This week at the State Legislature, both the House and Senate focused on moving bills through the process and to the other house. There is some good news and some bad news. The Sierra Club would like you to call your legislators about some bad bills that are mentioned below. Also, find a few Request to Speak actions below.
Here's the good news... SB1152 and SB1154 passed on reconsideration in the Senate 16-14-1. SB1152 zero emission vehicles; plans (Steele) requires coordination by the Arizona Department of Transportation, Arizona Department of Administration, and the Arizona Department of Environmental Quality, to develop a zero emissions vehicle (ZEV) Plan that will increase the number of ZEV vehicles. SB1154 transportation electrification study committee (Steele) establishes a study committee to review laws and consider ways to promote EVs and to collaborate to identify the best ways to encourage an economy-wide transition from carbon-fueled vehicles to EVs.
More good news, HB2836 interim groundwater review areas (Griffin), a bill that allows these interim groundwater review areas to be established, was retained on the calendar and did not advance after Rep. Cobb successfully added her rural management areas for water provisions to the bill. Rep. Griffin responded by saying to her, "You killed the bill." We say "Good!" Another of Rep. Griffin's bad water bills, HB2549, was retained on the calendar as well, but we expect it will be back.
And now for the bad news, HB2055 Harquahala non-expansion area; groundwater transportation (Griffin: Bowers) passed out of the House 32-26-1-1 with Democratic Representatives Chavez, Espinoza, A. Hernandez, D. Hernandez, Longdon, Meza, Shah, and Sierra joining 25 Republicans to pass this harmful water policy. Please express your disappointment to these representatives and thank the remaining Democrats plus Representatives Barton, Biasuicci, Cobb, Fillmore, Finchem, Kavanagh, and Payne for voting no. HB2055 allows private water companies to import water from the Harquahala Valley and into active management areas (AMAs) for development. Creating groundwater sacrifice zones and further privatizing water is a bad idea.
HB2101 electric energy; reliability; public policy (Griffin: Abraham, Blackman, et al.) was reconsidered in the House and passed 37-21-1-1. Its twin, SB1631, also advanced in the Senate and we expect it to come to the Senate floor early next week. These bills repeal provisions in the law that create parameters for retail competition of electricity. We are still opposed to the bills as we have concerns about how they will affect community choice aggregation of electricity overall and rooftop solar in Salt River Project (SRP) territory.
Let your legislators know you have concerns about these bills too and ask them to vote NO.
You can find senators phone numbers here.
Please keep calling your representatives and asking them to oppose HB2536 corporation commissioners; qualifications (Griffin). It requires corporation commissioners to be at least 30 years old and have five years of experience in business, accounting, finance, economics, administrative law, or professional engineering. This would disqualify a lot of people who have been or would be excellent commissioners. It was again retained on the Committee of the Whole calendar this week and will likely be back on the calendar early next week.
HB2492 voter registration; verification; citizenship (Hoffman: Blackman, Carter, et al.) was amended to make it less onerous to register to vote, but it still requires additional ID for Tribal ID, birth certificates, etc. We still think it should be rejected.
HCR2025/SCR1012 voter identification; affidavit; procedure is another referral to the ballot. This one would force voters to provide extra forms of identification when returning their early ballots, something they already did to get the ballot. In Texas, a similar law, led to a large number of mail-in ballots being rejected. This has already passed out of the Senate along party lines. Ask your representatives to vote no on HCR2025/SCR1012!
You can find representatives phone numbers here.
To find out what district you are in, fill in ZIP here: https://azredistricting.org/districtlocator/
Request to Speak Actions at the Arizona Legislature this Week.
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Tuesday, March 1st
House Committee on Natural Resources, Energy, and Water at 2:00 PM - SB1376 codes; ordinance; use of refrigerants (Gray) allows acceleration of the phase out of hydrofluorocarbons (HFCs) by limiting local government's ability to prohibit the alternatives. This means a simple change in some building codes. HFCs contribute significantly to climate change. SUPPORT
Wednesday, March 2nd
House Committee on Government and Elections at 9:00 AM
- SB1094 petition signatures; description; invalidity (Mesnard: Leach) voids the signature of anyone who signs an initiative or referendum petition without either hearing or reading the initiative or referendum description printed on the petition. What if the person had previously read or knew about the measure and specifically went to sign the petition? Why would they need to read a short description? We don’t require anyone to read about or know anything about an elected official before signing their petition, why for a ballot measure? When you sign a petition, you are merely saying you think it should be considered by the voters and not that you fully endorse it. This bill will result in more signatures being tossed and again make it more difficult and more expensive to put a measure on the ballot. OPPOSE
House Committee on Judiciary at 9:00 AM Thursday, March 3rd
Senate Committee on the Judiciary at 9:00 AM in SHR1- HB2130 recreational users; property (Griffin) limits a landowner's liability for injuries to recreational or educational users that occur on the owner's land and declares that these users are liable for any damage they cause to the owner's land. It says the land owner has no responsibility to warn people of dangers on the land. This is way broad and could result in more harm to people. OPPOSE
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- Condensed from Sierra Club - Grand Canyon Chapter legislative report
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DIRECTIONS FOR REQUEST TO SPEAK ACTIONS
Sign on to your Request to Speak account, click the blue Request to Speak button, click on New Request in the nav bar (left column), then simply cut and paste the bill number into Search Phrase (for example: HCR2014). Push blue Add Request button, weigh in FOR or AGAINST, click No on Do you wish to speak? (in person), leave a short Comment, and click on SUBMIT. For another submission, click on the New Request link in the nav bar on the left and follow the directions above.
If you had an account with RTS previously, it is still active. If you do not have an account, go ahead and set one up, but someone will have to help you activate it as it requires going to the Capitol. Reach out to Civic Engagement Beyond Voting.
----ANNOUNCING---
MARCH FOR CLIMATE Friday, March 4th at 9:30 a.m.
Meet at Senator Sinema's office and march to Senator Kelly's office. Sign up here bit.ly/March4thClimate |
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