LWVAL Legislative Report updated April 10, 2011.

LWVAL Action Alert 3/28/11: Please support HB 181 to advance Home Rule in Alabama!

An Action Alert for HB181 to give counties some optional home rule powers was issued by the LWVAL on 3/28/11. A Public Hearing on the House bill is scheduled for 3/30/11. The LWVAL supports this legislation. Please take immediate action to voice support. See the Action Alert for more information.

LWVAL Action Alert 2/22/11: Please voice support for Forever Wild reauthorization funding.

UPDATE 3/3/11: HB126 is assigned to the House Committee on Economic Development and Tourism (ED&T). A public hearing by the committee is scheduled for Wed., 3/9/11 in State House Room 123. Please take immediate action by contacting your Representative and urge his/her support of this legislation! This is especially important if your Representative is a member of the House ED&T Committee. Please see the Action Alert for more information. Follow the progress of this legislation in the LWVAL Legislative Report.

UPDATE 3/26/11: Public hearing on SB140 by Senate Committee on Energy and Natural Resources, Thurs., 3/31/11, Room 807 (Joint Briefing Room). Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee contact information is available here.

UPDATE 4/2/11: SB140 is out of committee. Placed on calendar and pending vote in the Senate.

BACKGROUND
At the opening of the 2011 Regular Session of the Alabama Legislature the Protect Forever Wild Coalition introduced legislation to seek reauthorization funding for Forever Wild for the next 20 years. These are HB126 and SB140 (same, complimentary legislation.) LWVAL also supports this legislation and asks that you take action to voice your support. Please contact your legislators and ask them to support Forever Wild AS IS. You can go to www.legislature.state.al.us to get your legislators' contact information. The time to act is now. The legislature convened on Tuesday, March 1. The bills have been read for the first time and assigned to committee. For further information and resources please see the action alert to read a message from Tim Gothard, Executive Director of the Alabama Wildlife Federation and President of Protect Forever Wild and to get further information.

Thank you for taking immediate action!

2011 Legislative Session

The 2011 Regular Session of the Alabama Legislature convened at Noon, on Tuesday, March 1. Keep informed about the Alabama Legislature's activities during the 2011 Regular Session:

• LWVAL Legislative Report
• Alabama Legislative Information System Online (ALISON).

For each bill, the LWVAL Legislative Report includes bill sponsors, bill summary, complete bill text, current status of the legislation, LWVAL's position on the legislation, and LWVAL's action. See the 2011 LWVAL Legislative Priorities list for the issues on which the LWVAL Action Team will be focused in the coming 2011 session.

Earlier the Alabama Legislature met in Organizational Session (January 11 - 18, 2011). In that session, the legislature organized each house through election of officers, adopted the Rules of each house as well as Joint Rules of the two houses, established standing committees in each house and named the membership of each, and elected members to certain Joint Committees of the two houses. As stipulated by law, no legislation was passed in the Organizational Session"

LWVAL took action to bring about ethics and campaign finance reform

. On December 8, 2010, then Governor Bob Riley called for a Special Session of the Alabama Legislature to convene to consider ethics and campaign reform legislation. The League of Women Voters of Alabama advocated during the Special Legislative Session urging our legislators to support strong ethics reform and open government. Co-Presidents Dr. Kathryn Byrd and Dr. Charlotte Ward wrote this letter to the 140 state legislators to urge their active support for reform. At the opening of the Special Session called to address this issue, Nancy Ekberg, representing the co-presidents, presented the points of the letter directly to the legislators in public testimony at the Old State House Chambers. The League also sent this letter-to-the-editor supporting reform to several major newspapers in the state. The League urged all citizens who believe that Alabama should have stronger, more effective ethics laws and open government to contact their state senator and representative and make their voice heard.

By the close of the Special Session on December 16, the legislature had passed seven reform bills. As reported by the Associated Press, the bills included "measures to ban the transfer of money between political action committees, limit how much lobbyists can spend on entertaining public officials, give subpoena power to the State Ethics Commission and ban legislators from having a second state job after November 2014." Read this story in The Birmingham News and more news about the Special Session on al.com.

LWVAL strongly supports effective ethics reform and open government.

The League of Women Voters of Alabama has long supported the need for strong ethics legislation and open government. This continues to be a top-level advocacy priority for the LWVAL. See the complete list of 2011 LWVAL legislative priorities.

Alabama's air and water needs federal protection

An Opinion Editorial from the League of Women Voters of Alabama, March 14, 2011. Written by Dr. Joyce Lanning, LWVAL Natural Resources Director, and Dr. Charlotte Ward, LWVAL Co-President.

Among the programs and services currently threatened by the Congressional budget cutters are the Environmental Protection Agency and the Clean Air Act. Here in Alabama, a Public Service Commissioner has quoted information from polluting industries that seem to overstate the cost of addressing the harm caused by carbon dioxide, a greenhouse gas. In sum, laws, regulations and agencies designed to protect us and our environment for the long run are under attack by shortsighted forces looking only at this year’s bottom line. ... Read the complete editorial.

Support LWVAL education efforts when you shop online!
Or donate directly to the LWVAL or its Education Fund here!