Ways and Means advances absentee-voting, election-plan and education bills; roll calls record mixed votes

The Ways and Means Committee held a voting session April 2 and approved a series of bills on election procedures, school policies and tax and benefit rules, adopting subcommittee amendments on many measures and recording roll-call votes on several items.

The committee approved changes to absentee-voting outreach and election planning, advanced a measure targeting election-related deepfakes, and passed bills on school device policies, GED testing in Spanish and enrollment rules for military dependents. Most measures passed “favorably as amended,” with recorded roll calls on a number of bills.

Committee action and context

Delegate Feldmark opened the session and moved amendments to Senate Bill 4, which alters the composition, powers and duties of the West North Avenue Development Authority and designates the authority as a body politic and corporate. The amendments were adopted and the bill passed favorably as amended.

On election-law measures, Delegate Ebersole described Senate Bill 93 as requiring that “each local board of elections include a notice about how to request an absentee ballot application with the specimen or sample ballots and any other mailings to voters or eligible voters.” The committee adopted technical subcommittee amendments and approved the bill favorably as amended on a roll-call vote.

House Bill 201 (the House cross-file of Senate Bill 93, concerning sending absentee ballot applications before primary elections) was amended to conform to SB 93 and passed favorably as amended after a roll call.

Senate Bill 259, which revises local boards’ election-plan requirements and adds procedures for public notice and comment when a local board adopts an election plan, was amended in subcommittee to require that the Attorney General rather than the State Administrator review and approve ballot drop-box locations and to add provisions about geographic…