Key Topics
Review of Compacts and Commissions:
- The committee reviewed various interstate compacts, commissions, and other entities to determine their current status, functionality, and relevance.
- Discussions focused on whether these entities had met in the past two years and whether they fulfilled their intended roles.
- The Child Services Oversight Committee was highlighted as defunct, with its functions absorbed by other committees. There was significant discussion on the relevance and statutory status of this committee.
Child Services Oversight Committee:
- The committee was found to be inactive, and its responsibilities had been absorbed by other bodies, such as the Commission on Improving the Status of Children in Indiana.
- Discussions included removing the committee from statutory listings due to its inactivity.
Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Holiday Commission:
- The commission was confirmed to be active, although there was concern about the need for more meetings and involvement from some members.
Environmental Adjudication Directory Selection Panel:
- This panel was found to be repealed in the 2024 session and is no longer relevant.
Indiana Stadium and Convention Building Authority:
- Discussions revolved around the potential dissolution of this authority and the absorption of its responsibilities by the Indiana Finance Authority, particularly concerning debt obligations related to Lucas Oil Stadium.
Committee Actions and Votes
- Vote on Child Services Oversight Committee: The committee agreed to remove the Child Services Oversight Committee from statutory listings due to its inactivity and absorption of duties by other entities.
- Outcome: Unanimous agreement, no dissent.
- Vote on Indiana Stadium and Convention Building Authority: The committee discussed but did not take a final vote, choosing to investigate further due to outstanding debt obligations and the need for careful consideration.
- Outcome: No vote was taken, and further investigation was required.
Additional Notes
- Future Meetings: The committee plans to meet two more times, one for additional fact-finding and another for final recommendations and findings.
- List of Defunct Entities: Representative Bartel presented a list of defunct entities for consideration in future legislation to reduce government size by eliminating non-functional bodies.
- Governor’s Appointments: Discussion on the relevance and necessity of governor’s appointments to various local boards and commissions, with a focus on reducing the number of such appointments.
- Discovery of Inactivity: The revelation that the Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Holiday Commission had not met in two years, despite claims of its activity, was met with surprise, particularly by Senator Greg Taylor, who expressed concern over not being notified of meetings.
- Stadium Authority Discussion: The complex discussion around the potential dissolution of the Indiana Stadium and Convention Building Authority, which involved significant financial and legal considerations, highlighted the intricate nature of government oversight and the importance of thorough investigation before making changes.
I hail from the north end of the state. And before we get started, I just want to point out that we have sign up forms for testimony here on the podium. So if you’re gonna be testifying, we’d like you to sign up, please. And we will start off this afternoon with introduction of committee members. And to my left, we’ll start with Representative May, and we’ll work our way around the table. Thank you. Okay. Good afternoon. Representative Chris Mays. House District 65, which is all of Lawrence county, most of Orange, and parts of Jackson and Washington County. Justin Mow at House District 97, which is downtown Indianapolis, the near south side and southwest side of the city. David Nazgotsky. State Senate ten South Bend, in parts of St. Joseph County. Greg Taylor. State senator, District 33, west side of Indianapolis. Dandron Ellis. Senate District one. Senator Daniel. Senate District one, which is the middle of Lake County. Indiana. State Senator Jim Buck. District 21, populated area of Howard county, all of Tipton and the northwest of Hamilton. Chris Baker, with LSA, Reagan Hatcher, district three. Gary Hobart, Lake Station, New Chicago. Larissa Sweet. District 50, representative all of Huntington County, Wabash, Wells, and Miami. Karen Engelman. District 70. Olive Harrison, part of Clark, part of Floyd, part of Washington. Steve Bartel is District 74, representing Orange, Perry, Crawford, Dubois, and Spencer counties. Excellent. And as I said, Doug Miller, my district’s House 48, and I represent about a third of Elkhart county. So this afternoon, we’ve been tasked with looking at compacts, commissions, and other items that are current in code, and I’m going to have LSA talk about our charge. Thank you, mister chairman. So, the Legislative Council has charged this committee to do the following things in 2024, in each even numbered year, to determine whether a group has met