The legislature hit their most recent deadline yesterday as committees had to report on bills that originated in the opposite chamber. Everything that did not clear a committee yesterday is dead for the year.
It was a mix of a day, but a number of liberty bills remain alive in some form or fashion.
- House Bill 1422 was a regulatory reduction pilot program. The way the bill works is the Mississippi Departments of Health, Transportation, Agriculture and Commerce, and Information Technology Services would have review its existing regulations, accept written comments from the public for 60 days following the review and conduct at least two public hearings for citizens and businesses to identify any rule or regulation that is burdensome. Each of the agencies covered in the pilot program would have to reduce their regulations by: 10 percent by December 31, 2020, 20 percent by December 31, 2021, and 30 percent by December 31, 2022. This bill wasn’t acted upon in the Senate, but a smaller bill that has already passed the Senate is still alive in the House. Senate Bill 2605 will implement a similar program, exclusively for the Department of Environmental Quality and at five percent each year for the next three years.
- The Senate also didn’t act on HB 1510, legislation to provide universal recognition of occupational licenses for military families. However, the House took SB 2117, which was a similar bill, and added language from HB 1510 to it.
- Also alive, SB 2790 and HB 1104 would give the Occupational Licensing Review Commission the ability to do a review of an existing regulation to determine whether it increases economic opportunities for citizens by promoting competition and uses the least restrictive regulation to protect consumers. Right now, the OLRC, which is comprised of the governor, attorney general and secretary of state, is limited to review only new regulations.
- HB 326 will expand the sales cap for cottage food operators from $20,000 to $35,000 and also remove the restriction on the prohibition of posting pictures of your goodies on Facebook and Instagram.
- Legislation to expand the state’s Right to Try law is also still alive. Right to Try laws gives terminally ill patients the ability to try medicines that have not yet been approved by the federal government for market. SB 2830 would expand the current list of eligible patients to an individual with a traumatic injury and would also allow adult stem cells as a treatment option.
- Though it will be heavily regulated, hemp legalization continues to move forward with SB 2725 still alive.
- SB 2552 would remove the prohibition on how much alcohol a craft brewery can sell on its premises. Currently, breweries cannot sell more than 10 percent of what they produced at their own place of business each year.
- SB 2771 would extend the repealer on the related tax credits and increase the amount of credit for businesses as part of the Children’s Promise Act.
