Welcome to the first weekly report designed to inform CAC board and staff, as well as CAC members and the general public regarding our activities and work during the 2023 Indiana General Assembly. 

The General Assembly’s first day of session was January 9th. While the Governor revealed his legislative priorities on January 4th, the legislative priorities for each caucus were presented this week. Each of those rundowns can be found here: 

• Governor 2023 Next Level Agenda
• House Republican Priorities
• House Democrat Priorities
• Senate Republican Priorities
• Senate Democrat Priorities

The Governor also gave his State of the State address this week to the Legislature. You can read a copy of his speech or watch the video here.

The few committee meetings that occurred this week were related mostly to the biennial budget. Since this is a budget year, the legislative session will be lengthier, concluding by April 29th as opposed to last year’s March 14th statutory end date. 

By the end of Week One, CAC was tracking about 50 bills. One bill of note is House Bill 1007, Electric Utility Service, authored by Rep. Ed Soliday (R, Valparaiso), who Chairs the House Utilities, Energy and Telecommunications Committee, and committee members Rep. Chris Jeter (R, Fishers) and Rep. Sharon Negele (R, Attica).  The bill is designed to reflect the recommendations from the final report of the 21st Century Energy Policy Development Task Force and is a priority bill from the House Republican caucus. The bill was the subject of a recent editorial from the Ft. Wayne Journal-Gazette,  Indiana House's energy plan proposal stuck in 20th century. CAC will be following HB1007 closely.

As of the writing or this report, legislation is still populating on the General Assembly website. Be sure to frequently check the CAC 2023 Indiana General Assembly page of our website for the bills we’re tracking, Statehouse Reports, and action items.

Once again, our staff in the Statehouse will be our Executive Director Kerwin Olson and our Organizer, Lindsay Haake. Also appearing from time to time will be our Organizer, Bryce Gustafson. 

Coming up this week

• The Statehouse takes Monday off to observe the birthday of Martin Luther King, Jr. and returns to work Tuesday. Committees are in full swing next week - including a meeting (agenda here) of the House Utilities Committee which will discuss House Bill 1173, which deals with utility scale battery storage. 

• Also meeting next week is Senate Utilities Committee (agenda here), hearing Senate Bill 33, which deals with solar panel decommissioning, and Senate Bill 221, which requires an energy audit of the Indiana Capitol Complex, and asks the legislature to study the feasibility of creating an Indiana strategic coal reserve.

We’ll be updating on the regular throughout Week 2 of the Legislature. Follow our social media for an up-to-date detailing of our work at the Indiana State Capitol on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram.

Respectfully submitted,

Kerwin Olson & Lindsay Haake