From ou statehouse studio in Montgomery.

I'm Todd Stacy.

Welcome to Capitol Journal.

We're here at the start of another legislative week.

Tomorrow is the 15th legislative day, marking the legislature's halfway point.

Here's what we expect this week.

The House will conven at 1:00 on Tuesday and take up a full calendar of bills, including legislation to prohibit the disruption of a church service and to institute a sales tax holiday for firearms.

The Senate will convene at 2:00.

Though we don't know what will be on its agenda, this will be what state House types call a three day week.

As the House and Senate mee Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday, a typical session wee has the House and Senate meeting on Tuesday and Thursday with Wednesdays devoted entirely to committee work.

There will still be a full slate of committee meetings on Wednesday, but the chamber will also gavel in and coming up later in the show.

I'll sit down with my Capita Journal colleagues, Randy Scott and Jeff Sanders.

So talk about what we can expect this week in the state House.

One of the measures expected to come up for a vote in committee this week is Senate Bill 298, which would allow the stat to assume operational oversight of certain local police departments that failed to meet staffing requirements.

The proposal by State Senator Will Barfoot of Pike Road, would require Alabama's class three municipalities, including Montgomery and Huntsville, to maintai at least two full time officers per 1000 residents within five years.

If that standard is not met, the Alabama Law Enforcement agency could step in until staffing levels are restored.

During a public hearing last week.

Barfoot faced some criticism from federal lawmakers, including Democratic Senator Kirk Hatcher, who represents roughly three quarters of Montgomery.

It was over what he described as a lack of transparency ahead of the bill's introduction.

Barfoot letter addressed those concerns on the Senate floor and offered an apology.

I'm very passionate about that bill, and you will be hearing some more about that.

But I'll let my passion put blinders on my eyes and let me explain that.

I believe the bill is a good bill, and I intend to, push that as hard and as far as I can for the citizens of Montgomery in the surrounding areas.

But what I didn't do wa I did not have a conversation, a personal conversation with my colleague that also represents Montgomery ahead of time.

I've already had that conversation with him now of apologize for my lack of, transparency with him and m lack of, communication with him.

But I want this body and the members to know that that was in no way intended or meant to be seen as a disrespect to my friend, from Montgomery County.

So publicly acknowledging tha with all of you and I would say, don't make the same mistakes that I've made.

Those relationships are important.

And we've got to continue those.

With this being an election year, we continue to see bill related to elections and voting.

Senate Bill 42 from Stat Senator Wes West Kitchens of Ava would clarify what happens and the result of a tie in municipal elections.

The bill would call for a runoff election between the top vote earners.

This bill came after our municipal elections last year and I'll tell the story what happened?

To understand why we moved this piece of legislation.

Community that I represent, Guntersville mayoral race.

There were two candidates in the race, and it ended in nightcap.

Even after the provisional ballots and everything else, it ended in that time.

What we found out was that there were contradictions in state code as to what would happen if only two candidates.

Everything spelled out if there's more than two candidates.

But there was a contradiction.

Whether you have a runoff, whether the council decides what the process may be.

So this just clarifies that even if there's two candidates in the race, if it ends in a tie after the first vote, that there would be a runoff election for that position.

And it does specify in here that a tie breaker procedure if the runoff ended in a tie again.

So if you had two consecutive ties.

It would go a lot just like any other.

But it just takes that first step out.

And that wa we don't have any confusion and hopefully we will never happen.

But it was something that was, very near and dear to a lot of people in my district and, working with the league, we wanted to make sure that we corrected it.

So if or when it does happen again somewhere else in the state, we don't have to go through all the legal hoops that we did this last time.

That bill was approved by committee last week and is awaiting consideration in the House.

Another election related bill is from Stat Senator Vivian Figures of Mobile Senate Bill 166 would allow old campaign records to be discarded or destroyed after four years.

Figure said it is needed to mirror federal law and allow candidates to discard useless records without breaking the law.

This bill is really simple and it helps all of us legally for sure.

As I was declaring, as a as I have before, including me, I came on this big boxes of campaign information where we had you know, sent in our reports.

And back in the day, you know, I've been here 30 years.

This is my 30th year.

So we used to do things about paper, I mean, everything, if you can imagine.

You had to write out of your contributions.

