The Senate is proposing a Constitutional Amendment that, if passed, would implement the Healthy Kids Plan – and by-pass the needed 3/5 majority in the House to pass the statutory plan. The actual implementation of the Senate plan is still being drafted – but it will be finished soon.
The Senate version of the bill, reportedly, is very similar to the original Healthy Kids Plan the House proposed. The Constitutional Amendment language actually passed in the Senate yesterday, but until the implementation language is finished, we won’t know anything more about the bill.
Basically, the Democrats are using a two pronged attack. They will try to push through the statutory changes, if that fails, they WILL push through a Constitutional Referral (all it takes is a simple majority for the Constitutional Referral).
It is possible, and very likely we can stop the House Statutory “Healthy Kids Plan”. But, when the Senate version passes, and is put on the ballet, that will be a different story – we’ve got a long fight ahead of us….
In the long term, the Democrats will probably get there tax hike. The referral will go to the voters; they will say o, cigarette tax, helps to pay for health care, why not. So, the Democrats will have effectively told your elected officials, your vote does not matter…and they will have their tax.
2 comments:
The way I understand the Senate plan -- which will amend SJR 4 -- it will be a referral for a constitutional amendment to tax tobacco only. No provision for "healthy kids." That is important, because of the dreaded "single subject" requirement.
If passed, then there will be a funding mechanism in place and the legislature can pass "healthy kids" as a stand-alone bill, with no tax. No tax means no 3/5 requirement to pass -- a simple democrat majority could do it.
Yes, that is correct.
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