Last day of the regular House session, that is. We are finishing up Committee of Conference reports on Senate and House bills today, plus a few other resolutions and items.
The budget compromise broke down last week between House & Senate conferees, so we will be called back into special session to deal with the budget shortfall and reductions...which should've been passed last week and acted upon today. Oh, well. We are advised to keep our schedules "flexible" for the month of June.
OK.
The month of June is not a fun time to be in this 200 year old building. There's no air conditioning. Today is both hot and humid. The lights in Reps Hall are off or low, the windows partly open, fans whirring to keep the air moving. Within the first 10 minutes of today's session we invoked the rule permitting the gentlemen to remove their jackets.
The wag seated in the row in front of mine wanted to invoke a (nonexistent) rule permitting "women to remove their skirts."
We're having an "end of session" cookout later today. If the session ever ends. You'd think so close to the close of our terms that people would want to wrap up rather quickly. However, some of them seem to want to debate endlessly. Which is why I'm sitting in the ante-chamber blogging.
The other activity round here is the first day of filing for office. So there's a constant cluster of people and press outside the Secretary of State's office, which I can see from this very bench. The Governor was standing out there a little while ago. Candidates for State Reps file at their Town Clerk's office.
The big question everybody's asking each other today, "Are you running?" Some are. Some aren't.
Yesterday was absolutely insane, I think I had a total of 5 meetings (2 legislative, 3 diocesan, depending how I define meeting.) Plus a reception in honour of the 1-year anniversary of the signing of the marriage equality bill, followed by an Indian dinner with my FFTNC.
Looking forward to my return to the peace and quiet of the lake, after all this Capitol City madness!
No comments:
Post a Comment