Thursday 3/30/2006 DAILY NEWS DIGEST

http://www.al.com/news/birminghamnews/index.ssf?/base/news/1143714175218550.xml&coll=2 – Legislators override Governor’s veto of Education Trust Fund Budget.

http://www.al.com/news/birminghamnews/index.ssf?/base/news/1143714079218550.xml&coll=2 – House committee approves General Fund budget.

http://www.al.com/news/birminghamnews/index.ssf?/base/news/1143713754218550.xml&coll=2 – Senate committee approves tax cut plan.

http://www.al.com/news/mobileregister/index.ssf?/base/news/1143713806218540.xml&coll=3 – Constitutional reform dead for this session, Sen. Little says this year’s efforts will improve chances of passage in 2007.

http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories/A/AL_XGR_EMINENT_DOMAIN_ALOL-?SITE=ALMON&SECTION=HOME&TEMPLATE=DEFAULT – Senate ends filibuster to approve constitutional amendment to limit eminent domain powers.

FROM TODAY’S ANNISTON STAR:

LEGISLATURE

Bill to change state ethics law brings confrontation

By Brian Lyman
Star Capitol Correspondent
03-30-2006

MONTGOMERY – A public hearing on proposed changes to the state ethics law brought a testy exchange Wednesday between a powerful state senator and the director of the state Ethics Commission.

Jim Sumner, the Ethics Commission director, and Sen. Hank Sanders, D-Selma, got into a mutual cross-examination over a bill that would significantly change how the Ethics Commission operates.

The bill, currently in the Senate Judiciary Committee, would require the director of the commission to clear legal opinions with the commission; ban the director from deliberations of the commission; and require the commission to deliver copies of complaints, along with the names of those filing them, to respondents.

The bill also would provide for specific measures to remove the director of the commission, would ban the filing of complaints within six months of an election, and would require that all complaints be resolved within six months.

Sumner said during the hearing that most of the bill’s provisions are impractical at best. Ethics complaints, he said, usually take between six and nine months to investigate fully, and staffing at the commission does not allow investigators to move any faster.

“I don’t think I’ve ever seen a more punitive piece of legislation than this,” Sumner said. “… It would make it impossible for the commission to function as a body.”

Sanders was cleared earlier this year of allegations that he used his position as chairman of the Senate’s Education Finance and Taxation committee to benefit nonprofits with links to his family.

After the hearing of that case, Sanders said Sumner should be fired, and the senator did show any new affection for the director Wednesday.

In a series of pointed questions, Sanders implied that Sumner’s presence during deliberations of the Ethics Commission was inappropriate and could sway the committee in its decisions.

“Your presence influences the process,” Sanders said, arguing that the director’s attendance at commission hearings was akin to a prosecutor sitting in on the deliberations of a grand jury.

Sumner said he does not participate in the committee’s votes or final decisions.

“I’m there, but I really don’t say anything unless I’m asked,” Sumner said.

The discussion between the two men got tense, and each alluded to Sanders’ case without addressing it directly.

Sen. Quinton Ross, D-Montgomery and committee chairman Rodger Smitherman, D-Birmingham, insisted that the proposed legislation had nothing to do with Sanders’ case. “Senator Sanders has not said a word to me about it,” Smitherman said.

The committee did not vote on the bill Wednesday.

Boos greet Riley’s final try for expanded tax cuts

By Brian Lyman
Star Capitol Correspondent
03-30-2006

MONTGOMERY — The House turned back a final attempt Wednesday night by Gov. Bob Riley to take money in the Education Trust Fund for an expanded tax cut.

The governor sent an executive amendment to the House that would have cleared $60 million out of the Education Trust Fund budget by taking $8 million out of the Community Service Grants, which allow legislators to fund projects in their districts, and $52 million from the state’s two rainy day funds.

Riley’s proposals were greeted with loud boos from the floor of the House as Education Finance and Appropriations chairman Richard Lindsey, D-Centre, announced them to the membership.

The House voted 63-38 to table the governor’s amendment. Lindsey said the amendment would undo the work of several months.

“We have worked for weeks to prepare a responsible tax cut,” Lindsey said. “You have voted for it, it has passed this House, and I don’t understand what the governor is trying to do with this executive amendment.”

The tax-cut plan that passed the House two weeks ago would reduce income taxes for a family of four making $20,000 a year or less, while providing smaller tax cuts for those making $20,000 to $100,000 a year. Riley originally proposed a tax cut that would have given relief of some kind to all Alabama taxpayers.

“Gov. Riley believes the amendments he offered were the right thing to do,” said Jeff Emerson, Riley’s spokesman. “We need to cut taxes for as many Alabamians as we possibly can. He proposed a way to do that without cutting any educational programs.”

The tax-cut plan that the House has approved still needs to be voted on in the Senate. It would cost the Education Trust Fund about $60 million next year.

A compromise plan reached by Riley and Rep. John Knight, D-Montgomery, earlier this year would have raised the minimum income tax threshold for families of four making less than $200,000 a year from $4,600 to $12,600. That compromise was amended by Democrats to form the plan now before the Senate. The compromise plan would have cost about $133 million, and Democrats argued that it would have taken too much money from education.

Emerson did not say how the tax plan would have changed with the additional $60 million available, or whether the governor would sign the amended plan.

“(The governor) says the plan has a lot of merit,” Emerson said. “He’s said all along since he ran for governor that we need to increase the threshold. He’s going to work to try to expand it to get the benefit.”