House Appropriations Committee approves multiple bills, refers measures to House floor

The House Appropriations Committee met and approved a series of measures, referring several to the full House for consideration. Committee members voted to pass a three-bill package unanimously, approved a two-bill package with a partisan split, and passed two additional bills in separate roll-call votes.

The committee chair opened the meeting and asked the committee executive director for an overview of the day’s agenda. The committee executive director summarized each bill, saying, "We have House Bill 144, which adds diversion programs as a referral option for eligible justice-involved youth," and that House Bill 460 "provides for age appropriate curriculums on child abuse awareness and prevention." He also described bills concerning jurisdiction between the United States and the Commonwealth (HB 469), an expansion of the media shield law (HB 490), the Meat Packing and Food Processing Protection Act (HB 1923), expedited placement of justice-involved youth into treatment (HB 1936), and changes to nuclear facility fees for small modular reactors and microreactor sites (HB 2017).

The chair grouped HB 144, HB 469 and HB 2017 as a package. A committee member noted, "On these 3 bills, Republicans will be voting in the affirmative," and the chair said Democrats would be recorded affirmative as well; the chair then announced the package would pass the committee unanimously and be referred to the House floor.

The chair then called HB 490 and HB 1936 as a package. Committee discussion recorded a partisan split: a member stated Republicans planned to vote in the negative while Democrats would be recorded in the affirmative. The chair announced both bills would pass the committee and be referred to the floor.

House Bill 460 was taken up next and required a roll call. Members answered individually in succession; the chair declared, "Seeing that the ayes have it, House Bill 460 will pass the committee," and said the bill would be referred to the House floor.

Finally, the committee called House Bill 1923 for a roll call. After the roll, the chair announced, "Ayes will have it, and House Bill 1923 will be re-referred to the floor of the House." With no further business, the chair adjourned the meeting.

The meeting record does not include full, attributable individual vote tallies for every member on each roll call; where individual members were recorded in sequence they are reflected in the meeting transcript. The committee did not identify movers or seconders for the motions in the public record shown in the transcript, and no amendments or substitutions were recorded during the session.