Strike Out the Band ...
Law to levy tax for city band nears final note
February 18, 2019 
Note from Mitzi Epstein - HB2454 might be intended to remove unnecessary laws, or it might be a placeholder for a striker. I expect it to be a "vehicle" bill, one that will be used to skip normal vetting steps.
But on the face of it, ... here's a quote from the article...
“I love marching bands, I love music, I love the idea of a band in the gazebo,” Rep. Mitzi Epstein, D-Tempe, said when the legislation was debated in committee. “Arizona has a lot of small towns and therefore should be able to have the flexibility to do what they want.”
Further notes from Mitzi:
Local control allows each unique town, city, and county in Arizona to develop its own innovations and charm.
I believe this bill as it is written is innocuous. It is a good idea to remove archaic laws from the books.
However, I think this bill is likely to become a striker. That means another legislator will "strike everything" from this bill and write in a new bill. That new bill does not have to go through a committee in the House because this bill already passed a committee.
What? !! Yes. It's a method of working on bills that was designed to allow a true emergency, such as funding for foster children's healthcare, to be processed speedily. Strikers were intended to be rare and helpful to the common good. Sadly, this method of "strikers" has also been used to avoid public scrutiny and allow powerful legislators to get pet bills passed even though the striker bill might cause harm.
For that reason, I vote, "no" when I think a bill is really there as a vehicle to become a striker.
Read more of this article by Howard Fischer in the Capitol Times, click here.
