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GOVERNMENT RELATIONS
2 0 1 6 : A Y e ar t o F o r g e t
Almost everyone in Alabama is glad to have
2016 behind us.
We saw all three branches of our government
disgraced; House Speaker Mike Hubbard
was convicted of 12 felony ethics charges
and removed from office, Supreme Court
Chief Justice Roy Moore was suspended for
the remainder of his term for telling Probate
Judges to ignore a U.S. Supreme Court rul-
ing, and the House started impeachment
proceedings against Governor Robert Bent-
ley’s activities related to an extramarital affair
and his firing of the law enforcement agency.
Other than all that, we only had to worry
about budgets. The Legislature and the
Governor fought all spring and summer over
Medicaid funding, finally covering most
of the projected shortfall with yet another
Band-Aid solution.
A lottery proposal made it through both
houses, but objections came from all direc-
tions and doomed the measure. We will
see it again, but with Indian casinos, local
gambling interests, and those who oppose
gambling for moral reasons, it’s very unlikely
a bill will pass.
The Medicaid funding issue will likely come
up again this year, but the main crisis for
2017 will be prisons. The state faces a possi-
ble federal takeover of the system; violence is
getting worse and worse; riots at one prison
resulted in the stabbing of two corrections
officers, and two inmates were killed in 2016.
The Governor and his staff proposed an $800
million prison construction package, intend-
ing to replace all but two existing prisons
with four super prisons – three male pris-
ons that would hold up to 4,000 inmates
each, and one female prison to hold up
to 1,200 inmates.
A scaled-back
version made
it out of the Sen-
ate the last night of session, but failed to be
passed by the House.
Governor Bentley has declared prison reform
his No. 1 priority for 2017, and he plans to
bring that same proposal back. He has said
he may call a special session within the regu-
lar session to isolate the issue.
This whole thing is fraught with politics.
Those legislators with prisons in their dis-
tricts do not want to lose those jobs. But the
biggest concern in Montgomery is the provi-
sion to exempt the construction and bond
issuance from the state’s bid laws.
Corrections experts also had questions about
the size of the facilities. And many legislators
were skeptical of the Administration’s claims
that the bonds would be repaid from savings
in staffing and other areas.
For our industry, the AGA’s top priority will
be passage of legislation that will eliminate
our members’ issues with on-premise tasting
requirements and allow for tastings in off-
premise locations as well as on-premise loca-
tions. Senate Rules Chairman Jabo Waggoner
will be introducing the bill shortly.
We will continue to advocate for funding
of the Healthy Food Financing Initiative;
work to be sure we are protecting the SNAP
program (HB 2 already introduced – prohib-
its waivers to work requirement); continue
to be involved in the fight for privatization of
the Alabama Alcohol Control Board and get
the state out of the alcohol business; and, if
Almost everyone in Alabama is glad to have 2016
behind us.
PATRICK MCWHORTER
LEGISLATIVE REPRESENTATIVE
THE MCWHORTER GROUP
| ALABAMA GROCER
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