North Dakota Township Officers Association - 2011 Legislative Updates
|
2011 Legislative Updates |
|
Click on Bill Number to see current status |
|
2011 |
| List of bills affecting townships (Click on bill number to review): HB1012 - Transfer 25% of the motor vehicle excise tax to the highway users fund HB1043 - Transfer 100% of the motor vehicle excise tax to the highway users fund HB1070 - Remove township funding in the infrastructure fund of oil taxation statutes - Oppose HB1101 - Gives townships the authority to establish valuations of vacant lots available for sale in a township HB1225 - Allows counties to increase their emergency fund levy - Support HB1232 - Snow and mud on township roadways - Support HB1259 - Sets ceiling of $60/day for township officer salaries - Support HB1263 - Athletic nickname and logo of the university of North Dakota HB1284 - Property tax appeals under certain circumstances HB1293 - 3% increase on property tax Oppose HB1294 - Takes away the authority of a home rule county or city from having tax authority. HB1322 - Special assessments against ag property after city annexation - Support HB1336 - Kill the Advisory Commission on Intergovernmental Relations - Oppose HB1347 - Severance tax on gravel and road construction materials HB1360 - Increase collections to State Aid Distribution Fund - Support HB1431 and HB1447 Verification of voters challenged at the voting place and township level. HB1449 - Townships to submit their budget information to the State Budget Office - Oppose HB1458 - Western oil producing area infrastructure funds to the townships. HB1459 - Surface drainage of water SB2020 - A BILL for an Act to provide an appropriation for defraying the expenses of the state water commission..... SB2054 - Devils Lake water control construction - Support SB2147 - Additional mowing of weeds and grass along county and township roads - Support SB2161 - Township liability on unmaintained and unimproved section lines - Support SB2193 - City annexation, notification by cities to townships Support SB2203 - Annual road funding report to the State Tax Commissioner - Support SB2219 - Township officer contracting to do work in their township - Support SB2294 - New property tax assessment procedures SB2295 - Recreational immunity. SB2301 - Township dissolution procedures. SB2307 - Restricts the township funds in oil producing counties SB2325 - Furnish local road entities with an extra $73.6 million in funding for local roads. SB2340 - Snow removal funding for counties and townships - Support SB2350 - Disaster emergency relief funding for FEMA projects - Support SB2369 - Emergency snow removal grants, flood mitigation, and for state disasters..... ************ 2011 Legislature general information: Maps to find your legislative district:
|
|
Legislative Reports ************************************************* NDTOA LEGISLATIVE REPORT 4-28-11 The 62nd Legislative Session completed its work for 2011 at 5:39 pm on April 28. NDTOA LEGISLATIVE REPORT 4-22-11 Dear Township Officers, NDTOA LEGISLATIVE REPORT FRIDAY 4-8-11 Here is this week's report on the bills that we are tracking this session: HB1259 is the township officer compensation bill that we had introduced. This allows the electors at the township annual meetings to pay up to $60 per day to the Supervisors, Clerk and Treasurer for their work. It also included an annual maximum of $2000 pay level. The bill has passed the House of origin by a 92 to 1 margin and the Senate 47 to 0. The president of the Senate has signed it and sent it to the House for the Speaker to sign and then to the Governor for his signature. HB1232 is the bill that gives townships the authority to deal with obstructions and safety hazards on section line roads. This bill passed the house of origin by a 92-0 margin and was amended several times in the Senate. It did pass the Senate by a 29-18 margin. The Senate amended version passed the House by a 86 to 2 margin and it is now on its way to becoming law. HB1322 is our introduced bill to give relief to the agricultural land that is taken in a city annexation zone. This bill was amended repeatedly in the House and Senate. As it stands now the bill gives the court the authority to decide the benefits of the special assessments placed on agricultural property. It also holds up the collection of special tax assessments until the court makes its decision on their validity. This bill passed the House by a 74 to 19 margin and the Senate by a 33 to 14 margin. It also sets up a interim committee study to look further into the problem. SB2147 is a bill that will allow county commissioners to require land owners to make