Statehouse Express: Season 4, Episode 4

It was an interesting week in the Indiana General Assembly! Catch up on what happened in this update with INPEA Executive Director John Elcesser.  

Transcript

Statehouse Express: Season 4, Episode 4

Hi! I’m John Elcesser, INPEA’s Executive Director, and welcome to the fourth episode of the Statehouse Express. It’s hard to believe that next week is the last week of committee hearings. House Ed is having an extra meeting on Monday and Senate Ed has their last one on Wednesday. That means we’ll know what bills are in play for the second half of the session. Bills that didn’t get a hearing in the first half are dead unless parts of the dead bills are amended into other bills that are still alive.

Last week, the House Ed Committee heard HB 1591, which has a number of Choice fixes in it. It included the change in the fees language, the birthdate change, and the inclusion of Pre-K costs as an allowable Scholarship Tax Credit (SGO) expense. It also has a part that would allow non-public school leaders to participate in the State Principals Institute. The bill was introduced, and testimony was taken, but it won’t be acted upon until Monday.

An amended bill, HB 1281, on financial literacy also passed. The amended bill provided more flexibility to the Department of Education how it would be implemented, whether it would be a graduation requirement or if had to be a separate course or could be integrated into an existing course. Interestingly, one Democratic member of the committee offered an amendment that removed the requirement from non-public schools unless it ended up being a graduation requirement. I have no idea where that came from but we are not going to argue with less regulation. 

The Senate Ed Chair pulled two new bills from Wednesday’s agenda, one of which was a controversial CRT bill.  He only opted to hear the previously heard bills that were slated for amend and vote. SB 167 passed out of committee unanimously. It requires all students, unless a waiver is requested, to complete a FAFSA. This bill has passed out of the Senate before but has never gotten a hearing in the House.

SB 435, which would automatically register eligible students for the 21st Century Scholars Program, passed unanimously as well. 

It’s been somewhat of a chaotic week at the Statehouse as one key senator chose to post a rant on Facebook about his perception of how a school handled some issues brought to the administration; an issue, by the way, where the school followed all of their local policies and procedures. 

Among many other things, he generalized his concern to all voucher schools and has pledged not to allow any expansions and to increase accountability. INPEA is working with other key legislative leaders to ensure they have a broader perspective on the issue. 

As we move into the last weeks before crossover, House Ed meets on Monday to vote on the bills they heard last week and will hear three new bills. One bill, HB 1608, deals with sexual orientation and gender identity instruction. It is sure to be very contentious. We don’t know what bills will be heard in its last meeting before crossover.

Bills that passed out of committee now will be heading to the chamber floor for second and third readings. Bills that pass out of one chamber will head to the other chamber and start the process all over.

As I’ve said, we need people to be ready to engage, whether it’s for offense or defense. Watch for invites to local rallies in your areas and watch for legislative alerts. We have lots of work to do!

So with that said, we’ll see you back here next time for the Statehouse Express!