Everything, your expenses by paper and turn them in.

So, as you might can imagine, after 30 years, I've got a lot of it.

But I didn't want to throw it away because I didn't want to do anything unlawful.

And when I ra for the US Senate, I knew that I could destroy those records after six years.

So this bill says that after four years, without that particular report, that you only keep it for four years and then you can destroy it.

So anything prior to that, you can get rid of it.

And this is the candidate's permission to destroy?

Yes.

It's your choice.

I mean, if it's something, it's an exclamation.

They probably would still keep records.

That bill is also awaiting a vote in the House.

Governor Kay Ivey has declared this week Public Schools Week in Alabama.

Ivey specifically pointed to Alabama's top ranked first class pre-K program, major gains made in mat and reading after the enactment of the Literacy Act and the Numeracy Act.

She also laude Alabama's 92% graduation rate.

The governor said, every child deserves a high quality education, and every teacher deserves the right training and support.

Together, Alabama's students and teachers are proving that by focusing on the fundamentals of education and by working har in the classroom, we can unlock a promising future for every child in our state.

We'll take a quick break, and then Randy Scott and Jeff Sanders will join me here at the desk to talk about what to expect in the state House this week.

Stay with us.

You can watch past episodes of Capital Journal online any time at Alabama Public Television's website.

aptv.org.

Click on the online video tab on the main page.

You can also connect with Capital Journal and link to past episodes on Capital Journal's Facebook page.

Born Henry Louis Aaron on February 5th, 1934, in mobile.

Baseball icon Hank Aaron first honed his baseball skills while growing up in Alabama.

He is best known for breaking Bab Ruth's record of 714 home runs, ultimately hitting 755, a record that stood from 1974 to 2007.

During his career, Aaron was a member of the Milwaukee and then Atlanta Braves for 21 seasons and made the National League All-Star team every year from 1955 to 1974.

He won three Gold Glove Awards for outfielder, and his lifetime records for most runs batted in and most extra base hits still stand.

Aaron was elected to th Baseball Hall of Fame in 1982, with 97.8% of the votes cast in 2002.

He received the Presidential Medal of Freedom, the nation's highest civilian honor.

APT is Alabama's storyteller.

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Dawg.

Welcome back to Capitol Journal.

Joining me next are my Capito Journal colleagues, Randy Scott and Jeff Sanders.

Gentlemen, thanks for making the time.

Here we are again.

Thanks, Todd.

Well, yeah, I wanted t have you all on where tomorrow.

We're going to hit the halfwa point of this session, day 15.

We'll get to that in a minute.

But first, we wanted to get you all to get your all to educate our audience.

What do we expect in the legislature this week?

Randy, I'll start with you downstairs in the house.

What are we expecting on the floor?

And committee?

What's what are the major themes?

Well, business as usual in terms of getting bills all to the floor and out.

Because I can say one thin they've been consistent of doing is getting those bills talking, but not going on and on and on and getting to the point of getting those bills out.

As a matter of fact, as far as I know, they had the first cloture vot this past week of the session.

Right.

So that was kind of stunning, because that leads to another issue.

I think we're going to talk about dealing with the leadership, because that cloture motio was taken by someone who wasn't the the leader of the majority of the House, right, who was kind of the actin majority leader, explained that a little bit cloture, meaning cutting off debate.

So, you know, otherwise it can go on for hours and hours and hours.

And when the majority decides they would like to move on, they move the previous question and the they I guess they get like ten more minutes of debate, ten minutes of debate.

And pretty much that's the majority right to do that, to cal that of the minority says, well, you know, something we have, let's say $170,000 per representative, just like the majority members do.

They deserve a right to have their say.

So that's what we're doing here.

So when you have a cloture motion that nixes all of it.

So last week they had it and it was a ten minute okay, who's ever going to get up and talk for the minority about this proposa that they have some issues with.

You get ten minutes and after that that's it.

It's over.

They vote on it and tha they move on to the next bill.

Right.

And also with cloture, the reason the majority doesn't do it that often is because it really does rile up the minority.

Right?

I mean, they know that the next IT bill that comes up there's going to be a lot more, you know, clashing because they got cloture.

I can recall some years ago there were some people who were in the minority who said that basically they feel just so as much as the majority, they have a right to speak for their people, too.

