Bill Would Limit Bill Overload Legislators Would Be Allowed To Introduce Only Three Per Session

Legislators introduce hundreds and hundreds of bills each year, and most don’t make it.

Many aren’t just doomed, they’re silly.

Consider the 1991 bill to create the 51st state of Lincoln - as in county - complete with its own state tree (the telephone pole) and motto (“I’ll be dammed”).

Or the one to declare Walla Walla Sweet onion sandwiches the state sandwich. Or this year’s bill to include None of the Above on ballots for voters less than pleased with the candidates.

“You look at some of these things and think, why take up people’s time? We put in way too many bills,” said Sen. Bob McCaslin, R-Spokane.

McCaslin said he supports a bill introduced Tuesday that allows legislators to introduce no more than three bills per session on the public’s dime.

Any more than that and lawmakers have to dig into their own pockets to pay for printing and other costs.

Rep. Shirley Hankins, R-Richland, introduced the bill to force lawmakers to “put our own house in order.

“Regulatory reform begins at home. I mean some of these are conservative Republicans putting in all these bills and they cost money. No one even knows how much.”

True enough. While the introduction and scrutiny of bills is the primary task of lawmakers while in session, no one knows how much is spent to draft, print, distribute, hear, analyze and adopt each bill introduced.

Even during short sessions like this one, lawmakers push a mountain of legislation through the lawmaking process. In 1994, also a short session, the government print shop printed 9.7 million pages of legislation, at a cost to taxpayers of nearly $250,000.

That doesn’t count the tax dollars spent for staff lawyers who draft the bills, code revisors who put them in bill form, budget analysts who figure the estimated cost of a given bill if adopted, legislative analysts on committee staffs who work up detailed bill reports, and agency staff who pour over every bill introduced.

This year there are more than 1,000 bills already in the hopper, and it’s only a 60-day session.

But even lawmakers who admit too many bills are introduced say they are just doing what the people want.

“I’ve put in some bills for people I know aren’t going anywhere,” said Sen. Eugene Prince, R-Thornton.

“But people want them. And doesn’t a constituent have the right to have their idea heard? Limiting ideas is not what we are here for.”

, DataTimes