an early cutting of weeds on roadsides, if necessary, to be completed by August 1st. This bill was passed by the Senate with a margin of 44 to 3 and the House by a margin of 70 to 24. SB2161 is our bill that clears up unimproved section line liability. It has had much discussion on it even though the Senate passed it by a 43-4 margin and was amended and passed in the House and is now in conference committee for the final decision. SB2219 is our bill that clears up the procedure of an officer contracting with his township to provide needed services. This bill passed the Senate by a 44 to 3 margin and the House of Representatives by a 92 to 0 margin and is on its way to becoming law. SB2294 is a bill on improvement of tax assessment procedures as recommended by the tax commissioner. This bill passed the Senate by a 46 to 0 margin and was amended and passed in the House of Representatives by a 89 to 4 margin. The Senate then concurred with the House amended version by a 47 to 0 margin. It has been signed by the Speaker of the House and sent back to the Senate for the President of the Senate’s signature. SB2295 is a recreational immunity bill that seeks to clear up the liability of property owners on land they own. This bill has passed the Senate by a 35 to 10 margin and the House amended version was passed by a 92 to 2 margin. The Senate refused to concur with the changes and the bill is now in conference committee for their decision. SB2369 is the snow removal and disaster flooding funding bill which has passed the Senate 43 to 0 and the House by a 94 to 0 margin. This bill has changed and remains to change. The final version may not exist yet. HB1012 contains the majority of township funding for the next 2 years. This bill is not finished yet. It has passed the House by a 89 to 4 margin and has a 12 to 1 do pass recommendation from the House Committee so it looks good so far. NDTOA LEGISLATIVE REPORT 3-18-11 This week in the 2011 Legislative Session we worked on several bills which I will try to explain to you.
This bill has on emergency clause in it which means it will take affect when the Governor signs it. Today it passed its House of origin by 43-0. NDTOA LEGISLATIVE REPORT 3-11-11 This week in Bismarck we ended the week in a snow storm !!!!! High winds and heavy wet snow was no match for the hot air and wind in the Senate chambers as they debated the Sioux nick name bill. HB1263 held the Senators in session for an extra hour on Friday afternoon. The Senate voted to pass HB1263 by a 28 to 15 margin. The Governor is rumored to be leaning towards signing the bill soon. NDTOA LEGISLATIVE REPORT 3-4-11 Township officers, this week was a short week with the Legislature still in recess until Wednesday morning. The committees were busy hearing bills but not voting or making recommendations on them. On Friday both the Senate and House of Representatives held short floor actions and handled some bills. LEGISLATIVE REPORT 2-24-11 It is Crossover time and all 841 Bills and 76 Resolutions must be reported out of committee in their house of origin. The legislature is in recess from February 28 - March 1 which means they all go home and work on their income taxes for a few days……. LEGISLATIVE REPORT 2-18-11 This week in the 62nd Legislative Session the following occurred: All township Officers interested in Legislative activities. LEGISLATIVE REPORT 2-11-11 As the mid-point of the 2011 Legislative Session nears, some exciting things are happening at the Capitol to our Bills. We attended the House Political Subs Committee yesterday and were able to sit in on the committee discussion of our HB1259 which is the pay cap raise from $20 per day to $60 per day with the increase of maximum annual cap of $1000 raised to $2000. Larry and Ken both testified in favor during the hearing of the bill. The only problem with the bill was found by Representative Klemin. His concern was whether the expenses might be considered income instead of reimbursement of expenses. He offered a friendly amendment to protect township officers from the IRS questioning their federal responsibility. HB1259 was given a unanimous Do Pass in committee by a 14-0 margin on Thursday 2-10-11. This last week SB2161, which is our bill on liability on unimproved section lines, was considered in the Senate. After much floor debate and a vigorous defense from Senator Olafson, assisted by Senator John Andrist, the Senate voted a huge majority for our SB2161. It passed by a 43 to 4 margin. The House of Representatives voted a Do Not Pass on HB1449 by a margin of 37 to 56 on Friday afternoon (2-11-11) This is the bill that would have forced all townships to