After a busy session we ended on a relatively quiet note. Speaker Pingree and the House Leadership did an outstanding job of managing the calendar to get legislation processed while being respectful of our time. I don’t believe we were in session after 5pm more than three days. The final week we were able to accomplish much by the afternoon break. The final night was a bit long as we awaited final action by the Senate so we could then ajourn sine die, which in Latin means “without day” (A legislative body adjourns sine die when it adjourns without appointing a day on which to appear or assemble again.).
The only unfortunate part of this final week was the Democratic effort to run through a tax increase on the last day of session. This was the result of passage of LD 1088,
“An Act To Modernize the Tax Laws and Provide over $75,000,000 to Residents of the State in Tax Relief”. This bill was run through the hearing process and passed by primarily Democratic party line vote.

Governor Baldacci declined to sign the legislation as presented so an intense effort to negoiate a compromise was undertaken by Democratic leaders bent on passing a bill before the end of session. The result was a proposal, LD 1495 “An Act To Implement Tax Relief and Tax Reform”. This legislation was deposited on our desk 15 minutes before a vote was expected. There was not the customary public hearings nor even a review by the full Taxation Committee. It was an last minute attempt to craft tax reform in a very closed environment.
On a strict Democratic vote it passed the House and won the support of only one Republican, Sen. Peter Mills, in the Senate.

Following the Governor signing the bill a coalition of concerned legislators and citizen’s mobilized a petition drive to allow Maine voters a chance to have a say on the newly passed tax bill. Over a short time more than 70,000 signatures were collected and in September they were submitted to the Secretary of State for review and certification. After a delay which resulted in a lawsuit being filed by the group’s spokesman Charles Webster the courts found the Secretary of State had not properly fulfilled his duties and ordered that the petitions be certified. The vote will take place in June of 2010.

I spent a busy summer working on personal and family business and dealing with some items on my Legislative schedule. Not too many trips to Augusta were necessary but we did have some hearings before the LAbor Committee for Gubernatorial appointments.