Weekly Report: 4/1/2024

Prepared By: Tessa Schwarz

The legislature is on break for 2 weeks for Spring recess, so no votes on bills or committee hearings this week. The legislature will go back into session on April 16th. Here’s a brief recap of what happened this week.

The Bill of Rights for Individuals Experiencing Homelessness (HS2 for HB 55) was heard in the House Judiciary Committee, and the HOMES Campaign did a great job of organizing impacted people to come to Dover and testify in support. Unfortunately, time ran out in the hearing and most were not able to speak. The bill hearing will continue on April 17th. A lot of extremely offensive comments about people experiencing homelessness were made by committee members in last week’s hearing, so this bill could definitely use as much public support as possible if you are able to comment either in person or virtually on April 17th. 

The new version of last year’s HB 230 (protections for gender-affirming care, also known as the Trans Refuge Bill) was released from the House Health Committee last week, despite a deluge of anti-trans comments made by both legislators and members of the public. This year’s version (HB 346) simply extends the current legal protections afforded providers of contraceptive and abortion services to providers of gender-affirming health care. 

This version differs from the original bill by removing provisions that allows Family Court to determine custody disputes when a child is in the State to receive gender-affirming health care, and the provision of gender-affirming health-care is at issue in the custody dispute. The original bill also prohibited the state from enforcing an out-of-state court order that removes a child from a parent because the parent allows the child to receive gender-affirming health care. The protections for providers outlined in the new version of the bill are good on their merits, but without family court provisions, they fail to offer meaningful "refuge" to individuals.

HB 275 — Rep. Morrison’s bill updating the definition of "sexual orientation" throughout the Delaware Code to include asexuality and pansexuality — passed the House last week. Its passage is in spite of a host of ignorant comments made in the committee hearing and on the House floor, and several notable Democrats choosing to “take a walk” to avoid voting on this one.

Several bills from the recently announced housing package were released from the Senate Housing Committee. While these bills seem fine on their own, some advocates again worry that these incremental steps are a way to “check the box” on the housing crisis without meaningfully addressing the root of the problem.

We do also want to note that we had previously marked HB 256 as concerning because it could make it easier for polluting cars to get on the road, but after listening to the committee hearing, believe the benefits of not overburdening folks who can’t afford repairs and would therefore be rendered unable to drive outweigh the costs until a better solution to provide vouchers or assistance can be put in place. This bill was released from committee and would limit the repair waiver expenditure required by the Department of Natural Resources and Environmental Control to a uniform statewide amount of $450.

There’s still a few months left in this year’s legislative session, and we are looking forward to seeing meaningful action on worker protections, probation reform, and affordable housing.

Issue Campaign Next Steps

Just because some of our core priorities aren’t in committee this week doesn’t mean that there aren’t things you can do to help get them passed. Right now, we have one bill that is sitting in committee, and another core issue that hasn’t had a bill introduced yet to address it.

Here’s how you can get involved:

• Call For An Appropriations Hearing - Universal Free School Lunch (HB 125) passed the House Education Committee in early March. The next step is the House Appropriations Committee. However, the Chair decides when a committee gets scheduled and what goes on the agenda. We’re asking people to send personalized emails to make sure it gets a hearing.

• Attend “The Rent Is Too Damn High” Event - No matter what neighborhood we live in, or what we look like, we all deserve a quality home. But years of increasing rents have displaced our loved ones and disrupted our communities. We can pass rent regulation policies to keep people in their homes and restore our vibrant state. Attend this event to learn more and take action.

First Round of Endorsements

We are going to be announcing our first round of endorsements four weeks from today on Monday, April 29th, and we’ll be holding our coordinated campaign kickoff that Saturday on May 4th. We'll be knocking doors, making calls, and otherwise supporting a slate of candidates across the state who are fighting for the multi-racial working class. If you are interested in getting involved, you can sign up here.