Our Stories

We are in the final weeks of session. Lawmakers are tired, and there are significant differences between the House and the Senate budget proposals to work out. This year, there are also new budget dynamics as federal pandemic relief funds will expire next year and must be allocated and spent before they do. 

It’s day 75 of the legislative session and the pace just continues to accelerate, with 30 days remaining for lawmakers to pass crucial policies and make difficult budget decisions.

We’ve just passed the third major cutoff of legislative session – Wednesday (March 8th) was the deadline for most bills to pass out of their “house of origin,” meaning a full vote of either the House or the Senate.

Today marks the second big deadline of legislative session. “Fiscal cutoff” is the deadline for bills with budget impact to be voted out of a fiscal committee. This week has truly been a marathon of bill hearings and committee votes (called “executive session” in legislative lingo) going well into the night. These will continue all day today until the deadline of 5pm. 

Whew! Session is in full swing with more bills introduced in the last two weeks. Committees are engaging in hybrid hearings and getting smoother at switching back and forth between remote and in-person testimony.

This session, Stand is advocating for restorative educational justice by urging lawmakers to build a debt-free youth justice system. One way to reduce the harmful impacts of juvenile legal system involvement on young people’s educational and life opportunities is to eliminate the ineffective and inefficient practice of imposing financial restitution in juvenile cases.