General Assembly Takes 4 Months To Send First Bill To Gov. Wolf

By Andrew Staub | PA Independent

Lt. Gov. Mike Stack ran the Pittsburgh Marathon on Sunday, but even that wasn’t as protracted a process as passing a bill in Harrisburg.

Stack signed his first bill as Senate president Tuesday as lawmakers began sending their first pieces of legislation to Gov. Tom Wolf since he took office in January. State Sen. Larry Farnese, D-Philadelphia, celebrated the occasion with a photo on Instagram.

Bills, though, can’t pass with the click of a button. With committee meetings and hearings, making the legislative sausage takes much longer, evident by the nearly four months it took for the first bills to reach the governor this year.

As of early Tuesday afternoon, just two bills had been sent to Wolf, according to Bill Patton, a spokesman for the House Democratic Caucus. One names some roads and bridges, and the other extends the filing period under the Emergency and Law Enforcement Personnel Death Benefits Act.

As of Tuesday, the House has been in session 31 days so far in 2015; the Senate has been in Harrisburg 26 days.

Action will undoubtedly ramp up as the June 30 budget deadline nears. For now, it’s not unusual for so few bills to have reached the governor’s desk early in the first half of a two-year legislative session, Patton said.

“Introduction and early movement on bills just takes a while to get rolling,” Patton said. “A bill has to pass both the House and Senate in identical form before the governor gets it. So, if one chamber amends a bill from the other side, then that adds time, too.”

According to Patton: The first bill of 2013 was signed in February, but it was a time-sensitive matter. The second law was signed in mid-April. In 2011, the first law was signed in April and the second in May. The first law of 2009 was signed in June, and the first of 2007 was signed in May.

Back in the present, the House sent a third bill, another bridge and street naming measure, to Wolf a bit later Tuesday afternoon. All three of the bills were introduced in January.

Two had technically received final House approval April 21 but couldn’t be sent to Wolf until Stack signed them Tuesday. Lawmakers from both chambers had been away from Harrisburg since April 22.

None of the legislation hitting Wolf’s desk so far would be considered a heavy lift, at least not such as pension reform, liquor privatization or raising the minimum wage. Those are marathons in their own right, with lawmakers already discussing them over more than one legislative session.