in the immediate preceding two years. Identify all interstate compacts that have been fully operational for at least two years to which the state is a party to consider whether to remain a party to or withdraw from each interstate impact. If the committee determines that the state should withdraw from the interstate compact, identify the steps needed to withdraw from the compact and the definition for group under this resolution is. Refers to any authority board, commission, committee, a council delegate, foundation, panel, task force that is established by statute, has at least one legislator assigned to it, and is not staffed by legislative service agencies, and the source on that is Indiana code to five. 1.313. Great. Thank you. Senator Bohacic, would you like to introduce yourself? Check district eight. All are parts of St. Joe, Laporte, Marshall, and Star counties. Great, thank you. As we move down the agenda, I asked LSA to look at all of the compacts, commissions, as per the charge from legislative services. And the items that are on the agenda, we believe are those items that are those entities that have not met or have not been working to fulfill their charge. I would like to stress today that today and our next meeting will be fact finding. We’re not going to be judgmental. We’re going to look at anything pertaining to the viability of each entity and make sure that they’re carrying out the charge if they are or if they’re not, why they’re not. If there’s individuals here to speak to that. And we want to make sure, moving forward, that the state of Indiana is properly allocating resources. If those entities need to be staffed and individuals need to be attended, that they’re doing so. But if they’re not performing their function, or if they’ve reached obsolescence, that we address that as well. So I just wanted to lay that groundwork at the outset. The first item on the agenda is the child Services Oversight committee. Is there anyone here to speak on that? Okay, so we have Hannah Joy Alte. Thank you, mister chair. My name is Hannah Drayalty. I’m the recent executive director of Iarca. Can’t speak as to why the oversight committee hasn’t met in the past, but can say I would be in support of moving it so that there is more statutory oversight and authority that goes with the committee and would say, appreciate being considered for that, would support a move to have statutory oversight. And that’s about it for right now. Great. Thank you. Does anyone on our committee have any questions for Hannah Joye? Yes, mister chairman. What’s the purpose of the child services Oversight committee, if you could explain? So Mark Fairchild, with the commission for improving the status of children is here, and he’d probably be the best one to answer that. Yeah, I can take a stab at it, but he’s the expert. Sarah, would you like to address that? Yeah. Okay. I actually received an email from Mark Fairchild with the commission, and he explained that the child services oversight committee was replaced. It was repealed in 2014 and replaced by our interim study committee on child services that’s staffed by LSA and meets during the interim. So this committee did the same thing that like reviewing DC’s reports on child fatalities, and I believe they also looked at DC’s policies that were in practices that were in place just to oversee the department. So it continued to meet for a couple of years after being repealed without the statutory authority. But Mark indicated that he was in agreement to remove this from our list of appointments and the IGA website because it’s no longer active. Senator Buck. Thank you, mister chair. So to be clear, then, you’re in favor of removing this committee? Mark Fairchild is. And then. So, yeah, Mark is back there, but as the director. Because if it hadn’t met in two years, and that’s what this committee is trying to determine, if there’s something that’s significant, that’s one thing. But not having met for two years, if there’s justification. Like to hear it. Thank you, Sarah. Appreciate it. More. Just who are you again? Who are you? So I understand your role in this. I’m Sarah Doggett with LSA. Thank you very much. I apologize, Senator Nieskotsky. Thanks. Mister chair. I think probably would be the same question that I have for everyone. Just to try to get a better idea. When was this first established? How many years ago has it been established? I didn’t get that information. I don’t know if Mark would be a better person to answer. Mister chair, is it okay if Mark swaps? Yeah, we’ll recognize Mark Fairchild to speak. All right. Thanks for the opportunity to speak on this. Hopefully I can give a little bit more context. So the Child Services Oversight committee was created in statute in 2013. That was also at the same time that the commission on improving the status of children in Indiana, who I’m the executive director of, was created. And it was meant to inform some of the early efforts of that commission. It was actually then removed in 2014 from statute, which is why you see that there’s not a statutory