RURAL BROADBAND

• SB 356, authored by Sen. Erin Houchin, sets up a framework for the Office of Community and Rural Affairs to award grants to qualified broadband service providers for qualified broadband projects in underserved areas.
• No funding was assigned to the grant program at this time. A discussion about how to fund the grant program outlined in SB 356 will be held during the 2019 budget-writing session.
• Rep. Sharon Negele will be the second house sponsor of the bill.

AIM OPERATIONAL INITIATIVES

• Aim has several initiatives surviving their journey through the legislative process.
• HB 1004 which contains multiple efficiency measures and has the support of House leadership, will be carried by Sen. Ron Alting. HB 1256 includes language regarding title of RDC property and will be carried by Sen. Chip Perfect.
• Rep. Sharon Negele will carry the ball on the order to repair bill, SB 296, during the second half of the session. SB 269 is the rural sewer district notification bill and Rep Ed Soliday will be the House sponsor.

CONFLICT OF INTEREST

• SB 10 is a bill that dials back the conflict of interest law prohibiting municipal employees from serving on the councils of their employing community.
• SB 10 eliminates the conflict of interest in communities of less than 2,500 in population in an attempt to help smaller communities address problems finding enough interested and eligible people to serve on their governing bodies.
• Despite the Aim legislative team sharing our concerns about watering down transparency in this previous Aim initiative, the bill cleared the Senate 35-13 and Rep. Jim Pressel will carry the bill in the House.

GUN PERMIT FEES

• HB 1424 is a bill regulating handgun licensing. The bill sets forth many regulations regarding licensing terms and background check requirements. It also addresses permitting fees for lifetime license applicants.
• Effective July 1, 2019, the bill removes the fee for lifetime handgun permits. The Legislative Services Agency estimates the negative statewide impact to be $2 Million in 2019 and $4 Million annually in 2020 and beyond.
• Lawmakers have indicated that measures will be taken during the 2019 budget-writing session to mitigate the negative fiscal impact to those currently issuing such permits, which we have been told will result in a neutral impact to law enforcement training funds.

“We’re at the halfway point of the General Assembly. Our list is down to 70 or so bills so that’s a good thing. It makes the process a bit more manageable. As we’ve talked to you about in previous segments, the first half of the session was definitely dominated by annexation. We were able to defeat or work to defeat one very bad annexation bill giving county commissioners veto authority over city or town initiated annexations so that was a positive. But we still have three bills moving that impact annexation waivers in a negative way.”

– Matt Greller, CEO of Aim