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Committee holds bill on special-session emergencies, introduces clarifying RS language
Summary
The House State Affairs Committee voted to hold House Bill 344 and introduced RS 32659 to clarify when the governor may declare certain disaster emergencies without convening a special legislative session.
Representative Price presented language to clarify that, for certain disaster emergencies related to fires, floods, tornadoes, earthquakes or invasive species, the governor may declare a disaster emergency without calling a special session. Price said the RS text restates existing time limits and clarifies the governor's authority for those event types.
"In the RS before you ... provided however in the case of disaster emergencies related to fires, flood, tornadoes, earthquakes or invasive species, the Governor may declare a disaster emergency without exercising his authority to convene a special session," Price said.
Committee members asked how the 60-day and 30-day limits in current law would interact with the proposed language and whether major wildfires were covered. Price and others clarified that the RS language specifically excludes wildfires from the expedited declaration language and that existing sequential 30-day renewal limits are preserved in statute.
The committee voted to hold House Bill 344 in committee. The committee then voted to introduce RS 32659 and send it to second reading. Both actions were taken by voice vote; the transcript does not record a roll-call tally.