citation behind this one versus the others on your list. It continued to meet informally to continue building that work early on with the commission. But most of the work that was done within that to inform the commission and get us in a place where we could be working across state agencies on child services issues, was integrated into other committees and task forces of the commission. It was meeting until about 2021. And at that point, the Child Services Oversight committee that we have meet in this interim, actually in a couple of weeks that I’m a member of, started picking up and doing a lot of the high level child fatality review and other tasks that felt more under that oversight level of role, and of course, has statutory authority. At that point, we stopped meeting on that and used that as another informant to the work of the commission. So nothing has gone away. It’s kind of recirculated to other areas? Yes, Senator Buck. And how much money has been appropriated, or is there an appropriation in the budget for that committee, not for what the committee, especially the children’s commission itself, has an appropriation of 350,000 annually for two and a half staff and other supports that we do throughout the year. So I do have a question. Is that money being reallocated, then, in the other areas where we’ve diversified, or where this charge has been diversified, that allocation was actually made quite recently in the 2023 cycle. So that funding was never attached to that group as it was not meeting during the time. Representative Moed. Thank you. Do you guys submit any sort of findings or annual report to the Legislative Council or the legislative body in either of the two, the non existing or the existing non meeting group in the past, and then the current group that you have? Yeah, we have an annual report. We actually just clicked publish on that for the last year’s one, so that’s available. And all of our materials and meeting recordings are available on our website, too. Sure. Any other questions? All right, seeing. Thank you. Thank you both. Next up is the doctor Martin Luther King junior holiday commission. Anyone here to speak on that? Any comments from Sarah from LSA? I actually did get confirmation from the Civil rights Commission that they are active, and he asked me to apologize to the committee for them. They haven’t kept their website updated, so he did get me that information. They are active. All right. Thank you. Any commission. Senator Taylor, I was really interested in this topic. I’m supposed to be on this commission. I can guarantee you I haven’t met in two years, so I don’t know what the Civil Rights Commission is talking about, but love to know when they’re meeting and what they’re meeting about. I think it’s important that we have this commission. We have a annual, if you all know, during the legislative session, annually, we have a presentation with the Civil Rights Commission, has a presentation on Doctor Martin Luther King Holiday, and there’s a presentation downstairs in the oak here in the rotunda. So I think it needs to be continued. But don’t know why I’m not getting notices of the meeting. So, you know, we could get a report back from the commission. Why I’m not a part of it. That’d be great. Yeah, we’ll definitely continue to follow up. We appreciate your insight on that. Yeah. Senator Buck as well. Do you know how much money is appropriated for that? Thank you. Next up is the environmental adjudication Directory selection panel. Anyone here to address or discuss that? Sarah, do you have any information on what their charge is, what they oversee or discuss for the environmental adjudication directory selection panel, the statute actually is repealed and I did not receive any other information about it. But it is. It was repealed just this past session, the 2024 session. All right, thank you. The. I’m sorry, the governor’s security council. Is anyone here to talk about that? I’m assuming this was formed during COVID Anyone have any comments or. Yeah, Representative Bartels. Thank you, Mister Chairman. I know there’s potential revisiting of this with merging with another council. I think we’ll see in the next couple months some language that may say this is what it needs to be with merging some other councils. Thank you. The Indiana Civic Education Commission. No one here to testify. I did get a text from a member of the department of ED, and it just simply says that they believe that at their last meeting they took care of what they were charged with doing. So they’re looking further to see if there’s a need for that particular commission to stay in place. So that’s the information that I have at this time. Does anyone else have any other comments? Seeing none, we’ll move on to the interstate Rail passenger advisory council. Representative Aylesworth. Senator Buchanan. Thank you, mister chairman. Yeah, I can say with assuming the exact legal verbiage is the same interstate rail passenger council and meets as a part of the Midwest Interstate passenger Rail commission, which is kind of