Wednesday, June 10, 2015

Finance Committee Rewrite of Erin's Law Has Big Improvements

I'm at the public testimony for HB 44 Erin's Law.

I wrote up a synopsis of an earlier post that argued that at least 2000 kids would be molested because of the changes from the original Erin's Law to the Senate Education Committee Substitute.



When I got here, I was quickly shown by a friend that there is a new committee substitute bill from the Finance committee.

There are lots of small changes have improved the bill significantly.
  • Schools have changed from 'may' back to 'shall' have this program.  That's the biggest benefit.
  • Parents now have to 'opt out' as in the original, instead of 'opt in' as in the rewrite.
  • And the kids covered are once again K-12, not just 7-12.  
  • The prohibition on contracting with abortion providers is gone.
Things are much improved.  I'm hopeful.  I need to compare the two bills carefully to see what is gone and what is still there.

Here's a link to the working draft of the new bill.

1 comment:

  1. The Republicans in the Alaska Legislature should have left things alone to begin with....what is wrong with them? Time to vote them out of office when they are up for reelection - beginning with Anna Fairclough from Eagle River!

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