With only hours remaining in the legislative session, the House-Senate conference committee dealing with Legacy Amendment funding is still trying to get traction.
Sporting groups had opposed a tentative deal struck Monday afternoon among negotiators for the House and Senate, and made available to Gary Leaf of SportsmenForChange.org, among others, for their review. The deal was criticized by Leaf et al on a handful of fronts, and Leaf and others said the Senate hadn't followed through on its promise to hold fast in a couple of key areas as a bill that will administer about $210 million in Legacy Amendment funds is fashioned — and with great difficulty.
The conference committee was rescheduled multiple times, and finally set for 4:30. But conference committee chair Dick Cohen held up the meeting to discuss the agreement privately in his office with me and Lessard council member Jim Cox. The meeting was off the record. But broadly, Cohen said he believed hunters, anglers, environmentalists and other conservationists should consider the bill a victory, noting that, as an arts advocate, he didn't get everything he wanted, either.
Cox said he understood and appreciated Cohen's position. But Cox knows the fish, game and wildlife portions of the bill more intimately than Cohen — a fact Cohen acknowledged — and stressed that some portions of the tentative agreement wouldn't fly.
About 15 minutes later, Cohen and House co-chair Mary Murphy called the conference committee to order. To his credit, Cohen, who had the gavel, began taking testimony on the proposed bill.
Meanwhile, in Senate Majority Leader Larry Pogemiller's office, upstairs in the Capitol, Pogemiller was getting up to speed on the sporting group's complaints — complaints that were shared by Lessard council chair Mike Kilgore, also present in Pogemilller's office, and council member Bob Schroeder.
In the end, Pogemiller, who has been a key legislative supporter — more accurately, the key legislative supporter — of sporting groups during the past few years, agreed some changes should be sought.
Pressed for time on two fronts — in budget negotiations with the governor, and by the speed with which Cohen and the conference committee likely would hear testimony and close out the hearing — Pogemiller in the end left his office quickly, hoping to carry his concerns, and those of Leaf, Kilgore, Schroeder, et al, to Cohen and Murphy.
He did so, and while these legislative leaders were in the hall, listening to Pogemiller, Sen. Frederickson took charge of the conference committee.
The only person to speak during this time was Sen. Ellen Anderson, who basically lauded the efforts of the committee, the Lessard council and all others who had touched this legislation.
As Anderson finished, Cohen entered the meeting, adjourned it temporarily — to the surprise of most in attendance — and headed upstairs to Pogemiller's office.
In turn, Sen. Sauxhaug and Rep. Murphy (the conference committee co-chair) were brought into the discussion, and soon Pogemiller appeared outside the hearing room, asking for Schroeder, Kilgore, Leaf, Lessard and others who earlier had been in Pogemiller's office.
"I want you to explain to Rep. Murphy and Sen. Sauxhaug what your concerns are," Pogemiller said.
At which point — at 5:34 p.m. — everyone again disappeared behind closed doors.