UPDATE 04/16/05
Slowly moving forward. We had a hearing on HB 3277 Thursday night. The insurance companies were there to hammer us. Rep. Isett laid out the Bill and we gave a history on the 7 year battle for insurance equity. Then the insurance companies wanted us to define risky activities. We let them know that they had been defining risky activities, after the fact, for years. They want to charge us higher premiums if we ride and we said no way. We left the Bill pending and worked on writing a substitute on Friday.
Though it goes against the grain we will narrow it down to cover just us but we will not accept higher premiums, win or lose.
The Advisors have received a copy of the proposed changes that will be finalized on Monday.
On Friday we met with the Calendars Clerk on HB 264. We think there is a good chance of a hearing on that one for Monday or Tuesday of next week. We will keep our fingers crossed.
We also met with Chairman Krusee on HB 514. We got a big surprise to start the meeting off. He brought HB 963 out of committee last session on April 28th, about the time I had surgery. It was Calendars that held up our Failure To Yield Bill last session. We were not informed of this by our sponsor but none the less it is my responsibility to know these things. I apologized to Chairman Krusee and I now apologize to you for not having known this.
He was very cordial and by the end of the meeting we had scored another first for the association. He agreed to bring HB 514 to a hearing despite his not liking the Bill and said he will not lobby against it. Next week's agenda is already posted so Chairman Krusee looked at his calendar and said their next meeting is April 26th. He then said it won't be posted until next week but while you are here I will tell you now you will get your hearing on the 26th. You can't get much more cooperation than that. You now have a real advance notice on the hearing so let's see if you guys can get there. The meetings are generally at 8:00am.
The Chairman even brought up a way to make money for motorcycle awareness or to be used in any way we see fit. We have opted to pass this idea on to B.A.N.D. and have passed the information on to Rebecca.
More on this later.
We will start next week off by testifying in favor of HB 2418. This Bill was introduced by Rep Dutton and says an officer may not make a request for consent to search unless they have probable cause. This Bill offers protection from searches for people who aren't aware they have the right to say no. Hopefully we will be attending a Calendars Committee hearing on HB 264 also. There is no action needed from you on this hearing if we get it. No testimony is taken it simply sets the date for a Floor vote.
We are typing this out at home as we prepare for the Houston COC meeting today. We do not have all the E addresses here but will post it to those who don't have district advisors on Sunday when we get back into the office.
