(Again.) Sen. Charles Bishop (R-Jasper) couldn’t be bothered to show up for Tuesday’s meeting to work on a (partial, short-term) solution to Jefferson County’s financial woes, but he’s ready to shut down a special session with a filibuster.
Rep. Ken Guin (D-Carbon Hill), the House Majority Leader, and Sen. Zeb Little (D-Cullman), the Senate Majority Leader, don’t sound hopeful that a special session will produce results. None of this bodes well for future efforts to address the much larger problem of the sewer debt.
Catch-22. JeffCo doesn’t have home rule, so decisions have to go through the legislature. JeffCo leaders’ abysmal mismanagement has pretty much torpedoed any chance of home rule for the foreseeable future. The county’s precarious financial situation is damaging the state’s economic development, but its own legislative delegation can’t get its collective act together. Six of the 24 legislators missed Tuesday’s meeting. An ABC 33/40 story on a June 26 meeting indicates only 18 legislators showed up for that one (it doesn’t list the attendees, so I don’t know if the no-shows were the same). A couple of Tuesday’s no-shows, Bishop and Rep. Jack Williams (R-Vestavia Hills), got paragraphs of press today, but apparently the reporter didn’t ask them why they couldn’t participate in the actual decision-making process. Sen. Coleman told us yesterday that the County Commission has been less than cooperative when dealing with the legislative delegation.
And then there’s this:
A special session could last a minimum of five straight meeting days to a maximum of 12 meeting days scheduled over a 30-day period. It could cost from $110,000 to $430,000, the Legislative Fiscal Office has estimated.
If Charles Bishop decides to show his ass filibuster and tanks an agreement, can we demand that he reimburse the taxpayers?
And if our county leaders and legislators can’t come together and craft a workable solution (legislative and administrative), can we give them layoff notices?