Senate completes late-night work: dozens of house substitutes adopted, multiple bills passed
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Summary
In a late session the Senate took up and agreed to a slate of House substitutes and passed multiple bills by recorded votes, including transportation, health, education and property-related measures. Several bills were taken off and then re‑tabled to place them on the Thursday calendar.
The state Senate completed a broad package of floor business late in the evening, agreeing to multiple house substitutes and passing numerous bills by recorded vote. Beyond the longer debates on HB 297 (transportation restructuring) and the receivership substitute (SB 17), the floor record shows the Senate agreed to or passed substitutes on a range of measures covering education, public safety, tax and property items.
Notable floor actions recorded in the transcript include: adoption of the substitute for House Bill 466 (designation of the Marsh Tacky horse and Pineywoods cattle as state heritage breeds, passage recorded with 41 yays, 6 nays), passage of House Bill 413 and numerous other bills reported by committees, and the adoption of committee substitutes for bills on mental-health peer certification, motor-vehicle operation and traffic rules, unclaimed property (SB 403 house substitute, with sponsor noting a program to return roughly $3.3 billion of unclaimed property to taxpayers) and others.
Several bills were taken from the table and then re-tabled to be available for consideration on Thursday’s calendar per leadership motion. The majority leader also moved the Senate to adjourn until 10 a.m. Thursday, April 2, and the body agreed.
The floor saw a mix of unanimous voice votes and recorded tallies; where recorded votes were taken the transcript gives the yeas and nays and the chair’s announcement of passage. The extended late-night session included colloquy, multiple amendments, and points of parliamentary inquiry; senators urged colleagues to consider local impacts and technical details on several measures.