And when you cloture them, you're pretty much saying, well, you know, whatever else you got to say, that's too much.

Say which guy in the nex ten minutes and then that's it.

We're moving on to something else.

And so yeah, it does ad for some irritated feelings or as some people will say, some hurt feelings, but it does make people look at each other differently from that point forward.

And of course that was on the sound science bill having to do with state regulations not goin exceeding federal regulations.

We did report on that last week.

All right, Jeff, what can we look forward to in the Senate this week.

Well unlike the House, that has been much more congenial up i the Senate the last few weeks.

And, hopefully that'll continue.

What are you saying about the House?

Just saying that's is a lot of times it's the opposite that the Senate can be a lo more dramatic and but who knows?

We're only halfway through.

We'll see what happens.

But a couple of bills, we'll start with, Senate Bill 298 by Senator Will Barfoot.

That would, basically in the municipalities in the state, which really only include Montgomery and Huntsville, if they don't meet staffing goals within, like, I think it's two officers per 1000 residents within five years, Alia can step in and kind of take over the running of those, police departments.

Received a lot of pushback last week, did not get a vote in committee, but it had a public hearing.

It's supported by the attorney general's office, obviously has support within the Republican Party.

But Senator Kirk Hatcher, a Democrat who represents the large majority of Montgomery, was upset that he says he wasn't really told about the bill in time.

And that created some hard feelings.

But that's going to come back into committee this week.

I think some of that's been patched over, but, even if it passe the Senate, down in the House, I know the minority leader there has said that, he is not very happy with that bill.

So that to come up to committee this week, that happened last week.

And I have to say I spoke to the minority leader over the weeken and his views had not changed.

He said if that bill makes it down to the House, that's going to be some interesting times out there.

And they're just.

Yeah.

And it really I don't thin the bill is aimed at Huntsville.

It's just the way they're kind of maneuvering it through as a class three, but it's a way to kind of get past local bills.

You know, it's just kind of the minutia of how the legislature works.

But, that'll be something to watch.

Something else to watch.

Coming up this week is, you all remember the end of last session when we had the big filibuster that killed all those local bills, which this year we're seeing a lot of those local bills move first.

So we kind of get through those.

But Senator Bobby Singleton, th minority leader in the Senate, pushing SB 133 and that says he has kind of a gambling bill that has to do with Green County racing that he wants to kind of be would change kind of the the commission that's appointed by the local legislative delegation.

It would change the rules for simulcast racing.

He has gone on the floor a lot and said he just wants an up or down vote on its bill.

Now, I guess to be more complicated with that, because it does deal with gambling.

We're in an election year, and then that's another one.

Our conversation.

But that is the same as last year.

It's similar.

I really am trying to kind of go through the legislation and compare the two, but it basically does a lot of the same things.

But that will get a, it is in committee schedule for finance and taxation that's coming up on Wednesday.

Right now, it' the only bill in that committee that day that is interestin because we, my my recollection of the argument was, look, it's he's like, it's a local bill, so you should just be treated like a local bill.

But a lot of others say, no, it would change gambling law in the state of Alabama.

So it's not a local bill.

So they you know what?

They're both.

Right.

Well, yeah.

Yeah.

Which leads to disagreement.

Yes.

So that's that's interesting.

We'll we'll have to have to watch that.

Let me ask it.

We're here at this halfway point, 15 days where what does your impression of the, the session so far as we reached this halfway point?

Randy, I'll start with you.

They've been going at a quick pace, to say the least.

They have had bills come in and they've worked through them, coming out of committee to get them to the floor of the House, getting them passed, letting people talk about it.

And like we said, that speed bump, if you will, of the cloture last week was for one bill.

But for the most part, they have been handling business down in the House of Representatives.

Not saying a decision hasn't, but they've been going through and going through their calendars and going through it quickly.

For instance, they're getting ready for next week's calendar and at the top of next week's calendar of two bills are going to be interesting.

One is House Bill 360 by Representative sales.

It's a Second Amendment sales tax holiday.

That should be interesting.

And right after that, House Bill 363, which deals with the disruption of worship services.

Now, the sponsor of that bill, Mr.

Barnes, Greg Barnes, a new member of the House, said he brought that bill du to what happened in Minneapolis a few months ago.