file another one of those reports with the state database. In other good news from Bismarck, HB1232 our bill on obstructions and traffic safety hazards on section line roads that was introduced and defended by Representative David Monson passed the House Agriculture Committee by a 13-0 margin. On Friday 2-11-11, we met with our transportation partners, the ND Assn of Counties, the League of Cities and the ND Department of Transportation, to discuss current snow depths and associated emergency funding for all the transportation providing entities in North Dakota. In order to present a successful case, we must have statistics from our membership. Please send us credible information to use to enable us to get emergency snow funding passed in Bismarck. We need you to let us know how many dollars your township expended on snow handling so far this winter!! How much do you think you may need to pay for snow handling from now until spring? We need to know how much more this year’s expenses are over your normal snow handling expenses. This is important….please help!! We need this information to seek emergency funding for you!! If you have pictures of snow depths and quantity, send them to the legislative office at 1115 N 1st St. Apt #208 Bismarck, ND 58501. Ken and Larry LEGISLATIVE REPORT 2-4-11 One of our most important bills in the 2011 Legislative Session is HB1232. This bill would include snow and mud to the list of obstructions in a township right of way. Sounds pretty simple !!! Not so !!!! Much of the township law was put in ND Century Code many years ago and was just added to every time we thought it was needed. There comes a time when extensive rewriting becomes necessary. Representative David C. Monson from Osnabrock in District 10 agreed to be the Prime Sponsor of a bill to make our road rights of way safe. President Syverson, Ken Yantes and Representative Monson visited the Legislative Council office of John Walstad, head code reviser. John puts bill change ideas that legislators have in NDCC form. We explained what we wanted to do and he said he would try to do it. After a few days the first draft was ready for viewing. Representative Monson found other changes needed to happen to update more of our out of date laws that had to do with obstructions and penalties. The bill was carried back to Legislative Council by Representative Monson for a rewrite . The second version of the bill looked right and the bill was introduced and we now had a bill number to report to the membership..HB1232!! The bill was assigned to the House Agriculture Committee to handle and a hearing date was scheduled. The 15 member Committee didn't like the bill and amendments were added. During committee discussions more amendments were added. Eventually, the committee voted a do not pass recommendation by a margin of 10 to 1. Our bill sponsor, Representative Monson, put in a plea to the committee to reopen discussions on the bill. He won his case and the committee chairman gave him a week to rewrite the bill. With counsel from Senator Olafson from Edinburg in District 10, Representative Monson reworded the bill. It went back to Legislative Council and was rewritten. Representative Monson found another short coming and the bill was again rewritten by Legislative Council. This copy was submitted to the Agriculture Committee and received unanimous support for a Do Pass recommendation on February 3. I wish to thank Representative Monson for his determination and never quit attitude. HB1232 gives townships the right to keep their road right of ways and traveling surfaces safe from hazardous conditions. The bills passage could save precious lives in the future. My hat is off to Representative David C. Monson. In other bill action in Bismarck: SB2295 is a bill that supports our policy on recreational immunity. Both Ken and Larry attended this hearing to defend our policy. SB2301 is a bill that dealt with township dissolution procedures. Larry attended this hearing in the Senate Finance and Taxation Committee. SB2350 is a bill that sets up $22 million for emergency snow removal funding for governmental subdivisions. NDTOA President Larry Syverson supported passage of this bill. HB1284 is a bill that allowed property tax appeals under certain circumstances. Ken sat in on this one and monitored the bill action. HB1293 is a bill that would set a maximum of 3% increase by any political subdivision on property tax irregardless of any conditions. Ken opposed passage of this one due to the inability for the citizens who needed extra funding for any reason to due so. SB2307 is a bill that restricts the township funds that come through