{"id":37,"date":"2013-01-13T17:26:00","date_gmt":"2013-01-13T17:26:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/impactpossible.com\/voice\/index.php\/2013\/01\/13\/the-arkansas-general-assembly-convenes\/"},"modified":"2017-06-20T16:16:16","modified_gmt":"2017-06-20T16:16:16","slug":"the-arkansas-general-assembly-convenes","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/impactpossible.com\/voice\/index.php\/2013\/01\/13\/the-arkansas-general-assembly-convenes\/","title":{"rendered":"89th General Assembly & New Advocacy Website"},"content":{"rendered":"
\nThe Arkansas General Assembly
\nconvenes for their regular session for the 89th time on Monday, January
\n14.<\/div>\n

<\/p>\n

\nWith Republicans in the majority in
\nthe state House and Senate for the first time since the 1870s it has generated
\nlots of speculation on what changes or types of legislation the new majority
\nwill implement now that they have control. With 51 seats in the House (out of
\n100) and 21 seats in the Senate (out of 35), Republicans will be able to pass
\nall but budget bills without getting any support from Democrats. Budget bills
\nrequire 3\/4th approval so whatever budget is finally approved will be
\nbipartisan.<\/div>\n

<\/p>\n

\nThe General Assembly utilizes a
\ncommittee structure to review and approve bills for votes on the floor of the
\nHouse and Senate. So to become law a bill must be approved by a committee first
\nbefore it can be voted on by the entire House or Senate (with, I think, one
\nrarely used procedural exception). Therefore if Democrats oppose a non-budget
\nrelated bill they will either need Republican support or they will need to stop
\nit at the committee level.<\/div>\n

<\/p>\n

\nIn the 2011 legislative session the
\nRepublicans appeared to be a very organized and mostly unified group on
\nlegislative issues. So normally I would find it unlikely that many Republicans
\nwould cross over to support Democrats in opposition to their party on
\nmajor issues. However, the recent race for Speaker of the House highlighted
\nthat the Republicans aren’t necessarily unified on big issues. The Speaker’s
\nrace saw a coalition of very conservative Republicans and presumably all the
\nDemocrats in the House to elect Davy Carter (R, Cabot) over the presumptive
\nRepublican candidate, Terry Rice (R, Waldron). If a coalition that diverse can
\ncome together on an issue as important as the election of the Speaker of the
\nHouse, anything is possible.<\/div>\n

<\/p>\n

\nThe second option for Democrats is to
\nstop bills at the committee level. Republicans control all of the key
\ncommittees in the Senate. They also control Revenue and Tax, Education and
\nState Agencies in the House. So if it is related to schools, tax cuts,
\nelections or constitutional amendments Republican have a clear path to enact
\ntheir agenda if they are unified.<\/div>\n

<\/p>\n

\nDemocrats share control of Insurance
\nand Commerce and Public Health committees,
\nwhich are the two most likely to deal hot button issues like insurance exchanges
\nand healthcare. So any legislation related to these issues will require
\nbipartisan support for it to become law.<\/div>\n

<\/p>\n

\nYou can view a list of House
\nCommittee assignments HERE<\/a>. You can view a list of Senate Committee
\nAssignments HERE<\/a>.<\/div>\n

<\/p>\n

\nLike every legislative session, it is
\ngoing to be an interesting one so please visit www.rogerslowellvotes.com<\/a> to find information on
\nimportant issues and stay informed in 2013! <\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The Arkansas General Assembly convenes for their regular session for the 89th time on Monday, January 14. With Republicans in the majority in the state House and Senate for the first time since the 1870s it has generated lots of speculation on what changes or types of legislation the new majority will implement now that […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[1],"tags":[31,32,43,37],"class_list":["post-37","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-chambernews","tag-89th-general-assembly","tag-arkansas-general-assembly","tag-northwest-arkansas","tag-state-legislature"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p8RhO8-B","jetpack-related-posts":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/impactpossible.com\/voice\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/37","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/impactpossible.com\/voice\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/impactpossible.com\/voice\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/impactpossible.com\/voice\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/impactpossible.com\/voice\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=37"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"http:\/\/impactpossible.com\/voice\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/37\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":142,"href":"http:\/\/impactpossible.com\/voice\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/37\/revisions\/142"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/impactpossible.com\/voice\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=37"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/impactpossible.com\/voice\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=37"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/impactpossible.com\/voice\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=37"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}