And so he he's made no qualms about it.

And that bill has gotten a lot of attention of a lot of members of the House.

So we shall see if the good tidings of passing bills and getting to legislation starts.

Oh, could this be the start of something that could be a little bumpy road coming up on the in the House chamber for the next few weeks?

Yeah.

You could call those red meat bills.

For sure, Jeff.

Halfway point Senate.

What's your what's your, vibe so far?

It's like, you know, everybody's getting along.

You know, it's like they're taki I'm exaggerating, but honestly it has been very smooth going.

Only a couple of speed bumps so far.

That will change.

Obviously, I think it's we can get some of these red meat bills.

More of these.

Probably pass the house, come up through the Senate.

We'll see what happens with this bill this week.

I think that's going to get some considerable debate in the chamber.

No cloture motions in the Senate, you know.

No, no real filibusters.

Going on.

There's been some slow down days.

But, you know, sometime I think it's hard for even us.

You've covered it a lot of times you can be watching something and you see the slowdown taking shape, and you're like, what's going on?

Well, you know what?

What's the problem with this bill?

And then later you talk to a lawmaker, you know, kind of off the record though.

Oh, nothing was going on.

We were just working on some wording on an amendment.

So we just had to kill time for out.

Right?

Yeah.

So you do have to kind of get through those days and kind of kind of weed through what's happening.

But, so far so good, as they say, A little kabuki theater ther on the Senate floor, you know, working out some things behind the scenes while I, you know, act out, in front there.

We'll talk about some of that palace intrigue in the house.

The last couple of weeks, Randy, you've had, you know, that pretty rare circumstance where, they had this caucus meeting and somebody, presumabl one of the members recorded it, you know, recorded it, secretly shared some of the audi with the intent pretty clearly.

The intent is to embarrass the speaker.

That doesn't seem to have worked.

But that's like a that's like a cardinal sin when it comes to caucuses.

They're supposed to kind of close ranks and keep all that together.

That, you know, relatedly, you had Scott Stegen who was the majority leader step aside.

He wants to run for, Alabama Republican Party chair Jim Brown.

He was vice chair stepped up in the interim role.

But now we have a new majority leader in poorly.

So all right, all that to say has the vibe been to the House, given that there's so much going on behind the scenes?

Well, some of this drama.

Well, you heard whispers al week long even before last week.

That is something going on.

There's something goin on.

There's something going on.

And you could tell people were trying to maintain their focus on the people's business.

Then finally, you heard that there was a disruption in terms of leadership, but nobody will be specific and say, well, you know, who in terms of leadership is causing the disruption.

And then when it came to that bill, we were talking about that was there was cloture.

Representative Ji Brown brought the motion right, which was unusual.

And a lot of people were saying the media was saying, well, what's what's that all about?

Where's static?

Well, that's the role of the majority leader, right?

Yes.

And so everybody was say, so does this mean to Brown is now the new majority leader.

What does this mean.

And we know he has.

And everybody was thinking about the bill that he was sponsorin that was causing a lot of this.

He was alread the Public Service Commission.

Exactly the PSC bill.

And how could he do that when he's focused on this, what was going on?

And before you know it, it was announced that Paul Le was now the new majority leader.

Now, questions still continue.

Okay.

So we're staffing.

What about staffing and what does this mean?

What does this mean for Paul Leave because he's also the chairma of the House Health Committee.

How does that deal with his now being the majority leader?

And so a lot of people were just taking a sit back and watch approach to see what's going to happen next.

But you can bet there's some talk behind the scenes because you don't hear it in front of you in the house.

You best believe is going on behind the scenes, and somebody is talking about it, and somebody is trying to get headway into what's going on.

Yeah.

And, you know, I'm, I'm curious if they're going to be repercussions.

Like, do they know who who recorded it.

They know who passed i around that, that kind of thing.

Because that's the kind of thing that, you know, comes with consequences.

That also came out as well, too.

Everybody was asking the who, the who, the who, who did it, who do you think that it, you know, taking not not taking bets, of course, but everybody's trying to figure out, well, who would have done this?

Who could have done this.

It try to see.

Okay, is anybody here today?

Is that person?

Who is that person not here?

What's going on?