the County Infrastructure Fund in oil producing counties and gives them to the schools instead. NDTOA opposed this bill. HB1294 is a bill that takes away the authority of a home rule county or city from having tax authority. Ken monitored this one. HB1458 is a 10 page bill that does a lot of things in the western oil producing area. One of them was to devote a larger amount of infrastructure funds to the townships. Ken supported the bill. SB2340 is a bill that devotes $19 million to emergency road funding/snow removal -- $4 million to townships alone with no matching funding required. President Syverson spoke in favor of passage on this one. HB1259 is the bill that would raise the cap on township officers daily compensation from $20 per day up to $60 per day, if passed at an annual meeting of the township. It also increases the annual cap from $1000 up to $2000, if approved by the voters. Both Ken and Larry testified for passage on this bill. HB1431 and HB1447 both were opposed by Ken and Larry as they drastically changed our NDCC on verification of voters challenged at the voting place and township level. SB2325 is a bill that has been introduced by Senator Terry Wanzek that would furnish local road entities with an extra $73.6 million in funding for those local roads. Both Larry and Ken attended and Larry testified in favor of the bill. HB1336 is a bill that would kill the Advisory Commission on Intergovernmental Relations. Ken testified in opposition to the bill and sought continuance of this discussion forum.. SB2161 is a bill that spells out the liability of a township on unimproved section lines. Senator Olafson, Senator Judy Lee and Senator John Andrist (all past NDTOA Legislators of the Year) strongly supported this bill which was repeatedly rewritten by Senator Olafson. He coordinated the effort and has our heartfelt thanks for a job well done. Ken and Larry entered into the committee discussion at different times but it was Senator Olafson’s gift of and master of the English language that accomplished the needed changes in NDCC. Next weeks coming attractions in the Legislature. SB2294 is a bill on new property tax assessment procedures which we heard about at our annual meeting this year. The meeting will be heard on Wed. Feb. 9th at 9:00 AM in the Lewis and Clark, Senate Finance and Taxation room. HB1322 is the bill that supports the policy developed at this years annual meeting on agricultural land not being subject to special tax assessments until the land is put to another use. It will be heard in the House Finance and Taxation, Fort Totten room on Wed. Feb. 9th at 9:30 AM. HB1459 is a bill that deals with surface drainage of water. It will be heard in the House Agriculture Committee (the Peace Garden Room) Thursday at 9:00 AM. We continue to monitor and support those bills we think will be good for the township officers and we oppose those that we feel may be detrimental to our membership. Your lobbying team, President Larry Syverson and Executive Secretary Ken Yantes LEGISLATIVE REPORT 1-28-2011 By Ken Yantes This week your lobbyists worked on the following bills: HB1347 is a bill that would have put a severance tax of 10 cents per ton on gravel and all road construction and maintenance materials. This bill would help townships that had gravel pits in them to get some tax money to pay for road damage caused by the extraction of gravel in their townships. It would have cost the townships that need to buy gravel from out of the township 10 cents per ton. Larry brought out the costs to those who would need to buy and spoke in the neutral area of the bill hearing as we have no grassroots developed policy on this issue. HB1232 is a bill introduced and defended by Rep. Dave Monson from Osnabrock. This bill was in support of our policy developed two years ago that asked for mud and snow placed on highway surfaces to be considered obstructions. Both Ken and Larry testified in support of this bill. The legislators in House Transportation were less that receptive to the section of law we were trying to improve. The committee voted 10-1 DO NOT PASS. Larry, Ken and Rep. Monson sought a continuation of the committee action until Thursday 2-3-11 which would give us time to seek an improved amendment to the bill. Senator Curtis Olafson drew up some improved wording and together we will seek to gain support for our policy. HB1360 is a bill that we have policy on. It would increase the 4/10 of the one cent sales and excise tax that goes to the State Aid Distribution Fund to 6/10. Ken testified in favor of the bill as well as the counties and the cities. This could bring in $69 Million to the fund if