Based on Senate Bill 92: Department of Children and Families & House Bill 93: Juvenile Diversion Program Expunction

LEGISLATIVE POLICY DEVELOPMENT (and drift) PAPER

Policy Development and Administration

INTRODUCTION: A key purpose of this class is to make you more aware and knowledgeable about how public policy is developed and goes through the policy process over time. This assignment allows you to track two pieces of legislation based on your policy and agency interest, and develop information on how it fares in the 2021 FL legislature. You will get a taste of how the legislative policy process works, and how you can follow bills you are interested in.

Your paper will cover five topics: (1) what is the purpose of the legislation and why is it being considered now. (2) What are the market and government failures that the legislation is trying to “fix” or improve? (3) Who the primary stakeholders and interests are for this legislation, and why are they interested in the bills? (4) How does the legislation alter or create new policy compared to current law? (5) Was the legislation passed or not, and what was the committee and floor vote? Why do you think it was passed or not passed? And Reflections on what you learned about the policy process through following these bills

The FL Legislature meets beginning March 2-April 30th for its normal legislative session of 60 days.

Overview and Purpose: This paper is designed to give you an opportunity to integrate many of the themes we are discussing in class in an applied project based on a policy that you are interested in knowing more about. I have laid out the instructions for the paper in steps.

Step One: Go to one of the FL legislative Bill Tracking sites online (see below), and select two bills (or pieces of legislation) that you want to track through the 60 day session. The bills can be from either the FL House or the FL Senate. They may not be filed yet in both houses. Once you have selected the bills, send me an email that: (1) gives the name of the bills; (2) the purpose of the bills and program it relates to, and (3) why you are interested in this topic.

The FL Senate has a bill tracking site: https://www.flsenate.gov/Login?referrer=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.flsenate.gov%2FTracker

The FL House has a bill tracking site:

https://www.myfloridahouse.gov/Sections/MyHouse/login.aspx

LesgisScan is a nonpartisan data service that impartially provides real time tracking of bills in the state and federal legislature. It can be accessed at: https://legiscan.com/FL/legislation/2021

Step Two: Find out which legislative committee will be hearing the bills (or has jurisdiction over the bills). Through the FL Legislative website, find out when the committee will be meeting to discuss at least one of the bills, and attend the committee hearing. Observe who speaks at the hearing, and what groups are represented (and probably speaking). See how the committee hearing legislative process works.

Step Three: Find out what the background of this legislation is. Why is it being introduced? How is the bill and the problem it is solving being framed? Who is sponsoring it, and why? Who are the stakeholders in favor or opposed to the legislation? How politically controversial is the bill? You can also contact a committee staff to interview them about the legislation if you feel that would be helpful. And each piece of legislation has a Background section on the first page that explains its purpose.

Step Four: Write a paper that covers key points of what is to follow in the Introduction. This paper should use the following headings:

(1) Introduction and Purpose;

(2) Background on the problem the bill addresses and how it is handled now (or what the current law is);

(3) discuss any market or government failures the bill tries to fix, or is addressing;

(4) Stakeholders and their support or opposition to the bill, and discuss why they are taking their positions;

(5) A description of the legislative committee hearing you attended and what occurred;

(6) Outcomes: What happened to the bills in the time you were tracking them? Were they amended? Were they passed out of committee? Were they passed on the floor of the House or Senate? Did a similar bill pass in the other chamber? Write a conclusion about why the actions taken probably occurred;

(7) Conclusion and Self Reflection on what you have learned about the policy process:

A. Write a conclusion that first summarizes what happened to the two bills.

B. Then second, provide your assessment (and personal reflections) of the policy process you observed and interacted with. What did you learn? What did you conclude about the overall policy process or bill hearing process? If you were a staff person or manager managing this program impacted by the legislative bill, would you be pleased with what happened or not? Why?

Due Date: You should email the title of the two FL Legislation bills you have chosen to track to Prof. Berry by February 24th . The final paper is due by April 17th and should be uploaded as a Word file onto Canvas under the labeled assignments for the legislative policy development paper.