Paging Miracle Max: A look at the ‘mostly dead' bills with three weeks left

Yahoo

18-03-2025

An empty State House lobby in this file photo. The halls are much busier this week as lawmakers power into the last three weeks of the session, but some bills have already passed by the wayside. (File photo by Bruce DePuyt/Maryland Matters)
Anybody who knows Annapolis knows very few things are ever really dead before Sine Die. And anybody who's watched 'The Princess Bride' know that there's such a thing as 'mostly dead.'
With three weeks left in the session, we present the Miracle Max Report, a list of those mostly dead initiatives we don't have to worry about so much now. Some could still come back — it's not quite time to go through their pockets, looking for loose change — but odds are slim.
Some didn't make Monday's 'crossover' date, the deadline by which a bill has to move out of one chamber if it's to be guaranteed a hearing in the other. Some were pulled by their sponsors or have been frowned on by legislative leaders, committee chairs or the governor.
Most bills on crossover day are dead by inaction, usually by a committee opting to not bring the bill to a vote or simply not getting around to it before the crucial deadline.
That was not the case with House Bill 380, which went through days of contentious debate in the House, only to be killed on the spot when it arrived in the Senate Judicial Proceedings Committee, which took all of 10 seconds to vote it down down on the spot on Feb. 28.
HB 380 would have removed a criminal penalty on those who sell or offer contraceptives from a vending machine at a kindergarten, nursery school, or elementary or secondary school.
Del. Nicole Williams (D-Prince George's) said it was an effort to decriminalize access to contraception, but Republicans had a field day promoting the narrative that the bill would have exposed 5-year-olds and younger to a host of lewd products and scenarios.
The House spent days in floor debate before passing the bill 89-41, sending to the Senate, which assigned it to Judicial Proceedings. It didn't last long.
'We all know what this bill does. There is a motion for an unfavorable – is everyone comfortable being recorded in the unfavorable?' Judicial Proceedings Chair Will Smith (D-Montgomery) asked in the opening seconds of the committee voting session. He quickly got a second.
'All right. We have disposed of House Bill 380 unanimously,' Smith said, before moving on to the rest of the voting list.
HB380 did not even get a hearing before the committee killed it. With no Senate version of the bill, the legislation was dead long before crossover.
Supporters of the For Our Kids Act said it would provide $500 million in a tight budget to fund school lunches, child care scholarships and the state's general fund, all while improving public health by 2-cents-per-ounce tax on sugary drinks, syrups and powders.
Opponents saw that as just so much sugar-coating on a tax on soft drinks.
House Bill 1469, sponsored by Dels. Emily Shetty (D-Montgomery) and Joseline Peña-Melnyk (D-Prince George's and Anne Arundel), was modeled on a 2017 Philadephia law that raised more than $400 million in fiscal 2022. Similar laws have been adopted in Seattle, Boulder, Colorado, and Berkeley, California. Maryland would have been the first state to adopt such a law if the bill passed.
The bill would have taxed distributors of sweetened drinks by the ounce; sweetening powders and syrups would have been taxed based on the ounces of drink each container could produce. The bill included language to increase the tax rate annually, based on inflation.
But it ran into fierce opposition from business owners, who packed a March 7 hearing to complain about the bill that they said would hurt retailers and cost people jobs. It probably didn't help that some skeptical lawmakers were enjoying a soft drink during the hearing.
If there were any doubts about the bill's future, Gov. Wes Moore (D) put them to rest Monday during remarks about ongoing budget negotiations.
'There are a few things that will not be included inside of that final budget,' Moore said. 'We've got to bring down the cost of what people are seeing inside of the grocery stores in the markets, and that's why things like the soda tax will not happen in the state of Maryland, and the soda tax will not be included in the final budget.'
The governor's comments also affected another bill's odds, though this one didn't turn out quite the way he liked.
For years, lawmakers have tried unsuccessfully to expand beer and wine sales in the state to other retailers, like grocery stores. Maryland is one of only a handful of states that do not allow those sales.
Supporters of expansion thought this would be their year, after Moore in December said the he supported the proposal, something he said voters across the state have been asking for. While he did not make it part of his legislative package, he said he expected a bill 'on my desk at the end of the session.'
That buoyed the bill's backers, but left many legislators unmoved.
Supporters cited polls that show the concept is widely popular among consumers in the state. Besides providing choice for consumers, they said the change would create jobs and could ease the problem of food deserts by giving groceries the margins they need to move into underserved neighborhoods.
But critic said expanding alcohol availability would burden communities that already suffer from a disproportionate number of liquor stores. They also said it would be a death sentence for mom-and-pop liquor stores that would not be able to compete with prices big retailers and grocery chains were likely to offer.
Senate Bill 824 was up for a vote in the Senate Finance Committee on March 5 when it was pulled back at the last second by its sponsor, Sen. Cory McCray (D-Baltimore City), when it became clear there were not enough votes on committee to pass the bill. He withdrew the bill entirely five days later.
A similar bill in the House, House Bill 1379, got a committee hearing on. Feb. 17, but has not moved since.
Contested races for circuit court judge in Maryland will continue, at least for the foreseeable future.
