The Legislature is in a semi-holding pattern just prior to the final week, which is dominated by the unveiling of the final budget. Six conferees from the House and five conferees from the Senate have the authority and responsibility to craft one compromise budget from the conflicting fiscal documents brought forth by each chamber. At this point the budget philosophies of the two groups are so significantly at odds a compromise seems a distant hope, but the system has worked for most years and I remain cautiously optimistic.

We have persevered through the hectic pace of six weeks of legislative wrangling, and now before the final budget push there is an anticipatory calm as we wait for the last winds to hit. I generally use this space to report on the actions or non actions of the General Assembly, but this week I thought I might broaden my scope and compare and contrast the legislature of ten years ago with where we are in 2006.

When I first came to the General Assembly in 1993 I was part of a Democratic majority, but in 2000 the leadership in the House of Delegates switched and there were new structures, new rules and a different agenda. Depending on your perspective, the shift has been characterized by greater efficiency or less democracy. A change of this magnitude does not happen quickly, is not always smooth and it takes time to assess--a task I will leave for historians to come. We have, however, over the course of the past few years heard about a new commitment to efficiency that provides better overall government. It’s impossible to evaluate the quality of the process by focusing solely on the quantity, but I would like to offer a quick snapshot.

In 1996, 2,992 bills and resolutions were introduced while this year the General Assembly addressed 3,099 measures, an increase of about 1%. The ratio of legislation between the House and the Senate is still similar, in 1996 the House introduced nearly ¾ of the bills and this year we represented a little more than 2/3 of the bills. The number of legislators and the number of days remains equal, but in 1996 there were 20 Standing Committees in the House with 50 subcommittees within that structure. The Senate operated with 11 Standing Committees and 23 subcommittees. Now the House organizes its work using 14 Standing Committees and 34 subcommittees. The Senate still utilizes 11 committees but their subcommittee system has grown to 39. Not all subcommittees meet regularly and some Committees from 1996 had very narrow parameters, like Interstate Commerce and Claims. There clearly has been a streamlining in terms of numbers.

Many of the topics addressed have not changed over the decade, although in some cases the numbers seem to reflect a heavier hand over legislative authority. This year we had 5 bills related to Family Life Education issues while in 1996 there were no bills; any curriculum adjustments were handled by the Department of Education. This year three bills focused on the use of contraception, while in 1996 there were none. The number of abortion bills almost doubled and in 1996 there were no bills about adoption, while this year there were four, three of which addressed restrictions on who is allowed to adopt children.

The largest single change comes under the citation of Sex Crimes. In 1996 there were four bills under this heading. This year there are three additional categories—sex offenders, sexually violent offenders and sexually violent predators and the General Assembly considered 39 bills in total. Reflecting a sign of the times in 1996 the Assembly heard 5 bills about illegal aliens while now there is a separate legal classification under Immigration and the legislature considered 28 bills. The same is true for computers and technology. While in 1996 we were addressing technology related bills there were no security or identity theft bills and this year we have added headings under Internet, data collection, libraries, electronic voting, video games and many more.

I can not make any sweeping or even narrow judgments about the legislative difference between then and now. Solely from the numbers and subjects of the bills, there does not appear to be a clear substantive change. I can assure you the hours of work in contemplating the issues before us have not diminished—with committees beginning at 7 a.m. and closing at 7 p.m.

The most radical difference appears to be a choice by the new leadership to streamline the process by dispatching bills to a subcommittee where the issue receives an uneven and often unpublic hearing with no recorded vote to reach the citizenry. This year, under the guise of efficiency, new rules were instigated that make it possible for major issues of importance to be heard by a minimal number of legislators—sometimes no more than four—and bills are killed with no full committee consideration. When efficiency-changes circumvent full consideration, I fear as a legislature we are shirking the very purpose for which we serve.