A Citizen's Guide to Indiana

Masson's Blog

HB 1044 – Purple Heart Plates

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The House unanimously passed House Bill 1044 amending the provisions related to the Purple Heart license plate. First of all, my obligatory comment that the legislature spends far too much time on license plates. I think there are 30 of them at this point.

This bill will expand eligibility to motorcycles in addition to passenger motor vehicles. It also makes an interesting change to the people who are eligible. Currently, an individual is eligible if “the person has received a Purple Heart decoration that is awarded to a person who suffers an injury while serving as a member of the armed forces of the United States.” Under the new law, eligibility would be limited to “an individual who has received a Purple Heart decoration that is awarded to an individual who is wounded in action against an enemy of the United States or as a result of an act of an enemy of the United States if the wound necessitates treatment by a medical officer.”

I don’t know whether, under this definition and under the military’s Purple Heart rules, there are those who have been awarded a Purple Heart who will be ineligible. To me, the way to draft the statute would be to say that an individual who has received a Purple Heart is eligible for the license plate, and leave it at that.

[tags]HB1044-2007, license plates[/tags]

Old news

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I’ve been a slow poster lately, mostly due to work raising its ugly head — it’s a damn shame I’m forced to make a living instead of being a Man of Leisure, but that’s the way it goes. Be that as it may, I caught the story of a classless move by Rep. Craig Fry with respect to the passage of the budget bill.

Apparently, he used the fact that House Republicans would not vote for the budget bill and the Democrats slim majority to essentially extort an additional $2 million for a school district in his area. If that’s not how the deal went down, I’d certainly welcome a correction.

A short-sighted view might call this shrewd politics or zealous advocacy on behalf of his district. But, ultimately, we all lose with this kind of free-riding negotiation. It’s kind of like the property owner who knows the highway is going through his yard, that all his neighbors have sold, and decides to extract excessive windfall profits from the public. That property owner’s negotiating position isn’t so good because of something valuable he has contributed, but only because he waited around long enough. So, he gets a windfall well beyond the value of what he’s giving, and the public loses. The next time a project is contemplated, it has more trouble going forward because even more people will want to be paid off as the hold out.

I don’t see any good that can come from Fry’s move. He looks bad. The Democrats who paid him off look bad. The Senate will almost certainly remove the $2 million from their version of the bill. If Fry’s gonna get his, the rest of the House Democrats might start asking why they shouldn’t hold out for theirs.

Like I said, my opinion here is based on the facts described above. If something different was going on, I’d sure like to know about it.

Hershman on SJR 7

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Bilerico and Advance Indiana take Sen. Brandt Hershman to the woodshed on SJR 7 – the amendment that would prohibit same sex marriages and prohibit any marriage rights from being extended to unmarried couples. According to those entries, Hershman’s past statements and attempts at legislation cast doubt on his credibility when he suggests that subsection (b) of the Amendment — the provision limiting the potential rights of unmarried couples — actually wouldn’t change anything. Once again, I think it’s useful to post the actual text of subsection (b):

(b) This Constitution or any other Indiana law may not be construed to require that marital status or the legal incidents of marriage be conferred upon unmarried couples or groups.

Breaking that down to its broadest reading, it says: Indiana law may not be construed to require that the legal incidents of marriage be conferred upon unmarried couples. I don’t know how proponents of the measure get around the interpretation that, if the General Assembly passes a law that conveys a right which is an incident of marriage to an unmarried couple, a court cannot enforce that law. That’s not only a change. That’s a big change.

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HB 1379 Bulk form users of county recorder documents

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HB 1379 – Bulk form copies. Rep. Hoy. Increases to 10 cents per page (from 5 cents) the fee the county recorder is required to charge “bulk users.” A “bulk user” is a person that purchases a copy of all recorded documents (or the indices) received by the county recorder for recording in a calendar day, week, month, or year.

This was a hotly contested issue, passing the House by a vote of 52 to 41. It was not a particularly partisan vote, however. That’s refreshing to me somehow – a close, yet nonpartisan, vote. Even with a topic as mundane as copy fees at the Recorder’s office.

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HB 1274 – Crash Report fees

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House Bill 1274 Accident response service fees. Rep. Herrell. Limits the fee for a crash report to $8. (Current law allows a fee of not less than $5.) The fee can’t be charged to inspect a crash report (as opposed to getting a copy) and allows a person to scan the report with a handheld or personal scanning device for free. No fee would be chargeable to the driver of a motor vehicle or other person involved in the accident. Passed 92-0.

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HB 1042 – BMV hours of operation

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House Bill 1042 BMV hours of operation. Rep. Orentlicher.

Requires a BMV branch or full service contractor to be open from 8 a.m. to 8 p.m. (local time) on Monday through Friday and from 8 a.m. to 5 p.m. on Saturdays. Modifies the hours to 6 a.m. to 6 p.m. the day before an election. The day before an election, a branch is permitted (rather than required) to solely conduct ID transactions. Allows males required to register with the Selective Service System to do so at the BMV.

Passed 85 to 6. (Voting “no” were Reps. Davis, Duncan, Foley, Murphy, Torr, and Walorski.) The introduced bill by Rep. Orentlicher only contained the Selective Service provision. The other parts of the bill were amended in by Rep. Turner.

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HB 1038 – Battery by body waste

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Don’t poop on your probation officer. That’s not just a good idea. It’s the law! Or, it will be if House Bill 1038 continues to progress. That legislation makes batter by body waste a Class D felony if committed on a probation officer, firefighter, or first responder. It’s already the law with respect to other law enforcement officers or corrections officers. Passed the House 93-0.

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