the Senate distributes nearly $76.3 million to higher education institutions and nearly $206 million to K-12.
For the smallest school systems, it’s several hundred thousand dollars. Mobile County, the state’s largest K-12 system, would get $14.8 million. Every school’s proposed allocation is listed in the bill approved by the Senate and now in the House. Schools would receive the money this summer. Read more.
House and Senate Resume Legislative Session in Slo-Mo
MONTGOMERY — On their first day back in session after spring break, lawmakers in the House and Senate slowed down legislative action to draw out debate and call attention to lack of movement of bills. Read more.
More from the Legislature
House Passes Bill to Shorten Absentee Application Time
Open Records Bill Clears Committee, Lawmakers Want More Work On It
Absentee Application Time Shortened
A bill that would shorten the time allowed to return absentee ballot applications passed the Alabama House on Tuesday. Read more.
Legislature’s Differences on Election Legislation Reflect a National Divide
MONTGOMERY — In the wake of the 2020 elections, measures to change voting procedures and regulations have been introduced at the federal and state levels, revealing a deep partisan divide over how voting should work.
While Democrats in Congress are pushing legislation that would limit states’ ability to enact strict voting requirements, Republicans in state legislatures are considering bills to tighten voting regulations in the name of securing voter integrity.
Alabama has followed suit, as a number of election-centered bills have been introduced during the ongoing 2021 regular session. Around 32 bills from both Democrats and Republicans introduced this year have dealt with Alabama election law.
Some of the conservative measures have drawn sharp concern from Democrats saying the bills promote voter suppression and are in reaction to President Donald Trump’s false accusations of widespread voter fraud during the 2020 election.
Read more.
More from the Legislature:
Bills Would Limit Cities’ Gas Tax Spending
Senator Looking for Fix on Tax-Filing Interest Issue
Will Alabama and Mississippi Expand Medicaid to Low-Income Adults This Time Around?
WBHM
After a fire destroyed their last apartment in 2019, Kenneth Tyrone King and his family recently saved up enough money to rent a new place in Birmingham.
But the relief was short-lived. Bills, mostly medical, quickly began piling up at the new address.
For King, 57, this was just the latest development in a cycle of debt. He has not had health insurance for years. He lost his most-recent job at a temp agency after having emergency open heart surgery in December. He barely has enough money for the two prescriptions that he needs each month.
“I can afford one of them, but one of them, it’s like a $60 medication,” King said. “Those types of challenges, if I had affordable health care, or a health care plan, it would have at least covered some of it.”
King falls in the coverage gap. He does not qualify for Medicaid and he cannot afford to buy a private insurance plan. If Alabama expanded Medicaid, that would mean opening up eligibility to people like him and other low-income adults who make up to 138% of the federal poverty level, which equates to less than $18,000 a year for a single adult. Read more.
Senator Looking for Fix on Tax-Filing Interest Issue
Earlier this month, the U.S. Treasury Department and IRS extended the filing and payment date for individual 2020 income taxes from the traditional April 15 to May 17. Alabama automatically extends its state income tax filing deadline when there is an extension on the federal level.
But the fine print on the Alabama Department of Revenue’s guidance on the topic said that, while it can waive late penalties for payments made by May 17, it is “not authorized to waive interest, and any interest accruing from April 15, 2021, through the actual payment date will be due.”
It would take a change to state law to waive the interest payments required of taxpayers who don’t file and pay by April 15. Sen. Arthur Orr, R-Decatur, told Alabama Daily News he plans to file a bill to address this “wrinkle” in the state tax code when lawmakers return next week to Montgomery.
Read more.
