While there is a petition underway currently to get a measure on the ballot in November to greatly restrict the use of the Emeregency Clause - something that impacted gun owners with the passage of SB941 here in Oregon last year, Rep. Bill Kennemer is bringing HB4106 forward next week in the short session. This from the email I received from Rep. Kennemer:
All of us legislators are limited to introducing a limit of just 2 bills. My first one (HB 4106), limits the use of "emergency clauses" by agencies. Some folks are planning an initiative petition for this November's ballot, similar to the bill I proposed last session (HJR33), that will limit the use of such clauses in legislative action to real emergencies; note that a whopping 49% of the legislative bills last session had such clauses but often were not true "emergencies". However, this new bill will be aimed at similar administrative abuses by state agencies. The issue is that many of these are political rather than necessary "emergencies". Thus they go into effect virtually immediately and without review or easy or ready recourse. One of the worst examples of such emergency clause abuse by an agency was the Oregon Health Authority's changing health care reimbursement retroactively! First, many of us view "retroactive" as unethical, and, secondly, making it unstoppable with the emergency clause destroys fairness and due process, two things government should definitely be about!
Definitely a bill we want to get legislators to support - even if the ballot measure goes through later this year. We need to stop the abuse of the emergency clause by out of control legislators.
All of us legislators are limited to introducing a limit of just 2 bills. My first one (HB 4106), limits the use of "emergency clauses" by agencies. Some folks are planning an initiative petition for this November's ballot, similar to the bill I proposed last session (HJR33), that will limit the use of such clauses in legislative action to real emergencies; note that a whopping 49% of the legislative bills last session had such clauses but often were not true "emergencies". However, this new bill will be aimed at similar administrative abuses by state agencies. The issue is that many of these are political rather than necessary "emergencies". Thus they go into effect virtually immediately and without review or easy or ready recourse. One of the worst examples of such emergency clause abuse by an agency was the Oregon Health Authority's changing health care reimbursement retroactively! First, many of us view "retroactive" as unethical, and, secondly, making it unstoppable with the emergency clause destroys fairness and due process, two things government should definitely be about!
Definitely a bill we want to get legislators to support - even if the ballot measure goes through later this year. We need to stop the abuse of the emergency clause by out of control legislators.
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