Day-care measure delayed

Rep. George Sayler, D-Coeur d’Alene, offered extensive amendments to his day-care licensing bill Thursday to get a House committee to pass the bill, but panel members said the amendments confused them. So the House Health and Welfare Committee decided to put off consideration of the bill and the amendments until this week.

HB 163 sought to impose at least minimal health and safety regulations and criminal background checks on Idaho day-care providers who care for at least two unrelated kids for pay. Sayler, after meeting repeatedly with committee members who opposed the bill on philosophical grounds, offered to exempt from regulation anyone who cares for five or fewer unrelated children. “They say politics is the art of the possible,” he said.

Abortion bill back

A Panhandle legislator began a second attempt Wednesday to make it illegal to coerce a woman into having an abortion after a state lawyer found his first bill potentially unconstitutional. The new legislation, proposed by Rep. Bob Nonini, R-Coeur d’Alene, includes changes intended to make it more legally viable than its predecessor, HB 161.

Both bills outline various forms of physical violence and verbal threats that could land violators up to five years in prison and a $5,000 fine, regardless of whether the victim has the abortion.

Smoking ban for bowlers

Second-grader Allie Hill took the podium Tuesday to share what she learned in health class about the tobacco smoke lawmakers may ban from bowling alleys.

“Every smoker can also hurt or kill many people who don’t smoke,” said Hill, a student at Pepper Ridge Elementary School in Boise. “You don’t want to kill a kid, do you?”

Smoking fouls her bowling experience, she said, urging lawmakers to pass the antismoking legislation.

Her testimony helped sway a House committee to unanimously approve HB 121 to prohibit smoking in Idaho’s bowling alleys, a move that failed in past years. Hill’s remarks even affected Rep. Eric Anderson, R-Priest River, a smoker and former ban opponent. “I think little Allie’s testimony was pretty compelling,” Anderson said.

The bill went on to pass in the House 48-17 on Friday. The Senate will take it up next.