There are a lot of private investigators going on investigating.

Action it out.

They have my out.

I just want to say this quickly.

It is a cardinal sin.

I don't think people realiz that, you know, that that caucus is the space where they can just speak their mind, you know, because there's not a lot of places like that in politics these days.

Everything is, you know, we're on social media, everybody has their phones.

But, I, I think there's a lot of and I cover the Senate, but there is a lot of angst.

And, you know, the Senate would be a little different if that happened because there's so few, you know, it would be much easier to pin down.

So it's easier to happen in the house when there's 76 or wrangle.

I thought it was interesting this week that, Tommy Tuberville, who was, you know, barring anything crazy, would likely be the next governor of the state of Alabama.

Good friends with the speaker came out and strong support of him.

Went to a caucus meeting.

So, you know, the, you know, all, all the wagons have circled around at Ledbetter, and, I think he's still on a pretty good spot.

Yeah, I agree with that.

You know, having Tuberville very publicly embrace the speaker, come out with social media post saying, hey, this is my guy.

It's a it's a big deal.

And other people have stepped up to back him even before this.

Remember, there was some talk a couple of weeks about a couple of weeks ago.

If I get my words out about former lawman Mo Brooks running for somebody seat, he is.

Yeah.

And it wasn't Lomax.

Lomax and a lot of people cam in for the speaker for support.

But speaking to it said himself, he's behind Lomax.

Lomax is a good guy.

He's a future of the party.

And we're going to stick with him.

Yeah, we'l we'll we'll keep on the lookout to se if there are any repercussions.

Because again, it's a it's a serious breach of betrayal, if you will.

And just knowing how caucuses work and things like that just go over the decades.

It's the it's the numbers that are, acting right that are, that aren't doing anythin wrong, that, that can, you know, get a little ticked off if like, there are no consequences for, for something like that.

I would say this.

I think they have a pretty good idea whether they never know or not.

And and whether anything is ever said it would be interesting to see what happen in certain leadership positions and what happens in certain chairmanship positions, over the coming weeks.

Who knows?

That's just my opinion.

And that's just, you know, as we go forward from here, you'll start seeing changes.

Yeah.

I bet, well, maybe the second half of the session will bring more drama upstairs to the Senate.

Jeff you seem to be lacking in drama.

I'm not.

I'm not complaining.

I you know, we get ou a little earlier those days out.

We do have budgets.

Remember the, the, the, the education budget with Senator Ord starting and he's told lawmakers it's time to get that going.

I don't know that we're goin to see a lot of drama with that.

But I think we're going to see the serious talks about the budget really beginning in the next few weeks.

We're at the halfway point, and who knows?

Are we going to meet even 30 days this session?

I mean, they I think they really, want once this budget process kicks into high gear the next week or two, they really want to move fast with it again.

We'll see what those bills coming up from the House, those are some of those red meat bills and, you know, and, we could run into, a little bit of a logja in the Senate.

Time will tell.

It wouldn't be a session if we did.

No.

Well, gentlemen, we're out of time.

Thank you.

We'll be following throughout the week.

To be continued.

Thanks, Todd.

We'll be right back.

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Rosa Parks is one of the most enduring symbols of the American civil rights era of the mid-twentieth century.

She was active in the Montgomery chapter of the NAACP, serving as its field secretary.

Although she was not the first black woman in Montgomery to be arrested for doing so.

Her 1955 arrest for violating the segregation ordinance by refusing to give up her bus seat to a white man, triggered a 382 day boycott of Montgomery city busses and prompted a challenge o the ordinances constitutionality in federal court.

In December 1956, after the US Supreme Court affirmed a district court ruling against segregation, parks took a symbolic victory ride near the front of a city bus.

Parks continued to work for civil rights causes throughout her life, and was awarded the nation's highest honors for her role in the movement.

You can watch past episodes of Capital Journal online any time at Alabama Public Television's website.

aptv.. org.

Click on the online video tab on the main page.

You can also connect with Capital Journal and link to past episodes o Capital Journal's Facebook page.

That's our show for tonight.

Thanks for watching.

We'll be back tomorrow night with more coverage of the Alabama legislature right here on Alabama Public Television.

For our Capital Journal team, I'm Todd Stacey.

We'll see you next time.