passed. HB1449 is a bill introduced by Senator Miller and Reps. Thoreson, Bellew, Heller, Kasper and Weiler which calls for the governing body of each political sub-division to submit their budget information to the State Director of the Budget for inclusion in their data base web site. We, all townships, would have to send in another report to state government. Larry testified long and hard in opposition to this bill. We sent out notification to many NDTOA members of the hearing time and date. Barb Knutson, Roger Olafson, Ken and Larry were at the hearing and lobbied in opposition…It may not have been enough…. SB2161 is a bill introduced by the NDTOA 2010 Legislator of the Year Senator Gary Lee. This bill reduces township liability on unimproved section lines; it has been a huge consumer of our time. We worked with the Senate Political Subdivisions Committee on many different versions of the bill proposal amendments to 24-06-31 of the NDCC. At this time a sub-committee made up of Sen. Olafson, Steve Spilde, CEO of the NDIRF, the ND Assn of Counties Attorney, Aaron Birst, and the two NDTOA lobbyists, Larry and Ken, is to combine the thoughts of all the different suggested amendments and submit a unified bill proposal to the Senate Political Subdivisions Committee next week. These proposed changes should include: 1. The person who creates a hazard in the unimproved section line should be responsible for liability created by them. 2. The person who alters a congressional section line must adequately sign the line to warn of any danger caused by the alteration. The restoration of the alteration must be paid for by the person that did the alteration. 3. The township is responsible to sign and warn the public if they are made aware of the hazard by a written notice of a man made condition on the unmaintained section line. Townships are not to be liable for natural occurrences on section lines. SB2203 is a bill that was introduced by Senators Uglem, Judy Lee and Nodland and Reps. Kaldor, Paur and Vigesaa. This bill supports our policy that calls for an improvement in the transportation reporting form that we all know about. It says that townships may use the annual township financial report that we provide to the county as our form to the Tax Commissioner. No special hard to understand state form is necessary if the bill passes. Urge passage of SB2203 to your legislators!! SB2219 is a bill that was introduced by Senators Olafson, Andrist and Dotzenrod and signing on were Reps. Brandenburg, Monson and Mueller. Vice President Roger Olafson successfully testified on this bill. He received an unanimous 6-0 DO PASS committee vote. Hats off to Roger!! This bill clarifies that a township officer may contract to do work in their township under special conditions. These conditions are: 1. The officer must be qualified to undertake the contract. 2. The board gives due consideration to all reasonable offers to provide the same service to the township. 3. The officer doing the contract must not vote on the contract and all the others must vote in favor of the contract. 4. If the officer having an interest in the contract is not a supervisor, all members of the Board of Supervisors must vote unanimously in favor of the contract. Some of the upcoming bills this next week that affect townships are: SB2350 is a bill to establish $22 Million for disaster emergency relief funding for 50% of the 15% matching funds needed for FEMA projects. SB2340 is a bill that sets aside $19 Million for snow removal funding for counties and townships. $15 Million to counties and cities ------ and $4 Million to townships distributed on the same basis as our highway users dollars are…No matching tax dollars would be required. The hearing on SB2340 is to be held on 2-2-11 in the Harvest Room at 9 am. This needs township support……it could mean as much as $70 per mile to your township if passed. HB1259 is a bill that entitles township officers to receive up to $60 per day for each day necessarily devoted to work as an officer. It also raises the $1000 allowable for additional expenses to $2000 per calendar year. These changes all must be passed by the residents of the township at their annual meeting. This bill will be heard on 2-3-11 at 3:30 pm in the Prairie Room. This bill needs the support of all township officers…..call or e-mail your legislators and urge a do pass on HB1259. NDTOA Legislative Team, Ken and Larry LEGISLATIVE REPORT 1-21-2011 This has been another busy week at the capitol. On Monday we had a meeting with our transportation partners to discuss strategy for the hearing on HB1043. This bill would transfer 100% of the motor