The Senate State Agencies and Governmental Affairs Committee will begin reviewing parts of Gov. Asa Hutchinson's plan to reorganize state government next week, committee Chairman Ron Caldwell said Thursday.
"We want public comment on it, so we are going to hear [the bills] in a special order of business," said Caldwell, R-Wynne.
During its meeting Tuesday, the Senate committee will review House Bill 1070 by Rep. Andy Davis, R-Little Rock, that would establish 15 Cabinet-level departments and transfer state entities into the departments, according to the General Assembly's website.
So far, Davis has filed nine of the 16 bills that would implement the Republican governor's plan to reduce the number of state agencies reporting to him from 42 to 15. Sen. Bart Hester, R-Cave Springs, is the Senate sponsor for the bills.
Hester told the Senate committee that he expects all 16 bills to be filed by the end of next week.
"At that point, we will let them sit for a week and then we'll withdraw all 16 and then [introduce] one omnibus bill that includes the language to all 16 bills and any changes that legislators or the general public or agencies deem necessary," Hester said.
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Then the plan is to let the "new omnibus bill ... sit for a week and then [bring it] into the House, so everyone has had plenty of time to understand what is going on," he said.
Hester said, "I would say in a perfect world ... we probably would have the transformation [legislation] about the third week of February" in the Senate committee. The bill will have to clear the House before it reaches the Senate committee.
The Senate committee may prefer to debate the 1,500-plus-page consolidated bill one section at a time, he said.
Caldwell said, "Basically, what we can do is take those sections in the bills and debate them one at a time.
"We can come in and conduct business routinely and then decide which bill we want to discuss" as a special order of business, he said. "That way, industry or stakeholders would be notified what we're going to discuss."
Sen. Bill Sample, R-Hot Springs, said he is reading his fourth bill that has been filed as part of the governor's proposed reorganization.
"I haven't seen anything that would make me vote against it at this point," he said. He said that he wants to fully understand the proposal so he can respond to people's questions about it.
Sen. Trent Garner, R-El Dorado, said he also wants the Senate committee to set aside time to review the legislation creating the 15 Cabinet-level departments.
"I think structurally that way would be an outstanding way, so we can move methodically and deliberately through this very needed and very good bill," he said.
Sen. Jimmy Hickey, R-Texarkana, said he wants the committee to review the bills in the order they have been filed in the House because he has read 300 of 400 pages of bills so far.
The House State Agencies and Governmental Affairs Committee's chairman, Rep. Dwight Tosh, R-Jonesboro, could not be reached for comment by telephone on Thursday afternoon about his committee's plans to review the governor's proposed reorganization of state government.
The governor's plan has these Cabinet-level departments: Agriculture; Commerce; Corrections; Education; Energy and Environment; Finance and Administration; Health; Human Services; Inspector General; Labor and Licensing; Military; Parks, Heritage and Tourism; Public Safety; Transformation and Shared Services; and Veteran Affairs.
Metro on 01/18/2019