Gov. Mike Beebe on Thursday signed into law the handful of bills approved during this week's special legislative session, aimed at boosting funding for state school employee health insurance and reducing jail crowding.
The Legislature also passed, and Beebe signed, a measure that puts a moratorium on the Arkansas Lottery Commission offering electronic monitor games until mid-March.
Beebe spokesman Stacey Hall said the signing ceremony was closed to news media, and news reporters and photographers were not allowed to watch it.
Afterward, Beebe said the media shouldn't have been excluded because the ceremony "was not a closed deal."
Beebe said Sen. Jimmy Hickey, R-Texarkana, and Rep. Harold Copenhaver, D-Jonesboro, and a few of their relatives attended.
Hickey had sponsored the lottery legislation. Copenhaver guided the health insurance bills through the House.
Future legislation on insurance funding and jail crowding may be necessary.
The governor told reporters earlier in the week that it was "anybody's guess" whether the changes to the school employees' insurance plan would be enough to stabilize the program.
"It's probably going to be an ongoing issue that they are going to have to look at going forward as you would with any system that potentially is dynamic," Beebe said.
The governor made similar comments about the prison-crowding measure.
"It is not the total fix because they need more than 600 beds, or the prison population needs to stabilize at least the influx based upon changes in the parole laws," he said.
Two of the bills signed by the governor will save the school employees' insurance plans about $9 million a year, according to supporters of the measures.
Acts 2 and 3 of the Second Extraordinary Session of 2014 make about 4,000 part-time public school employees ineligible for coverage and keeps employees' spouses off the plans if they can get coverage through their own employers. The measures also limit coverage for weight-loss surgeries and eventually will transfer about $4.6 million a year in school districts' payroll tax savings to the public school employees health insurance plan. Copenhaver sponsored the bills in the House, while Sen. Jim Hendren, R-Gravette, sponsored the Senate versions.
The governor also signed Act 1 of the session, sponsored by the Joint Budget Committee, which will send $6.3 million a year to the state Department of Correction to open up 604 beds in state prisons and jails.
The money will open 250 beds in the Pulaski County work center, 124 beds at the Tucker Parole Boot Camp, 100 beds at the McPherson lockup outside Newport, 72 beds at the Ouachita River facility outside of Newport and 58 beds at the Northwest Arkansas Work Release Center in Springdale, the department has said.
The last of the measures signed by Beebe, Act 4 prevents the lottery commission from offering electronic monitor games until March 13. The lottery had planned to begin offering the games Sept. 29. Rep. Charlie Collins, R-Fayetteville, sponsored the House's legislation while Hickey sponsored the identical Senate version.
The bill was largely seen as a compromise between opponents of the games, who wanted an outright ban, and those who thought the games should be considered during next year's regular legislative session, allowing more time for debate.
Asked whether the electronic monitor games would one day be offered, Beebe replied, "Monitor games are, if I can judge the tea leaves, in trouble based on what I know from the way people wanted to vote."
Information for this article was contributed by Michael R. Wickline of the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette.
Metro on 07/04/2014