vehicle excise tax to the highway users fund; the net result of this bill if passed as written would be an increase from funding in the last biennium of $10.3M to $16.2M. The other funding bill (HB1012) would transfer 25%, the net funding would total $12.4M. It is likely the result will end up somewhere in between these numbers. On Tuesday the 18th Ken attended and testified at the HB1043 hearing in the House Appropriations Committee, he emphasized the need for funding in the rest of the state in addition to the 17 oil producing counties. Larry started the day in the House Finance and Taxation hearing of B1225 testifying in support of the bill to allow counties to increase their emergency fund levy to rebuild their emergency fund if depleted. Larry then joined the House Appropriations hearing in progress and was the last testifier, he noted that a committee member had asked an earlier speaker about the impact of funding at a lower level and he added that one impact that had scarcely been mentioned was public safety. He pointed out that as roads deteriorate they become less safe. Those semis laden with the larger ag product are meeting school busses on roads with soft shoulders. The rural areas are not just property in the country or acres of production, they are our homes and some of us are dying because of poor roads. Wednesday was spent researching and writing testimony for the three bills to be heard on Thursday morning. We met with Steve Spilde to discuss the developments on the unimproved section line bill and the recreational immunity bill. Thursday morning Larry attended two hearings in the Senate Agriculture Committee, testifying in support of SB2147 which would give the county commissions the option to require an additional mowing earlier in the summer as a local decision (the date will likely be "by August 1"). Then testified to support SB2193 which would require a city imposing annexation to send notice to affected land owners and affected political subdivisions by certified mail, he asked that the bill be amended to add political subdivisions with taxing authority to the list that needed to be notified so the townships would get notice that they are about to lose tax base. This request was well received by the bill author. During this time Ken was in the hearing for SB2161 in the Senate Political Subdivisions Committee testifying in support of this bill to limit township liability on unimproved section lines. This will probably require some amending to get out of the committee with a positive recommendation. Friday morning Ken and Larry appeared in the House Agriculture Committee to testify in support of HB1232 which was introduced on our behalf by Rep. David Monson. This bill adds accumulated snow and mud carried onto roadways as obstructions and gives township officers the ability to require the removal of these obstacles. Ken covered mostly the mud deposited on roads in his testimony and shared a letter from Chuck Thacker describing this problem in Pembina County with the committee. Larry focused on the snow pile issue and passed around 8" X 11" enlarged pictures that were emailed to us by Al Bekkerus (Thanks Al). Both Ken and Larry had to respond to questions from the committee about various implications about the application of this bill and the previous law. The bill will likely face some friendly amendments to clarify some items further. After the morning hearings Senator Joe Miller (district 16, Park River) was questioned about his sponsorship of HB1449. To us this bill seems to require another @#&*&@& report to another #@&#$^$% state agency. To quote "The governing body of each political subdivision shall submit budget information to the director of the budget for inclusion in the budget database website." He was informed that township officers are still very unhappy about the transportation funding report, Some of you may have gotten my earlier alert about this bill HB1449 but again, it is being heard in the House Political Subdivisions Committee, on Thursday January 27 at 10 AM in the Prairie Room. We need to get the pressure cranked up to stop this one! Thanks for the support, Ken and Larry your lobbying team. LEGISLATIVE REPORT 1-14-2011 This is Friday of the 2nd week of the 2011 Legislative Session. We have some bill numbers on our bills for you to follow. HB1232 is a bill we asked Representative Monson to be the prime sponsor for us relating to snow and mud on the township highways that could cause traffic safety hazards. Representatives Headland and Kilichowski and Senators Miller, Olafson and Dotzenrod all co-sponsored this bill. HB1259 was introduced by Representative Glen