HB2719 will be worked in Taxation Committee tomorrow

Kansas HB2719 will be worked in a House Taxation Committee meeting tomorrow morning (Friday), at 8am in 582-N.

Word came mid-afternoon about the bill being worked today or tomorrow, during the committee’s meeting. Laura DeBaun and I came to Topeka, as our office is 25 minutes from the Statehouse.

As the hearing started, the KLA Govt. Affairs chair sent this message out on the statewide librarian listserv, as well as on the KLA website, asking people to contact the members of the House taxation committee.

Here’s my tweets from the committee hearing that are relevant:

What happens tomorrow morning?

HB2719 is moving forward and will be worked in Taxation Committee tomorrow morning at 8am. “Worked” means that amendments may be introduced and voted on which means the bill could be edited before it is voted on to be passed out of committee. I’ll be at that hearing, as will others.

Word has it that all mentions of libraries (not just regional library systems) will stripped out of the bill by amendment — but that amendment then still has to be passed within the committee; hence the need still to contact the members of the Taxation committee. Who knew we were all going to get intimate legislative process lesson over the last 10 days? That’s not necessarily a bad thing!

Here’s some further thoughts from me on the situation, if you’re interested.

Why does this situation matter?

I was reminded of the below quote right before word came about the committee hearing, and had shared it (not kidding), a minute before we learned there was movement on this bill. What a fortuitous reminder! It’s a reminder of why we are advocating so hard against this bill. There’s so many other reasons, but this one was timely this afternoon.