Senate Judicial Proceedings Chair William C. Smith Jr. (D-Montgomery) said last week that there were not enough votes on the committee to pass Senate Bill 630, which would have asked voters next year if they wanted to amend the state Constitution to eliminate contested judicial elections. A companion bill, House Bill 778, never got a vote in the House Judiciary Committee.
District court judges in Maryland serve 10 year terms, while appellate judges serve 10 years and then run for reelection base on their records, but do not face challengers. Circuit judges, however, have to stand for reelection every 15 years, but can be challenged by other candidates.
The Maryland Judicial Conference requested legislation to ask voters next year whether they want to change the current system for circuit judges stand for reelection.
Critics say the current system puts circuit judges in the potentially unethical position of having to raise funds and curry favor with people whose cases they may be called on to judge. But supporters say that by opening elections up to challengers, the current system allows for a more diverse, and representative, bench than might occur in uncontested elections.
Dozens of bills to make the change have been introduced and have failed since the 1980s. This year's attempt is apparently no different.
Supporters, such as Montgomery County Circuit Judge Kathleen Dumais, a former legislator, said they plan to keep the discussion going.
The Judicial Proceedings Committee is still at an 'impasse' about a bill that would usher in Good Cause evictions for participating counties, meaning its chance of moving out of committee this year is nearing zero.
Committee Chair William C. Smith Jr. (D-Montgomery) indicated last week the bill was struggling to get enough support from committee members and said the committee was 'running out of time' to push it through by crossover. The outlook had not changed over the weekend, Smith noted Monday, meaning the bill would need significant interventions to pick up momentum at this juncture.
Senate Bill 651 would let jurisdictions to adopt 'good cause eviction' policies, which require a landlord to cite a specific reason to not renew a lease with a current tenant. Last week, advocates learned that the committee was considering an amendment to limit counties to either Good Cause evictions or rent-stabilization efforts in their local renters' policies — they could not have both — which some advocates considered to be a 'poison pill' amendment to the legislation.
Similar legislation passed the House last year, but died in Smith's committee. The House is unlikely to move House Bill 709 knowing the bill would likely get stuck on the Senate side.
The Judicial Proceedings Committee will also be the hurdle for medical aid-in-dying legislation, as the chair gave a quick signal that the End-of-Life Options Act would be short on votes in his committee this year, as in previuoe=e too.
'The votes aren't there. Not in committee and not on the floor,' Senate Judicial Proceedings Chairman William C. Smith Jr. (D-Montgomery) said March 4.
His comments came just hours after a joint hearing by the House Judiciary and the Government and Operations committees on House Bill 1328, the End-of-Life Option Act, which would let certain terminally ill patients request medical aid in dying with the help of a physician.
Senate Bill 926 never even received a bill hearing in Judicial Proceedings, despite Smith sponsoring the legislation. That's how certain its outlooks is this year.
For the past couple years, Maryland lawmakers have been adding 'shield laws' for physicians who provide certain medical procedures that may be outlawed in other states.
So far, abortion and gender-affirming care are considered 'legally protected health care' under Maryland law, meaning that the state will protect information on out-of-state patients who receive that care in Maryland, as well as the physicians who provide that care.
SB1 was poised to continue the streak to include in vitro fertilization under those shield laws, amid fears that some IVF treatments would be restricted in other states.
But it never received a bill hearing. The bill was initially scheduled for a hearing on Jan. 23, which was canceled and never got put back on the calendar. That was on purpose, said bill sponsor Sen. Jeff Waldstreicher (D- Montgomery).
'I asked that this bill not move forward this year,' Waldstreicher said in a recent text message. 'Protecting IVF is deeply personal for me, but the shifting attacks on reproductive freedom by the Trump Administration makes drafting difficult. We will return next year with more clarity and tighter language.'
The bill does not have a House version, so without Waldstreicher leading the effort on the legislation this year, it's not going anywhere.
Some routine traffic stops by police officers will remain a go.
Senate Bill 292 sponsored by Sen. Charles Sydnor III (D-Baltimore County) sought to reclassify some primary traffic offenses as secondary, reducing the ability of police to pull a driver over. Some of those primary offenses include excessive noise, failure to illuminate a license plate and driving without a functioning headlight, brake light or taillight.
A House version is sponsored by Del. N. Scott Phillips (D-Baltimore County).
Law enforcement officials said at a Jan. 28 hearing before the Senate Judicial Proceedings Committee that the measure would make their jobs harder and decrease public safety.
Sydnor, Public Defender Natasha Dartigue, Attorney General Anthony Brown (D) and other supporters said the measure would increase public safety for motorists and police officers. The also pointed data from the Governor's Office of Crime Prevention and Policy that showed Blacks accounted for 32% of the population, but 43% of the nearly 428,300 vehicle traffic stops in the state in 2023. White motorists, by comparison, made up 57% of the state population that year but accounted for 39% of all traffic stops.
'The data is there. It's there for everyone to see,' Sydnor said. 'The problem hasn't gone away just because the bill doesn't pass. I suspect that me and Del. N. Scott Phillips will look and see what's the best ways to go forward.'