by Brenda Gadd, VP – Legislation
Anne Carr, Lobbyist

With a new Governor taking office, 24 new House members and three new Senators, it was already going to be an interesting legislative session in 2011. Veteran Nashville Representative Beth Harwell made history by becoming Tennessee’s first female House Speaker, and she promptly slashed the unwieldy number of House subcommittees from 3-4 per standing committee down to one. In addition, there were 15 new committee chairs in the House and two in the Senate. Throw in a potential $1 billion budget shortfall, and it was interesting indeed! Here’s a summary of the major issues the WPC was directly involved in, as well as a few others monitored as high priority.

Budget

WPC supported continued funding for Coordinated School Health and innovative programs previously funded through the Governor’s Office of Child Care Coordination. All were included in Governor Haslam’s first budget proposal, although the GOCC has been eliminated and its grants will be administered by the Department of Health. See below for complete information on another budget issue – removing federal Title X family planning funds from Planned Parenthood.

Child Custody

WPC joined with the Nashville Bar Association to seek introduction of HB571/SB803, by Rep. Vance Dennis and Sen. Andy Berke. The bill, which passed both bodies and awaits the Governor’s signature, requires the court to order a custody arrangement that permits both parents to enjoy the maximum participation possible in the life of the child. This was an effort to clarify similar language already in state law. Hopefully, it will eliminate spurious arguments that surface regularly about the “need” for mandatory joint custody. A mandatory joint custody bill was introduced this year, but it was never heard in committee.

Domestic Violence and Leases

There were multiple bills to allow the victim of domestic abuse or other offenses to terminate or amend housing leases with certain restrictions. WPC was an active supporter of HB826/SB1922, by Rep. Debra Maggart and Sen. Jamie Woodson, and negotiations between proponents and opponents were encouraging this year. Although there was ultimately agreement for modified language allowing a judge to order a respondent in an order of protection hearing to be responsible for a lease held by a victim, that language did not fit within the caption of the original bill. Fortunately, in a late hour development, the agreed upon amendatory language was added to HB570/SB509, which had to do with assessing court costs to a petitioner who lied about an offense. The new provision regarding a lease does not invalidate the lease and may be helpful only in cases involving an order of protection.

Restricting Federal Title X Family Planning Funds

Initiated by first-term Sen. Stacey Campfield, of Knoxville, the Senate added an amendment to the state budget to eliminate federal family planning grants to the Nashville and Memphis Planned Parenthood organizations. (The grants are administered through the Tennessee Department of Health.) The House version of the state budget, which was the one that ultimately passed, included the amendment as well, but the House also included a provision that said the amendment could not be implemented if it contradicted state or federal law. The Senate approved the House version of the bill without noticing the additional language. This has resulted in significant political angst since the session adjourned and the offending language was reported. Sen. Campfield has publicly demanded to know which House members were responsible, and at least one Tea Party group has called for the head of the staff attorney who worked on the budget amendment.

Federal Title X family planning funding is used to provide services such as gynecological exams, pap smears, and birth control to low income and uninsured patients. The intent is to help patients avoid unwanted pregnancies and to receive basic health care. No funds may be used to pay for abortions. All 95 county health departments receive Title X funds, and the state of Tennessee spends no state money on family planning.

The health departments in Davidson and Shelby Counties, both run by the local governments rather than the state, do not have the capacity to utilize all of the Title X funding available to them. This is because the contracts require that anyone who needs the care must be served for the entire contract period, regardless of whether the federal funding runs out. About 9,000 people receive the services from the Planned Parenthood clinics in those two counties.

Although it now appears that the Tennessee Department of Health will likely comply with federal law and continue to accept grant applications from Planned Parenthood for the coming fiscal year, it’s a sure thing that stand-alone legislation seeking to strip the funding from Planned Parenthood will be introduced for the 2012 session. WPC has opposed efforts to strip family planning funds from Planned Parenthood for several years.

A 2007 Tennessee Attorney General’s opinion indicates that the state could be at risk of losing all of the Title X funds it is allocated by attempting to exclude a qualified non-profit provider of the services.

SJR 127

SJR127 passed both the House and the Senate by more than the two-thirds majorities required this year and will now be on the statewide ballot in November of 2014. If approved by the public at that time (must receive one vote more than 50% of the number of votes cast in the gubernatorial race that year), it will change our state constitution to include the following language:

Nothing in this Constitution secures or protects a right to abortion or requires the funding of an abortion. The people retain the right through their elected state representatives and state senators to enact, amend, or repeal statutes regarding abortion, including, but not limited to, circumstances of pregnancy resulting from rape or incest or when necessary to save the life of the mother.

WPC opposes SJR127, which does not make exceptions for rape and incest victims or related to the health and life of the mother.

Other

A bill protecting breast-feeding mothers, sponsored by Sen. Mike Faulk and Rep. Harry Brooks, passed and is now Public Chapter 91. WPC supported the bill, which strengthened statutory language successfully pushed by WPC several years ago.

WPC opposed HB229/SB49, sponsored by Sen. Campfield and Rep. Bill Dunn, which was approved by the Senate but did not make it out of the House Education subcommittee. Dubbed the “don’t say gay bill,” it brought scores of teenaged protestors from Nashville high schools to the legislature during the last two weeks of session. Sen. Campfield ultimately amended the bill to prohibit public elementary schools or middle schools from the teaching of or furnishing of materials on human sexuality other than heterosexuality. There was little explanation of the amendment’s meaning on the Senate floor, where the bill was repeatedly delayed over the course of about a month.

Please note that legislation not acted upon this year remains pending in 2012 because that it the second year of the two year term of the 107th General Assembly.