By Terri Jo Neff |
Gov. Doug Ducey grew frustrated in May with the legislature’s slow pace of action on the Fiscal Year 2022 budget packet. So Ducey thought he would send the state’s 90 lawmakers a message by vetoing 22 bills, several which had passed with bipartisan support.
The vetoes did little to motivate either chamber to action and it would take more than one month before all 11 budget bills finally passed, and even then several bills were amended from what Ducey’s staff and legislative budget negotiators wanted.
But Ducey’s vetoes were not forgotten by many legislators. The Senate passed reintroduced versions of the 22 vetoed bills but was motivated enough to symbolically override one of the governor’s 22 snubs, something no other Arizona governor had faced in nearly 30 years.
The House did not follow the Senate’s suit, choosing instead to pass 20 of the Senate’s reintroduced bills. As of July 2, the governor had signed 10 of the reintroduced bills and the other 10 were transmitted to Ducey by the Senate prior to Sine Die on June 30.
Under current legislative rules, Ducey must act on the bills on his desk within 10 days after Sine Die of the bills automatically become law. The remaining two bills passed by the Senate died in the House.
The 10 bills Ducey has already signed:
SB1830 authorizes the creation of an individual and corporate state tax credit for the donation of real property to a school district of charter school. It passed with bipartisan support
SB1841 requires the Department of Law (the Arizona Attorney General’s Office) to review a federal executive order for constitutionality if requested by any member of the Legislature
SB1833 addresses proficiency testing by the Arizona Department of Health Services (DHS) of third-party marijuana laboratories and marijuana testing facilities
SB1834 allows DHS to conduct unannounced inspections of a medical marijuana dispensary
SB1835 requires that an election challenger or party representative must be a resident of Arizona and a registered voter of the state
SB1831 mandates that the State Registrar provide a person a copy of his or her original birth certificate sealed due to adoption if the person was born before June 20, 1968
SB1832 modifies Arizona’s DUI laws and requires traffic survival instruction courses to include information about aggressive driving. Such instruction is to be completed in person unless the Governor declares a state of emergency
SB1838 replaces the term “product of human conception” with “unborn child”
SB1839 outlines changes to Arizona Psychiatric Security Review Board
SB1843 changes the classifications of excessive speed and the statute related to waste of finite resources
The bills on Ducey’s desk:
SB1844 modifies the maximum Arizona adjusted gross income subtraction for college savings plan contributions authorized by section 529 of the Internal Revenue Code and allows subtraction of Achieving a Better Life Experience (ABLE) account contributions
SB1848 requires the Arizona Department of Housing to provide emergency shelter beds in western Maricopa County for homeless persons who are at least 55 years old
SB1846 exempts containers of spirituous liquor from prescribed labeling requirements under specified delivery conditions
SB1849 makes some changes to health and medical services offered to female inmates and allows a prisoner is to receive a certificate upon successful completion of training programs to work in a specific field or trade
SB1847 mandates DHS to provide grant monies from the Medical Marijuana Fund for research on the correlation of marijuana use and mental illness and requires DHS to develop a warning label to be affixed to the packaging of marijuana
SB1842 addresses the security, packaging, and labeling of marijuana and marijuana products
SB1845 requires the Department of Economic Security to implement a Produce Incentive Program
SB1850 contains technical corrections relating to multiple, defective, and conflicting statutory text
SB1851 outlines data required for the Arizona State Hospital financial and programmatic report, and establishes the Joint Legislative Psychiatric Hospital Review Council
SB1836 modifies sex offender registration requirements
HB2905 specifies that a county recorder or other election officer may not deliver or mail an early ballot to a person who has not requested an early ballot for that election.
HB2906 requires the certified public accountant (CPA) or auditor to present audit results to certain members within 90 days after a statutory audit and outlines requirements for training of certain employees (prohibits Critical Race Theory-based material/curriculum).
The other vetoed bills:
SB1837 would have banned a county recorder or other election officer from delivering or mailing an early ballot for an election to a person who did not requested an early ballot for that election
SB1840 would have required in certain instances that a certified public accountant or auditor present audit results within 90 days after a statutory audit, and it outlined requirements for employee training
