Leaders of the Wyoming House and Senate met in Cheyenne on April 8 to discuss the legislative off season. In a surprise move, they reduced the number of days most interim committees can use for meetings from six to four but granted the chairs of those bodies more leeway in deciding which topics to discuss and research.
Majority Floor Leader Sen. Tara Nethercott (R-Cheyenne) brought the motion to implement those changes during the Management Council’s annual meeting, where it generally finalizes which proposed interim topics committees will study, debate and discuss with the general public during statewide hearings between legislative sessions.
Proposed topics this year include maternal healthcare shortages, election overhaul measures, cloud seeding and law enforcement communication on the Wind River Reservation.
Nethercott said the reduction in meeting time came down to the need for cost savings and efficiency. She estimated the new policies will save the state about $120,000 to $140,000. Committee chairs can request more than four days from the council if they deem it necessary.
“I, too, am frustrated with this process and find it wildly inefficient,” said Nethercott in the Historic Supreme Court Chamber. “We’re going to spend about 12 hours today having chairmen read their interim topic letters.”
Rather than do that, the council voted to pass her motion and leave the decisions on specific interim subjects to individual committee chairs. Those chairs will need to send their revised lists of interim topics to leadership for a final sign-off sometime before April 22. The council will then take time to resolve any topics that crop up in more than one committee.
“I find it interesting that when more moderate or progressive legislators are meeting and discussing moderate and progressive subjects, more time is allotted,” said Rep. John Bear (R-Gillette), a chair emeritus of the Wyoming Freedom Caucus and the chair of the Joint Appropriations Committee. “But then when conservatives have a majority, we want to restrict the opportunity to study conservative issues.”
Management Council members include Bear, House Speaker Rep. Chip Neiman (R-Hulett), Senate President Bo Biteman (R-Ranchester) and the rest of both chambers’ leadership cadres, including two Democrats.
Other legislators pointed out the decision was partly made due to higher percentages of committee bill deaths in recent years, including before and after the Freedom Caucus’s takeover of the House.
“The House basically left 14 committee bills in the drawer [in the past session], so I do understand the frustration of some members of the Management Council,” said Sen. Chris Rothfuss (D-Laramie). “If we're not actually going to be able to introduce our committee bills, why would we spend so much time during the off season working on the committee bills?”
But the choice to reduce the amount of time each committee can use for meetings hinders the public’s ability to weigh in on the legislative process, Rothfuss insisted.
“We are directly reducing their access to their legislators in the most meaningful part of the process,” he said. “Now, if what we're admitting to is that the process itself during the interim through our committee work doesn't work any longer, then maybe we all need to just go freelance a little bit and act as individual legislators.”
Either way, Rothfuss said he was “not happy at all with the current state of affairs.”
And neither was Bear, who attributed the high number of committee bill deaths this past session to an “ideological shift” in the Legislature following the November general election and the new Freedom Caucus majority.
He opined that with the caucus now in control of most standing and joint committees given their respective majorities, more committee bills will pass both chambers in the upcoming budget session.
“I would anticipate that through the next interim, you have a conservative group picking the topics and voting on the topics in the next session, I would expect the percentage to return to a higher number,” said Bear, who voted against Nethercott’s successful motion.
Lawmakers like Sen. Stephan Pappas (R-Cheyenne) said that the changes upended he and his co-chair’s plans for the Joint Transportation, Highways and Military Affairs Committee’s meetings and tours across the state.
“The council did say you can still have your meetings [where we had originally planned], but I know their intent is to cut down costs,” said Pappas. “So I’m going to abide by that, and move the meetings to Cheyenne and Casper.”
Some state politicos weren’t fazed by the reduction in committee time and the other changes.
“We scheduled four days anyway,” said Rep. Ivan Posey (D-Fort Washakie), co-chair of the Select Committee on Tribal Relations. “[The changes] really empower me.”
The Legislative Service Office (LSO), a nonpartisan staff meant to assist legislators, is drafting a letter to committee chairs from the Management Council letting them know they might need to reduce the number of topics each committee tackles due to the change in allotted meeting days for each body.
This isn’t the first time in recent history that the Legislature’s leaders moved to break with precedent to cut state spending. During this year’s general session, Senate leadership declined to pass a stopgap supplemental budget meant for unexpected circumstances, saying it wasn’t necessary. That happened after the Freedom Caucus-dominated House drastically reduced the size of Gordon’s proposed supplemental budget.
Also during the Management Council meeting on April 8, lawmakers voted to add the conservative policy group American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC) to a list of approved out-of-state trips legislators can take, including the National Conference of State Legislatures (NCSL) and the Council of State Governments (CSG). Those trips are funded by state dollars.
This reporting was made possible by a grant from the Corporation For Public Broadcasting, supporting state government coverage in the state. Wyoming Public Media and Jackson Hole Community Radio are partnering to cover state issues both on air and online.