the commission, the compact of, I don’t know, maybe eight or so Midwest states to look at rail options, expanding rail, improving rail. A lot of discussion comes around federal dollars and how to kind of combine resources and make sure that states are working together. I can say that the group meets twice a year. Usually one of us attend the meetings. And so I got your report. I had the privilege to attend the meeting in Washington DC earlier this year, and we submitted a grant application which hopefully will be approved here in the fall for high speed rail study in India, in Indiana, between Chicago and Indianapolis. And I got invited to ride the high speed rail going from Chicago to Minneapolis on the 18 November. I could not go because that’s org day. I gotta be here for that. That’s important. But it does play a valuable role in coordinating among the states grant and money. So it works in conjunction with another entity. That’s my understanding. Yeah, I was actually, when I initially saw that, I thought that was a reason we were here. But I’m like, well, is this a different entity? I’m pretty sure they’re all kind of one entity. Yes, sir. Yeah. Senator Buck, do you know how much we appropriate for that commission? How much? How much is it? 500,000 in the budget. I think it’s 500,000 in the budget. Okay. Thank you. Anyone else have any questions? All right, thank you both. Thank you. You want us to fill out a form, chairman? Sure. Does anyone here to testify on behalf of the Lewis and Clark Expedition Commission? Seeing none. Yep. Representative and could I get a little more information on that? I have talked to their board member before, but I’m not sure if there’s a need for them or not. Could I get some more information and come back to our next meeting? Yeah, absolutely. As I said earlier, we’re here fact finding. The Medicaid advisory committee, standing fiscal subcommittee. I’m assuming that that’s part of our budget committee. Anybody have any working knowledge of that? Any comments? Mister chair? So I’m not certain it’s the same committee that met last week. I am a member that met yesterday, and a Medicaid oversight commission. That was their first meeting, but I’m not sure if this is the exact one or nothing. It sounds like it. So if it is, they met last week. All right, thank you. The oral history Project advisory committee. Sing none will check. Mark. By the way, in case anyone’s interested at the outset, LSA, as they peruse code, there’s 66 current ones that Sarah was able to locate within our statutory code, compacts and commissions, maybe even perhaps more than that. But that’s why we’re taking a deep dive in this, just to make sure that we’re doing the right things. Do you have comments, Sarah? So I did reach out to Emily McGuire with the library about the oral history project advisory committee, and she did respond that, confirming that they have not met in the past two years. She also provided a lot of information about they just have a new or, I’m sorry, Emily is the new project manager. And there’s some other information. I have brought copies for the committee if you’d like me to share. Sure. But the email does confirm that they’ve not met two years, and we don’t know their budget allocation or so as she’s passing those out. As I said, I think there’s 66 of these entities that currently exist in statute that the state of Indiana. So our constituents, including us, we’re paying to staff those and to make sure they’re meeting. And we just. I guess I want to have a discussion at this point. It would be somewhat theoretical in nature, but amongst the committee about your feelings on entities that are here statutorily but simply aren’t functioning. I know in the 23 session, we passed legislation to get rid of a number of. I think we passed legislation to get four, terminate our membership in four compact, statewide, and we’re continuing that work today. So, does anyone on the committee have any thoughts? I just found out I’m chair of that. Chairman Buck, how much money has that commission been getting the last few years? I hope it’s not a lot interesting how things shake out as we move along, isn’t it? That’s pretty good. All right, moving on. We have representative Bartels with us this afternoon. He authored House Bill 1396 in 2024, and there are provisions in that that relate to this particular interim committee. So I’m going to ask him to present his comments at this time. Thank you, mister chairman. Just some things to consider for repeal as we continue on with potential list of defunct or non meeting groups to take consideration for future testimony. Is the board for coordination of programs serving vulnerable individuals. It was established under an IC code. It’s believed to be defunct. And there’s a few duties that this program had that’s already kind of being absorbed by the CRC. Consideration of a repeal of that. The Board of coordination of programs serving vulnerable individuals, it basically is defunct. And the duties that normally were taken on by that board is actually being taken care of by