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House Human Services reviews amendment to Community Action Agency bill to require 3-year assessments and low-income representation
Summary
The House Human Services committee reviewed an amendment to bill 5 34 that would replace sections 3904 and 3905 to require designated community action agencies to complete needs assessments every three years and include at least one-third low-income representatives on governing boards; members also debated whether to present the language as a strike-all or a narrower amendment on the floor.
The House Human Services committee on Wednesday reviewed an amendment to bill 5 34, the Community Action Agency bill, that would replace sections 3904 and 3905 to require a three-year needs assessment and an annual community action plan and to set board composition requirements. Speaker 2, legislative counsel with the McDonough Office of Legislative Council, led the presentation of the posted amendment.
The amendment, Speaker 2 said, renames the provision to a “community action agency assessment and plan” and requires that “each designated community action agency shall determine the need for activities and services within the area served by the agency every 3 years, complete an assessment, and incorporate that information into an annual community action plan.” That plan would “include a schedule for the anticipated provision of new or ongoing services and shall specify the resources that are needed by and available to the agency to implement the plan.”
The draft also updates internal language to mirror the new plan name, normalizes hyphenation to “community-based,” and reorders subsections for clarity, Speaker 2 said. One substantive addition in the newly renumbered subdivision requires that “a minimum of 1 third of the members of the board are persons chosen in accordance with the procedures adequate to ensure that they are representative of individuals with low income.”
Members asked procedural questions about how the amendment will be presented on the House floor. Several members noted that presenting only the two replacement sections would require members to use two documents — the bill as introduced and the replacement sections — and could create confusion during floor debate. Speaker 3 asked whether there would be separate votes on the amendment and then on the bill; Speaker 2 said the voting sequence would be the same regardless of whether the committee uses a strike-all replacement or a narrower amendment.
Speaker 6, discussing parliamentary practice, summarized the practical choice: both approaches require a vote on the amendment followed by a vote on the bill as amended, but “with a very short bill like this, dividing it into 2 pieces makes it seem like…then we rethought a section,” and a strike-all can present a consolidated, post-testimony document for clarity. Speaker 2 said converting the amendment into a strike-all appeared to be the direction members favored and that staff would make that change.
No formal votes or final decisions were recorded during the meeting. Speaker 2 closed the discussion by asking the committee to go offline briefly to convert the amendment into a strike-all and announced a 10-minute recess.
The committee is expected to reconvene after the break to continue consideration and, if consented, submit the strike-all version for floor action.
