As of right now the Texas Legislature meets only 140 days and at the stroke of midnight on the 140th day everything comes to a stop and all the Legislators call it quits and head back home. What happens if they don't get everything done in that time? Do they call for special sessions, do they pick up where they left off during the next session, or does it all just forgotten about and erased from history?
These are some valid questions that the people need answers to. Why is the legislature session so short? Obviously a lot can't be done in that short amount of time but yet there has been no move to change it or add in some extra time in places? Which can lead to whether or not an important bill is going to pass or not that is going to have a tremendous effect on our Texans, both good and bad.
Not to mention all the craziness that is going on in the Capital during the tail end of the 140 days. All the Legislators look like they are running around like chickens with their heads cut off. All of them are stressed out the wazoo with having to close up with their committees and finish voting on bills. But they can't be in two places at once. They either have to be running their committee or voting. And if they can't be there for the committee or to vote then who takes their place?
With more time for our legislators to actually run thing and have a smooth working system they need more then just 140 days to do it all in.
I agree with your point of having the legislature get more days to review and pass bills. If they had more days maybe we would have more bills that would people. That's what the legislature is for isn't it? It's also crucial to have each representative have a vote and not have others vote for them. I think more days would definitely help. Also the legislature should not just forget bills but maybe continue them when they come back into session although the circumstances may change in 2 years passing. The legislature is needed but honesty from them is also needed and so we rely on them to review the bills they get and pass or deny them.
ReplyDeleteMore time however also means that we pay them for being in office longer and use all the resources longer. This could also be a problem so I can see both sides. The longer they have the more time they might take to make a decision and that doesn't affect them but the people. I can see the positive and the negative but the legislature needs to make decisions on bills regardless.
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ReplyDeleteIn Texas, Y U No Have Time?!, Tonisha discusses the length of the Texas Legislature's regular session. She points out that after 140 days the legislators drop everything they're doing and the session is over whether business has concluded or not.
ReplyDeleteIn her post, she presents several good points in her argument as to why the sessions should be longer. In the third paragraph, she discusses the way that legislators roam freely around the room in, what appears to be, a rather chaotic manner while a vote is taking place. During this process, legislators often go to the desks of those who are absent and cast votes for them as well; this is referred to as "ghost voting." Even after several attempts to resolve this issue, including fingerprint machines conveniently located throughout the building, it remains an ongoing problem.
I agree that it would be beneficial for the legislature to have longer sessions and possibly even to become full time. That would also prevent the governor from easily vetoing bills, with no chance for an override, after a session has adjourned. However, as Tonisha pointed out, there is not much interest in changing the session length. I believe this is because Texas is a very conservative state and many Texans still believe strongly in small government. Ergo, more time for politicians to sit around making laws can't be a good thing. Because of this, I don't think there will be any changes to the length of sessions any time soon.
I do agree with Ms. Huizar when it comes to the fact that our legislative sessions do seem to be too short to get everything addressed that needs to be. But if 140 days is too short, my question is how many days would be sufficient? If the legislative session is too long then all these state representatives will be taken out of their respective districts which in turn would make them largely unavailable to the people they represent. And if the legislative session is not long enough, then we would be running into the same problem that we are seeing now.
ReplyDeleteI don’t think that the length of the session is the only thing that’s leading to all these representatives “running around like chickens with their heads cut-off,” but also the tendency that many of us have to procrastinate when it comes to important things. I feel if our state reps buckled down and do a better job than what they’re doing now, they can get a lot done. But that still doesn’t mean they can get everything addressed that needs to be. And further more Ms. Huizar has an excellent point, what happens to all the items that don’t get to be addressed? Do they spill over on to the next legislative session or do they simply just get forgotten? These are all questions that the people of Texas need to be asking, because after all without questions we can never receive an answer.