At the Principal’s Office

Rep. Lindsey Holmes, Sen. Hollis French and I met with Gov. Sarah Palin and her staff Thursday afternoon about the capital projects for our districts that were put into the supplemental budget that passed the legislature last week. (Some wag has likened these meetings as going to the principal’s office. As someone who in his youth spent some time in the principal’s office – never, of course, for anything I actually did – I can tell you this meeting wasn’t anything like that.)

It’s not much money: in my case, $70,000 for three projects in House District 25. But all the projects are controversial because Palin has vetoed them once already and isn’t happy that they were put back in the supplemental rather than next year’s capital budget.

The meeting was cordial. Palin seemed interested in our explanations of the projects, but she didn’t make any commitments about whether they’d survive the veto process this time. She’d be a good poker player.

Capital Budget Redux

The first draft of next year’s capital budget came out last night. I don’t know what, if anything, is in it for House District 25 yet. Haven’t had time to check. I can say that it is just less than $1,600,000,000, split about half and half between federal funds and state funds. And I can predict with some confidence that it will get bigger before it reaches the House floor.

Greatest Hits of the 70’s and 80’s

Our Republican friends in the state House are reprising some of their greatest hits. So far, we’ve had one abortion bill on the floor – there’s another waiting somewhere – a couple of kill-all-the-predators bills, a few move the capital bills and, rumor has it, a capital punishment bill waiting in the wings. You’d think it was an election year or something.

74 and Counting

Today is Day 74 of the 90-day session, and the pace has definitely picked up. When I go to the floor for session, I carry a binder that has the day’s bills in it along with the backup for them: notes on what happened as the bills passed through committees, notes on how much they will cost the state treasury, letters of support or opposition and so on. Lately, these binders have gotten so big that I’m developing a list to port from carrying all that stuff.

We’ve passed a fair number of bills without much controversy, and one or two with a lot of controversy. But it’s hard to tell if we’re doing the right things, or if we’ve got the time left to do what needs to be done. Let’s all keep our fingers crossed.

Coming Soon; Special Session

As I write this, there’s been no official announcement of when we’ll have a special session on the gas pipeline. But all indications are that we’ll be getting together early in June to decide whether to grant a license to TransCanada for the project. Just how we’ll handle this in the legislature is also not certain, but hopefully will be clear before we leave here in just more than two weeks.

Best Laugh of the Week

Rep. Woodie Salmon sits in the back of the House Chambers. He’s not the tallest fellow in the world. On Friday he rose to speak and began by saying, “When you’re short like me, you can’t always tell if I’m standing up or sitting down.”

To which House Speaker John Harris, who is also, shall we say, vertically challenged himself, replied: “You don’t know what short is.”

Best wishes.