State Senate GOP unveils agenda

Indiana's Senate Republican caucus unveiled its legislative agenda Tuesday, and it looks a lot like their House counterparts and new GOP Gov. Eric Holcomb. It focuses on passing a balanced budget; a long-term road funding plan, attacking the opioid epidemic and improving career and technical education.

But the Senate Republican pillars also include a constitutional amendment and a revamping of a controversial vaping law. "Our state is moving in the right direction but there is more work to be done," Fort Wayne Senate President Pro Tem David Long said. The Senate has taken on the task of fixing the vaping law in which, on a mostly party-line vote, legislators approved and then amended a bill that made one security company the only one in the state with authority to certify companies for production of the liquid used in e-cigarettes.

Sen. Randy Head, R-Logansport, said Senate Bill 1 - the top bill is symbolized by the first bill number - will scale back overall security standards and remove the requirement that e-liquid manufacturers contract with a private security firm to be licensed by the state. "We don't need that much regulation to ensure safey," he said.  The new legislation also would eliminate a provision that barred new manufacturers from entering the industry after July 2016.

Head said the state will still regulate the industry but acknowledged the security rules went too far and were a barrier to entrepreneurship. Long said the legislature wouldn't have approved the bill if it had known the extent of the restrictions. But those in the industry fought the regulations for several years and predicted the monopoly situation precisely. "We had a lot of things going on last year," Long said. "We have to fix it. That's why it's Senate Bill 1." The security company with the monopoly, Mulhaupt's in Lafayette, is expected to fight any changes to the law. “Mulhaupt’s takes the business of protecting Hoosiers very seriously.

Without proper regulation and security, the production of e-liquid can be easily tampered threatening the health and safety of consumers. Any changes to state vaping laws should not put consumer safety at risk," said Doug Mulhaupt, president of Mulhaupt’s, Inc.

The legislation will be routed through the Senate Judiciary Committee instead of Senate Public Policy. The chairman of Public Policy - Sen. Ron Alting, R-Lafayette - pushed the bill and the security company that ended up with the monopoly is in his district.

The caucus also will push a second approval of a balanced budget amendment to the Indiana Constitution. Language already passed in 2015. If it passes in the same form this year then Hoosiers would have the final say in a public vote in 2018. Lawmakers for years have said current law already requires a balanced budget.

But former Gov. Mike Pence pushed for a constitutional amendment last year making it crystal clear. The resolution defines expenditures and revenue and says Indiana's two-year budget cannot have a deficit. But two-thirds of the General Assembly can vote to suspend the rule and authorize the state to spend more than it takes in.

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