COLUMBUS, Ind. — The first Third House session of 2021 will be Monday, in a virtual format.
It’s free, but registration is requested. By the end of last week, 95 people had registered for Monday’s 8 a.m. event. That’s more than the average 55 attendees who have shown up in person for these sessions during recent years.
The one-hour-long Third House sessions are held once a month until the Legislature adjourns in April.
During this first Third House session, only two state lawmakers from Columbus, Republicans Rep. Ryan Lauer and Sen. Greg Walker, have confirmed they will participate. Rep. Jim Lucas, R-Seymour, Rep. Eric Koch, R-Bedford and Rep. Sean Eberhardt, R-Shelbyville, all have standing invitations to take part if their schedules permit.
At the statehouse, lawmakers are only required to achieve two tasks this year — create a biennial budget and redraw legislative maps. Map boundaries for the next 10 years will remain under GOP control since Republicans maintained their super majority in the General Assembly following last year’s election and census.
More than 1,000 bills have been introduced in just a few weeks.
One proposal receiving attention is Senate Bill 001, while offers liability protections to businesses from individuals who may be exposed to the COVID-19 virus on their property. The Senate bill, as well as a House version, have been through the committee stage and appear to be moving toward passage.
One of the three authors of Senate Bill 001 is Koch, who represents parts of five townships in Bartholomew County .
On the flip side of the same topic, there is Senate Bill 74, authored by Sen. Dennis Kruse, R-Auburn, that protects workers from being ordered against their will to get the COVID-19 vaccination.
Lucas has filed a bill designed to rein in Indiana Gov. Eric Holcomb’s emergency powers. House Bill 1121 would limiting the term of Holcomb’s emergency orders to 30 days, unless an extension is approved by the General Assembly. This measure has remained with the Committee on Rules and Legislative Procedures since it was introduced Jan. 7.
Two other bills authored by Lucas involving marijuana also seem to be stalled in committee. House Bill 1028 would decriminalize possession of 30 grams or less of marijuana or five grams or less of hash oil or hashish. House Bill 1026 would allow permits for “cultivation, processing, testing, transportation, and dispensing of medical marijuana.” This is Lucas’ third year to propose decriminalizing lower quantities of marijuana, but none have made it to a committee hearing.
In the wake of the events and protests of 2020, Rep. Carolyn Jackson, D-Hammond, drafted House Bill 1015, which requires a publicly accessible database of law enforcement misconduct that lists officers who engaged in misconduct, were suspended without pay, or were demoted or discharged. However, that proposal has also remained in committee without a vote since it was introduced Jan. 4.
House Bill 1006, which requires Indiana’s law enforcement training board to mandate training in de-escalation, has already moved through a House committee. It was authored by Rep. Gregory Steuerwald, R-Avon.