Froseth and co-signed by Representatives Bill Kretschmar and Andy Maragos and Senators Judy Lee, Curtis Olafson and Jim Dotzenrod. This bill sets the ceiling of township officer pay at $60 per day instead of $20 per day. Any pay increase must be passed at the annual meeting by the residents of the township. The maximum annual amount of $1000 could be increased to $2,000. HB1322 was introduced by Representative Wrangham and co-signed by Representatives Shirley Meyer and Chuck Damshen and Senators Miller, Oehlke and Murphy. This bill dealt with the imposition of special assessments against agricultural property after being annexed by a city. SB2054 is a bill that asks for $5 million to construct a structure on the East end of Devils Lake to prevent an uncontrolled release of water. This bill was heard Thursday and many township officers from Ramsey County were present and testified in favor of the bill. Hats off to them. SB2161 was introduced by Senator Gary Lee, co-signed by Senators Hogue and Nething and Representatives Weisz, Hofstad and Dennis Johnson. This bill would reduce a township’s liability on unmaintained and unimproved section lines. SB2203 was introduced by Senator Uglem, co-signed by Senators Judy Lee and Nodland and co-signed by Representatives Kaldor, Paur and Vigesaa. This bill dealt with an appropriate annual financial report to report road funding to the State Tax Commissioner. This bill would allow a township to use the annual township financial form that was provided to the county auditor as the funding report to the commissioner. There are legislative changes left to report on but no numbers have been assigned to them yet. One of the most noteworthy is a bill introduced by Senator Curtis Olafson on improving the wording in the Century Code on township officers contracting with their own township to provide service in their township. We remain vigilant on those bills that would be harmful to townships and continue to support those that would be beneficial to townships. This last week HB1070 passed out of committee on a 12-0 margin. The bill would have done away with township funding in the infrastructure fund of oil taxation statutes in the ND Century Code. and returned it to school funding. The bill went to the House floor and was Killed by a 22 for and 72 against margin. The reasoning was that if the roads were not fit for travel the best school buildings would not be needed as the students couldn’t get to school on the existing roads. Your Lobbying Team, President Larry Syverson, Executive Secretary Ken Yantes 1-7-2011 NDTOA LEGISLATIVE REPORT This is the first Friday of the 2011 Legislative Session. Larry and Ken have been very busy in Bismarck on behalf of our just under 6,000 members. We moved into our apartment/office located at 1115 N 1st St. Apt. # 208. The phone # there is 751-1998. Larry’s cell # is 430-1767 and Ken’s is 230-4118. We have been very busy meeting the new Legislators and greeting those that we have known for a long time. At this time we have secured prime sponsors for most of our grass roots developed policy stands from the last 2 years annual meetings. Joint efforts with the NDIRF have resulted in bill drafts on reducing the township liability on unimproved section lines and recreational immunity liability as we discussed at our last annual meeting. Representative Dwight Wrentham has developed a legislative effort that is expected to allow an improvement in agricultural land retaining its agricultural designation after being annexed by a city until the land is put to a different use. Representative Monson, Ken and Larry have visited the legislative council office of John Walstad with concerns about snow piles and mud left on the township right of ways. It seems that extensive rewording of the century code pertaining to obstructions on section lines that cause hazards to the traveling public is in order. Representative Monson will be the prime sponsor on this bill. A bill sponsored by Senator Uglem that reduces the effort to report road funding to the Tax Department has been drawn up for submission to legislative Council. Representative Glen Froseth has sponsored a bill to raise the cap on township officers compensation from $20 per day to $60 per day. This coming Thursday, the 13th of January, a bill will be heard in the big meeting room of the Capitol in support of our policy on the Devils Lake Area flooding problem. We remain in communication with other Legislators to have bills drawn up to implement our other policies as passed in the last couple of years. The Legislative NDTOA Lobbyists President Larry Syverson and Executive Secretary Ken Yantes |