Idaho Legislative Session: Week 7 in review

In the seventh week of Idaho’s legislative session, the joint budget committee began setting state agency budgets, but the biggest ones are still to come, with public schools, Health and Welfare and higher education budgets up next week. Among expenditures approved this week was a $710,000 emergency boost to Idaho’s boat inspection program aimed at combating invasive quagga or zebra mussels.

House Speaker Scott Bedke revealed that he was pursued by a stalker four years ago, a former legislative committee secretary who claimed Bedke was going to marry her, and that he’d turned the matter over to the Idaho State Police. The revelation followed a report on two right-wing websites that the woman claimed she overheard inappropriate comments from Bedke during a committee hearing in 2012; multiple witnesses said the report was false.

The House on Tuesday killed legislation to shift $17 million in highway funds from the Idaho State Police to road work, but not identify a replacement funding source for ISP.

Legislation targeting tribal gaming was killed on a narrow vote in a House committee Wednesday after three days of hearings.

Congressman Raul Labrador, in a speech to the House Wednesday, said new President Trump is only doing what he said he’d do, and strong reactions to Trump “should concern us all.”

Proposed new school science standards were strongly supported by those testifying at a lengthy hearing in a Senate committee Thursday, after a House panel earlier rejected five references to climate change; the Senate panel put off its vote until next week.

The first of two resolutions calling for Idaho to petition for an Article V convention of the states to amend the U.S. Constitution – this one for a balanced budget amendment – cleared a Senate panel on a 5-4 vote Friday after more than two dozen people testified on it, all opposing it.