Week Seven - February 22, 2008

The Advocate is a new electronic tool provided to our business members and regional state legislators.  This publication, sponsored by Devine Millimet & Branch and designed by ActiveEdge, is intended to keep you up to date with all the latest happenings in Concord concerning legislation impacting businesses.  We hope you enjoy this weekly electronic publication!

The Legislature is on a week-long vacation next week, which gives all of us a brief respite to catch our breath and prepare for the next round of intense lobbying that will undoubtedly accompany some of the major issues this session that are starting to really gain some steam.

Here are some of this week’s bills that are Moving Forward:

RFID

After at least four years of talking about RFID (radio frequency identification devices), a bill is finally moving forward that has agreement by all involved parties. A subcommittee of the House Commerce Committee has voted to amend HB 686 with the RFID Commission’s proposed amendment, which adds abuse of RFID to the “computer crimes” statutes and also adds a prohibition to human implantation without consent. There was, and will continue to be, an attempt to require “labeling and notice” in the use of RFID; however, that will be a “next step” on the agenda for the Commission. We are sure the privacy gurus will continue to make lots of noise on this bill, since it still has far to go in the legislative process and will likely reach the House floor over the next few weeks.

Bariatric Surgery

An issue that first arose during the 2007 session continues to receive legislative consideration. Last session, the House Commerce Committee deliberated over the pros and cons of passing legislation that would require insurers to cover costs of bariatric surgery (also known as gastric by-pass for us medical novices) for patients with type II diabetes. That bill, HB 894, was submitted at the behest of a seacoast-area bariatric surgery group faced with an increasing number of candidates whose insurance expressly excluded coverage for the bariatric services. A House Commerce Subcommittee explored ways that limited access to coverage for bariatric surgery might be mandated, but limited to assure that appropriate clinical guidelines were followed before and after access to surgery. The full Committee, with significant questions remaining, voted to send the bill to interim study during that same 2007 session.

Fast-forward to 2008 - the same bill reappears, this time coming from the Senate side of the aisle with Senator Bob Clegg as its prime sponsor, who simply has to walk into a room to demonstrate the benefits of bariatric surgery. As he noted at this week’s hearing on his bill, SB 312, he has lost 101 pounds since his own surgery last fall. That being said, his remarkable loss of body mass certainly took nothing away from the compelling weight of his testimony, during which he described a number of weight-associated conditions that have abated since his surgery.

Going into executive session directly after the close of the hearing on SB 312, the Senate Commerce Committee speedily sent the bill out to the floor with a favorable recommendation by a vote of 5-1. It will be interesting to see how the House responds, since it had previously sent an identical bill to Interim Study just last year.

Workforce Housing

Much work, compromise and debate went into an amendment on HB 1472, which encourages (with a stick) municipalities to create workforce housing. The new language, which was a vote along party lines, gives the municipalities a little wiggle room by allowing them to take into consideration existing housing stock and their current ordinances and regulations regarding the development of workforce housing in attempting to comply with HB 1472’s requirements. There is a similar bill moving through the Senate. We expect workforce housing requirements for all communities will pass this year.

HB 1587 - The Beat Goes On

In its Wednesday executive session, the House Health, Human Services and Elderly Affairs Committee reviewed the most recent version of HB 1587, which is a bill attempting to restrict the sharing of patients’ medical records even further than currently stipulated by HIPAA. While a certain sense of inevitability hung over the bill from the start of its consideration, the Committee’s final vote to send the bill to the floor with a report of “Ought to Pass with Amendment” was less enthusiastic than would have been predicted. It seems the discomfort expressed by many sectors of health care delivery and financing had convinced at least eight members of the Committee that more work needed to be done. And of those, at least one member, Representative Charles McMahon, questioned any need at all for the legislation, prefacing his comments on the bill with the query: “Where’s the rat?” That being said, the bill did receive a favorable vote from the majority of the committee and will head to the floor early in March. A vigorous floor fight is expected, so stay tuned.

Here are Some Bills that Were Knocked Off this past week:

One of the most complicated bills of the session promoted by the Department of Revenue Administration has finally been sent to Interim Study after hours and hours of work sessions (you may recall last week’s update, which informed you that this bill had received such a recommendation from its subcommittee). HB 1308, which dealt with reasonable compensation for sole proprietorships, LLC’s, etc., was not ready for prime time according to the subcommittee chair who recommended study. Representative Marsh specifically thanked the Nashua Chamber for coming up to multiple work sessions and articulating the concerns of small businesses, which were numerous. David Heath of Melanson & Heath worked tirelessly on this bill. This bill will now go to the full House floor, where it is expected to receive the final vote to be sent to an Interim Study committee this summer. We will be back at the table when the committee begins work on HB 1308 this summer.

SB 435, which required DES to consider not only direct impacts but indirect impacts to wetlands before issuing a dredge and fill permit, has been sent to interim study. There were many legislative maneuvers on the Senate floor - none of which could get enough votes – so, finally, all greed on the further study. One more complication to construction projects has therefore been stalled.

All businesses joined together to stop the latest attempt to prohibit employment at will, HB 1515. The central issue for the business community was the lack of a clear definition of “just cause” for termination. The business community had a rough time last year with the House Labor Committee. However, the committee seems to have settled down a bit this year and is more receptive of some of the business community concerns.

Here are some of those Bills Still In Play:

Everyone in the State is certainly in support of HazMat teams. They are a valued emergency service to our citizens. The problem is, how does the State pay for these teams? They have been funded since the mid-1980’s by federal grants and by some, but not all, local communities. HB 1594 is an attempt to create a dedicated fund, paid by businesses, for the State to administer, train and equip the HazMat teams.

J. Christopher Williams
President & CEO
Greater Nashua Chamber of Commerce
151 Main St.
Nashua, NH 03060
Phone: 603.881.8333
Fax: 603.881.7323