2023 Legislative Session Update

It’s that time again to report my view of the Legislative Session. Just when you think you might be able to predict how things will go, the Session reminds you there are 174 legislators that have their own agendas, and you never know which subject will be the one that knocks the train off the track.

As I begin, I want to give a shout out to Ken, Charles and George for their work over the summer and as I needed them while working on the Garbage Lien Bill throughout the Session. This bill is one that I am told has been brought up for as many years as people can remember but never passed.

We worked with Senator Tyler McCaughn to have a hearing during the summer to discuss issues with every association that has interest in this legislation and try to bring out the problems keeping the bill from passing as well as get an agreement on language to move forward with in a bill. As you might would guess, even though things should have been on track with an agreement in place, the bill still faced quite a bit of challenges on its way to passage. If you would like to look at the history of actions and how this bill began and where we ended up click here. I’ll be glad to discuss it in further detail at our conference, but I am glad to report that the bill did pass. Now the Chancery Clerk’s office will keep a registry of all garbage liens, and this registry is to be updated quarterly.

The subjects or bills that seemed to be most important during this session were funding for hospitals, infrastructure, and education. There were bills that received lots of debate most notably the Jackson Court System and CCID Jurisdiction bill and the extension of Medicaid for post-partum benefits. A few bills that were also interesting and worth mentioning were the tax mis spender registry, the ballot harvesting ban, banning of TikTok on government devices and Mississippi becoming the second state to pass a bill regarding the sale of Pet Insurance. This session our legislature passed the largest budget in state history – 7.6 billion dollars.

Looking back, I am not sure I have ever known a session to have so much major legislation pass in an election year. In fact, there was a record number of bills dropped this year – 3,429 bills were referred to committee and 428 bills were sent to the Governor.

For the upcoming election, each of our statewide elected officials face opposition with the exception of the Northern District Transportation Commissioner. We have 84 legislators running unopposed, and 90 that face opposition in their race, (some of which are open seats). To view the complete list of who is running click here.

It has been my pleasure to represent you again this year. I am incredibly proud of the progress we have made. We have certainly grown in visibility and with name ID at the Capitol which makes a difference in our ability to help mold legislation that impacts our industry.