By District 56 Representative Clay Mansell
Mississippi District 56 Representative Clay Mansell is pictured presenting Senate Bill 2244 to the House. The bill, which passed unanimously, would allow foster care children to have free access to museums and state parks, and free transcripts from public universities and junior colleges.
On Friday, April 12, we completed the fifteenth week of the 2024 legislative session. Wednesday was the deadline for the House to discuss general Senate bills. Any Senate bills that did not make it off the calendar and before the House died.
After the Senate killed the House’s education funding formula proposal (INSPIRE Act), House Education Chairman Rob Roberson introduced a strike-all amendment to Senate Bill 2693 inserting the language into the bill. The amended legislation passed 104-16 and has been returned to the Senate. If passed, the INSPIRE Act would replace the Mississippi Adequate Education Program (MAEP), the current formula that has only been fully funded twice since its inception in 1997.
Other legislation that the House addressed includes Senate Bill 2689, which would replace the state high school subject area testing requirements with alternative assessments, like the ACT. Currently, high school students must pass tests on Algebra, American History, Biology and English. The bill passed 103-6, and it has been returned to the Senate.
Senate Bill 2349 would require schools to adopt and implement cardiac emergency response plans. The House adopted Amendment 1, which would allow schools to accept gifts or donations for the purchase of automated external defibrillators (AEDs). SB 2349 passed unanimously 121-0 and has been returned to the Senate.
I was proud to be able to present Senate Bill 2244 to the House. This bill would allow foster care children to have free access to museums and state parks, as well as free transcripts from public universities and junior colleges. This bill passed with a unanimous vote of 120-0.
Senate Bill 2339 would allow American Sign Language to be count- ed as a foreign language credit for high school graduation requirements. The bill passed unanimously 121-0 and has been returned to the Senate.
Senate Bill 2577 would create a criminal penalty for a person creating and disseminating a deepfake or digitization of a candidate ninety days before an election. A deepfake is a video in which a person has been digitally altered to appear as someone else, typically with malicious intent. The bill is similar to House Bill 1689, which passed the House earlier this session. SB2577 passed unanimously, 120-0, and has been returned to the Senate.
Senate Bill 2441 would prohibit the distribution or sale of certain alternative nicotine products, like an electronic cigarette or vape, that cannot be marketed or sold under federal law or FDA rule. A strike-all amendment was introduced creating the “Mississippi Tobacco Harm Reduction Act of 2024;” however, a point of order was raised saying that the amendment was not germane to the original bill. The point of order was well taken, and the strike-all was removed from the bill. SB 2441 passed 115-0.
The Ways and Means Committee also took up several bills from the Senate Finance Committee including a bill to move the Back to School sales tax holiday to the second Friday in July; a bill to allow cigar shops to sell alcohol on the premises; a bill to extend the repealer on tax credits for qualified charitable organizations; a bill to amend the qualifications for the Mississippi Main Street Grant Program; and a bill to define the authority of demolition and removal of structures in the Capitol Complex Improvement District.
Because it is late in the session, much of this week was spent deciding whether to concur with any changes made to House bills by the Senate or to invite conference on those bills. In conference, representatives and senators work together to finalize the details of each bill before they are sent to the governor. Included in the bills being sent to conference are most of the revenue and appropriations bills from both the House and Senate, which will determine the state’s budget.
Next week, as the session begins to wind down, legislators will spend much of their time in conference committees ironing out the final details of bills that were sent to conference. These conference committees will then have to file reports before the end of the session.
Visitors have included the Piney Woods School, Oak Grove High School, the Meridian High School Boys Basketball team, the Long Beach High School Choir, Accelerate MS, the Mississippi Organ Recovery Agency, Friends of Mississippi Veterans, Tupelo Young Republicans, Leadership Jackson County, South Jones High School Band, Mississippi Young Bankers and the Mississippi Children’s Museum.