the CRC. Just first consider. Yep. The Indiana stadium and convention building authority. It was basically acquired. It was to acquire, construct, equipped, owned, lease facilities, capital improvements board. It’s basically defunct. There are a few remaining duties with this board, but the recommendation in 1396, is it be absorbed by the Indiana Finance Authority. If I might air Jaylor, please. I don’t know how you gonna do it with the Indiana Finance Authority, but if I remember correctly, there’s still debt outstanding that was issued by this stadium authority. They have to. I know they’ve got obligations to bondholders for the debt that’s outstanding. Have you talked to the Indiana Finance Authority about whether or not they’re willing to take on that responsibility? Or is this something. I didn’t see them on the list. Yeah, that’s why I’m here. Just to add these things that were brought up a year and a half ago. So, if you look at 1396, there is some verbiage to try to take care of some of those issues on bonds, and it’s just for food, for thought, for the rest of the committee as we move forward. Is that that was the intent from some of the stakeholders in the executive branch. Correct me if I’m wrong, but that commission is made up not only of members of Marion county, but also they have members from the donut counties, if I’m correct. So that would be Hamilton, Hancock, maybe. Boom. What I’m trying to get at here is that’s a huge undertaking to dissolve that organization, because I know that they were the ones who. For Lucas Oil Stadium. I think it was just Lucas Oil stadium. They were the ones who issued the debt for Lucas Oil stadium in the old RCA dome that we had. So I’m just. Just saying there might be some obligations there. And, you know, before we go to, have you talked to the IFA about absorbing their responsibilities? That discussion has been very brief, but at this point, it’s. If you look at what this commission does and does not do, it makes sense to not have another commission out there. And in our effort to reduce government, this makes sense. Okay, so what. What are their responsibilities? I mean, don’t they still have responsibility for the oversight of Lucas Oil stadium or the over. Because the CIB. This. The CIB is the operating entity for the convention center. Correct me if I’m wrong, downtown Indianapolis, the state, even convention authority was put together when the original Lucas Oil stadium was an idea to make sure that the surrounding counties who have people who will come downtown and spend money on food and beverage had some oversight of Lucas Oil stadium. And if I remember correctly, there was a bipartisan effort to make sure that those counties stayed involved and had someone who was part of. Yeah, because of the money. I. That’s just what I remember. And then I was a young bond lawyer when they did the bond deal, and I know it was issued under the Indiana Stadium and Convention Authority. Indianapolis stadium and convention. I think the intent is, was they were. They were doing. They had dudes responsibilities. They’re no longer necessarily doing them. And the indian authority is kind of already doing them. So it doesn’t make sense. Sense to continue business as usual. We’re not really doing anything. So it’s more of a. Let’s throw it on the table. It’s been brought up a year and a half ago. We’re looking into it. So, I mean, we definitely need to get in the weeds on this a little bit more, so. Okay. Thank you. I just didn’t know. Yeah. Okay. Another one for consideration. Mister chairman, is the law enforcement academy building commission. Currently. Right now, it’s actually different from the Iela board. And so it’s. Iela board pretty much runs the building. So it’s kind of a defunct, non necessary, and it should be eliminated, or any duties that are still remaining should go to the board, lea board, just for consideration. The Natural Resources Advisory Council was established as an advisory capacity. The DNR and the Natural Resources Commission, as of currently, right now they don’t really have any role or no sunset. So we should repeal that as a consideration. 1396 also looks at the reduction of state and governors appointees to a bunch of local boards and commissions. I do have a list, I can just provide you a list. But talking to lots of people in the executive branch and stakeholders in this, there’s no real need to have state and governors appointees on these commissions and boards. Just reduces the number. We got some boards with 30 members and sometimes they don’t even have enough to have a quorum. So this is just throwing that out there and I can just give you a list, but it makes sense and I think that there wouldn’t be a lot of opposition to that. I think that’s all I’ll bring up right now. Mister chairman, I do think that there’s one possibility that when we consider merging, we talked about the governor’s security council. There’s also a recommendation that the emergency Response Commission and the Hazard Mitigation Council merge and possibly take on also some duties