Sunday, February 2, 2025

Push back on more bad bills at the AZ Legislature this week.

After all the negative bills last week, I thought you could use some good news.

Rep. Nancy Gutierrez's bill, HB 2213, which would fund free school lunches for children whose families meet the federal income requirements for free or reduced-price lunches, passed in the AZ House Education Committee by 9-3! If you are in district 18 and want to thank her for the hard work, her number is (602) 926-4134.

Next action... Contact the chair of the House Appropriations Committee, Rep. David Livingston (R-28) at 602-926-4178 (dlivingston@azleg.gov) and ask him to put the bill on his agenda.

Now back to our Request to Speak actions. There's less than last week, so that's good. And even one bill that supports EVs. Please weigh in on the following bills on the Request to Speak app anytime while they are still in committee.


If you haven't signed up for the system, you can find the form here:


Directions on how to navigate the system:


Monday, February 3rd

House Land, Agriculture, and Rural Affairs at 2:00 PM 
  • HB2201 technical correction; electricity; power authority (Griffin) will have a strike-everything amendment on S/E: wildfire mitigation planning; utilities; approval. The strike-everything basically gives the utilities near immunity for negligence related to wildfires. The wildfire mitigation plan is automatically approved once submitted. The ACC can request changes, but the power authority doesn't have to make them. This bill makes it nearly impossible to hold the power authority responsible for the damages they cause. OPPOSE
House Federalism, Military Affairs, & Elections Committee
  • HB2703 early voting; tabulation; ballot deadlines (Hendrix: Chaplik, Heap, et al) moves up the deadline for early ballots to 7pm the Friday before the election, and requires those with early ballots on Election Day to show ID and go through the lines. It eliminates emergency voting too. OPPOSE
Tuesday, February 4th

Senate Natural Resources Committee at 2:00 PM
Members of the public may access a livestream of the meeting here.
  • Presentation
    • The State of Agriculture in Arizona, Patrick Bray, Executive Vice President, Arizona Farm and Ranch Group
  • SB1113 renewable energy; public service corporations (Dunn) requires utilities to have the right of first refusal to construct, own, or maintain any renewable energy resource in Arizona thus giving utilities a potential monopoly on renewables. Why only renewables? Why not gas plants? This is a terrible bill that could block a lot of renewables. OPPOSE
  • SB1114 assured water supply; analysis; availability (Dunn) is an emergency measure that requires the Arizona Department of Water Resources (ADWR) to issue a Certificate of Assured Water Supply based on outdated certificates and allows other developers to claim the estimated water savings, up to 15 percent. This creates another way around the assured water supply requirements. OPPOSE 
  • SB1260 assured water supply; agricultural water (Dunn) allows the Director of the Arizona Department of Water Resources (ADWR) to designate a portion of the city or town that is located on lands served by a contracted agricultural water company as having an assured water supply. OPPOSE
House Natural Resources, Energy, and Water Committee at 2:00 PM
Members of the public may access a livestream of the meeting here.
  • Presentations:
    • Jim Robb, President & CEO, North American Electric Reliability Company (NERC)
    • Melanie Frye, President & CEO, Western Electricity Coordinating Council (WECC)
  • HB2223 wind farms; construction; policies; procedures (Marshall: Blackman, Diaz, et al) includes numerous mandates for wind energy generation facilities, including that counties require them to have a bond to indemnify the county from anything related to the wind farm. This is not required of other power generation facilities and is totally unnecessary. OPPOSE
  • HB2527 corporation commission; electricity; reliability; management (Olson) prohibits the Arizona Corporation Commission from authorizing a power plant retirement unless there is a new plant with equal or greater power. It requires that all replacement resources for power plant retirements be thermal (gas, coal, or nuclear) and precludes them from being renewable resources. The effect would likely be to keep coal plants running longer costing ratepayers more dollars -- solar is cheaper than coal. Due to its rate impacts and the restrictions on the ACC, it is also likely unconstitutional. OPPOSE
  • HCR2044 minerals; metals; supporting domestic supply(Griffin: Bliss, Carter P, et al) is another promotion for mining, including uranium mining, and asks for streamlining in permitting. Streamlining involves cutting out the public processes and further ignoring environmental and cultural concerns. OPPOSE
House Regulatory Oversight Committee at 2:00 PM
Wednesday, February 5th
 
Senate Regulatory Affairs and Government Efficiency Committee at 9:00 AM 
  • SB1229 planning; home design; restrictions; prohibition (Bolick: Bravo, Diaz, et al) Takes away power from municipalities to enforce their zoning requirements. Which means that owners can build anything on their lots as long as it complies with building codes (which are more lenient.)  OPPOSE 
  • SB1352 rezoning; administrative act; referral prohibited (Gowan) says a rezoning is an administrative act rather than legislative act and therefore is not referable by citizen petition to the ballot. This would limit communities' ability to stop a rezoning and put it before the voters.  Basically, this messy bill will prevent public opposition to rezoning applications. OPPOSE
  • SB1353 municipal development; permits; review (Gowan).allows permitting to be outsourced if a city does not approve, amend, etc. a permit in 15 days. This would just push cities to churn out permits and privatize local government further. OPPOSE
Senate Government Committee at 9:00 AM
  • SB1256 diversity; equity; inclusion; training; prohibition (Hoffman) prohibits the state from using diversity, equity, and inclusion programs for hiring, training, and promotions. The bill sponsor could benefit from training in this area. OPPOSE
  • SB1313 municipalities; counties; recycling; prohibition (Hoffman: Chaplik, Keshel, et al) says cities and counties should not ask people to place anything in a recycling bin that is not being "actively recycled" at the time of the bill's passage. This would prevent future expansion of recycling programs. OPPOSE
  • SCR1008 municipalities; counties; vote; fee increases (Petersen) refers a measure to the ballot to require that cities and counties have a two-thirds vote to increase any fees, taxes, etc. This will tie the hands of local government just as it has the legislature, except that the legislature has developed several work-around processes. This is government overreach. The state shouldn't mandate that municipalities have a 2/3 vote to increase fees. OPPOSE
House Federalism, Military Affairs, & Elections Committee at 2:00 PM
House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee at 2:00 PM 
Senate Judiciary and Elections Committee at 2:00 PM
  • SB1152 early voting; mailing date (Gowan) reduces early voting from 27 days prior to the election to 21 days before an election. This limits the amount of time for early voting and could affect voter turnout and burden election workers further. OPPOSE
  • SB1280 cast vote record; public record (Finchem: Rogers) requires a county recorder to make available the name, voter ID, and party of every person who voted only one hour after an election. This is an impossible and unnecessary measure. OPPOSE
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