The General Assembly is entering their last scheduled week. A special session is always possible, so this may not be the end of the story, but if they can get the budget and a fix for the unemployment system passed, they should be able to call it a session.
The budget will probably get worked out. They deal with that every two years. From the outside, it seems like the House and Senate are further apart than usual and the Governor is making vague rumblings of disapproval. (Governor – if you’re not going to consider a veto, your “demands” become “suggestions.”) But, I don’t get the feeling that there are any irreconcilable differences. I think the House and Senate will ultimately come up with something because they know they really have to as a practical matter — I’m not going to be one of those suggesting there is an immutable Constitutional requirement that the General Assembly pass a budget. The Governor will have some input but will most likely go along with anything the Senate and the House manage to get down to his office.
The unemployment insurance issue is more interesting. What happens if they don’t pass a change? Does the system seize up and freeze? Do the feds keep funding us? Are the consequences of inaction sufficiently clear to legislators to convince them they absolutely have to get something passed? If they don’t, is unemployment funding alone sufficient to convince the Governor to call a special session? I don’t know the answers to any of these things.
A last bit of significance, more to Indianapolis than to the rest of the State, is funding the Capital Improvement Board — the organization that pays the bills on the Colts and Pacers stadiums — as well as, I believe, other downtown development. If nothing gets done on that, I don’t see a special session in the offing to make it happen.
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