of the governor’s security council. So that’s a consideration that was we’re looking at a year and a half ago. And so I think you’re going to see that we can probably merge a lot of these things and still accomplish what’s necessary for citizens. Chair. Sorry, Senator Buck. Thank you. Mister chair. On the one commission you brought up on the governor’s security, I don’t know whether we have one that can merge some way or make sure. I just know that this statehouse, especially for our Supreme Court members, has not passed a safety audit since 1994. And when I’ve talked to the chief justice about it, she does not have the same protection that our governor, the speaker and the pro tem have. And that was the reason for lassation, getting appropriation for a judicial center so they can have more security. But knowing that that hasn’t passed muster for all these years, there needs to be some kind of an ongoing audit of this building of the House security. The members of the legislature, the executive branch, judicial branch, and our staff are really safe in this building from untowards people. So I don’t know what area that fits into. But back in the nineties, that was a big issue because of so many attacks on different governmental buildings. But I just know we haven’t passed muster for security since 94. Thank you for the comments. Anyone else on the committee? Mister chairman, this is thank you for the opportunity. We’re going to meet one more time, right? We’re going to meet one more time. Actually two, because we’ll have one more meeting. We may have some expanded topics. We’re going to do some more research on these, these items, have more discussion and then we’ll have a meeting for findings. Okay? So the next meeting would be more of informational and because I think represent borders, Bartles, I called you borders. We got different hairstyles. Yeah, you do represent Bartles. You got a list there. I think we all should be familiar with that list. I’ll tell you, for me, I remember why we’re doing this. Now, as far as the governor’s appointments go, I think we ought to be cognizant of the fact that we’re going to have a new governor. Doesn’t matter who it’s going to be, it’s going to be a new governor. Right. If we’re going to make these decisions, because I’m sure we’re going to do a report to ledge council saying, hey, these are the recommendations, right. That we ought to be vetting these things. And I don’t think we should be looking at, you know, like I said, the governor’s appointments with a new administration coming, it’s just my two cent on it, you know. Yeah, I mean, we can look at it, but I think you recommended, there’s a few that you’ve already got a list that you’ve recommended where the governor shouldn’t have appointments or something. Yeah, I mean, here’s an example. Why am I in Region 15? Why am the governor’s appointee to Region 15, a local economic board? I mean, I don’t, I can’t influence them with cash or any. I can’t. I mean, so, I mean, what’s, what’s the point, I guess, right. If we’re not there to do good, then we’re just another body taking up space and. Yeah, that’s why I want to see that list. I mean, I, I just don’t want to get a list. I thought we were only meeting one more time, like we were going to get a list at the meeting like we did today and say, all right, at that same meeting we need to get rid of this appointment, get to this appointment if we’re going to have a third meeting after we get all the information. That’s better. Thank you, mister chairman. Yeah, that’s the intent. We’ll definitely disseminate the information. Okay. Thank you 100%. Even if we make the recommendation, we still would have to do a bill next year, and we would have the input from the governor by then. So even if we make the recommendation, we still wouldn’t have to proceed with all of this. So any other comments, Representative Bartels, you’ll get us at list? That list? Yeah. I’ll provide the list to the chairman right after this. And also they can disseminate it tomorrow, I suspect. Excellent. Correct. Thanks. Any other comments? Okay. Sorry if there’s no other discussion, Senator Buck, just point of clarification. It’s the 9th. You’re asking for flexibility of the time. Flexibility of the time. Okay. Thank you. There’s no other discussion than we’ll stand in adjournment.
Meeting Attendees
- Representative Chris Mays – House District 65
- Representative Justin Mow – House District 97
- Senator David Nazgotsky – State Senate, District 10
- Senator Greg Taylor – State Senate, District 33
- Senator Dandron Ellis – Senate District 1
- Senator Jim Buck – District 21
- Representative Reagan Hatcher – District 3
- Representative Larissa Sweet – District 50
- Representative Karen Engelman – District 70
- Representative Steve Bartel – District 74
- Representative Doug Miller – House District 48
- Senator Bohacic – District 8
- Mark Fairchild – Executive Director, Commission on Improving the Status of Children in Indiana
- Hannah Joy Alte – Executive Director of Iarca
- Sarah Doggett – Legislative Services Agency (LSA)
