Sen. Hughes taking on new statehouse role

LINCOLN, Neb. -- Taking on new leadership responsibilities in the Nebraska Legislature has been challenging for Sen. Dan Hughes, but he told a group of constituents on a Zoom meeting Thursday morning that he is up to the challenge. The McCook Chamber of Commerce facilitated the meeting, which takes place at 8 a.m. every Thursday morning during the session.

Hughes was elected by his colleagues to be Chair of the Executive Board of the Legislature, and he told the gathering that the new role is a great honor, but also very time consuming. As a result, he said he has not had time to read through proposed bills as thoroughly as he normally does. He also pointed out that bills go through the hearing process in committee, where they can be changed, amended or killed. “Until they get through the committee process and make it to the floor, I don’t have time to worry too much about them,” Hughes said, adding jokingly, “Unless they’re my bills. Then they’re really important.”

As of Thursday morning, he had introduced four bills: LB190 which changes the provisions relating to the use of the Water Sustainability Fund; LB191 which redefines electors for the Irrigation District Act; LB215 which changes the 911 service surcharge provisions; and LB336 which creates a non-resident state park permit entry fee for use at Lake McConaughy State Recreation Area. LB190 and LB191 have been referred to the Natural Resources Committee (a committee that Hughes chaired last year); and LB 215 has been referred to the Transportation and Telecommunications Committee.

Hughes also proposed a rule change to exclude the press from committee executive sessions. Hughes said that there was a “gentleman’s agreement” that the press could be in the room during committee executive sessions when they were deliberating bills, before the bills were moved on to floor debate. The agreement was that senators would not be quoted unless they gave permission after the executive session. “That’s no longer the case. So the press basically has given themselves autonomy to print whatever conversations we have in executive session. And that certainly has a very chilling effect on the discussions that we have in committee executive sessions when we’re trying to craft the best legislation.”

According to Hughes, no other governing body in the state of Nebraska or state legislature in the nation allows the press into their executive sessions. “We’re not concealing anything from the public. Any votes are recorded and then made public. It’s just a very small amount of the discussion in getting the bill between the committee and floor debate that we’re trying to have the ability to have very frank discussions. The committee hearings are open to the press and once the bill hits the floor, there are three rounds of debate. So there’s full disclosure on any of that.”

Hughes said that committee executive sessions are normally called when the assigned committee wants to discuss a bill that has been brought to them and propose changes to it before sending it to the full legislature to debate. “When you’re debating, sometimes you play the devil’s advocate and being quoted out of context is a real concern. And it doesn’t allow us to use our best efforts to craft good legislation, in my opinion,” Hughes said. “Crafting legislation is like making sausage, it’s not a very pretty process at times. And we have to be able to have all the tools we need in order to do the best job possible.”

Not surprisingly, the media strongly opposed the rule change, and voiced their concerns through articles and editorials. Hughes said that he had had a “rough week of it. I felt pretty abused by the press.”

Hughes also discussed proposed legislation concerning Nebraska’s electoral college, specifically LB76, which would change Nebraska to a “winner-take-all” system rather than choosing electors by congressional district. Hughes said the proposal has been before the state legislature before, and he did support it.

He also said he supported voter identification, saying that we need to ensure the integrity of our voting system. “That’s the core aspect of our democracy. Our form of government is trust that our voices are heard at the ballot box, that it is a fair process, and it has not been corrupted. Unfortunately, the distrust in our system is very unfortunate, and we’ve got to do something in order to restore that faith in our system and that portion of our government.” He said he supports having the state pick up the fee for a voter identification for low-income individuals.

McCook Economic Development Director Andy Long asked the Senator about expanding the Work Ethic Camp in McCook. Long said that corrections officials had communicated that one requirement for expansion would be to allow low-level sexual offenders to be housed at the facility. Long said that a recent community survey contained a question to gauge the interest in the community for allowing that population to be housed at the Work Ethic Camp. Hughes encouraged Long to reach out to the governor’s office or the department of corrections and communicate any willingness from the community, stating that the discussion of building another large prison is going to be coming up, but even providing a smaller numbers of beds will be important.

Long also encouraged Hughes to advocate for the Nebraska Game and Parks Commission, saying that the pandemic provided a kind of boom for area lake tourism last spring and summer.

Hughes said he was ambivalent to supporting year-round daylight savings time, LB283. “Quite frankly, I don’t care. I’m a farmer. I work by the sun.

This man-made invention of time doesn’t mean a whole lot to me. I’m a sunup to sundown type of person regardless.” He went on to say that he was open to input from constituents, further explaining that living in the mountain time zone when most of his constituents are in the central time zone presents more of a challenge to him.

McCook City Councilman Gene Weedin encouraged Senator Hughes to support LB83, which changes some open meeting rules. The bill allows for virtual conferencing of specified governmental meetings, including city council meetings. It also requires that beginning July 31, 2022, the governing bodies must make their agendas available on their web sites 24 hours before the meeting and minutes available for at least six months following the meeting.