2026 Indiana General Assembly 

We are now a mere two weeks away from the scheduled adjournment of the second session of the 2026 Indiana General Assembly. Not much is standing in the way of legislators and the start of campaign season. In fact, some would say campaign season started with the announcement of the mid-cycle redistricting bill back in December. But now that the filing deadline for legislative seats has come and gone, legislators want to get back home and start asking for voters’ support.

One of the top priorities for all legislators is the sharp rise in utility bills. Of course, CAC has made this our priority since our inception more than 50 years ago. The affordability crisis is so damaging to Hoosier families that  a priority bill from the House Republican caucus, House Bill 1002 authored by Rep. Alaina Shonkwiler (R, Noblesville) is moving full steam ahead despite being opposed by the Indiana Energy Association, which represents the electric and gas investor-owned utilities, and the Indiana Electric Cooperatives, who represent the rural cooperatives, or REMCs. The bill was heard in the Senate Appropriations Committee this week and was voted out of committee unanimously. 

As you may recall, HB1002 was amended two weeks ago by the Senate Utilities committee to remove the requirement that all ratepayers are automatically enrolled in levelized billing, better known as budget billing. The amendment changed the mandate for enrollment in levelized billing to only apply to households that are enrolled in the Low-Income Home Energy Assistance Program (LIHEAP). However, those households will still be allowed to opt-out of levelized billing.  We expressed our opposition to treating low-income households differently from everyone else. Therefore, we recommended that eligible households be notified of the automatic enrollment when they are signing up for the program and offered the opportunity to opt out at that time, should they choose to do so. 

HB1002 includes significant priority issues of CAC, which were also components of our Ratepayer Relief Plan, released with our partners at Indiana Conservation Voters. As previously discussed, these include assistance programs for low-income electric ratepayers, mandatory reporting of customer payment data to the Office of the Utility Consumer Counselor (OUCC), and a disconnection moratorium during the hottest times of the year. Don’t forget to take action on HB1002 today.

The House unanimously passed Senate Bill 240, which would allow for surplus interconnection service (SIS) to be included in utility Integrated Resource Plans as of 2029. CAC supports the bill as it may lead to lower costs for consumers and the more efficient interconnection of new clean energy resources. It heads back to the Senate for further action.

House Bill 1116, which we supported alongside the AARP, aims to prevent seniors from falling victim to cryptocurrency scams. The bill was strengthened in the Senate Committee this week and proceeds to the full Senate for approval.

Senate Bill 258, which removes the IDEM Commissioner’s authority to call a public hearing on the risks to public health and safety posed by nuclear reactors, has passed both the House and Senate and heads to the Governor for his signature or veto, or it will become law without his signature a week later. Action is critical on this issue. You can visit the Governor’s Bill Watch page, which is now live, to keep up with the bills that have landed on his desk.

Indiana’s environmental deregulation bill, SB277, was heard this week in the House Environmental Affairs Committee, and if possible, became worse with an amendment adding harmful PFAS language from SB237, a dead bill, which would reclassify PFAS chemicals, which could allow polluters to escape penalties for emitting “forever chemicals” into our air and water. During the committee hearing, we cautioned against this and amplified the points raised by our colleagues from the Hoosier Environmental Council, Conservation Law Center, and Indiana Conservation Voters.

Furthermore, and perhaps most concerning, SB277 politicizes IDEM and leaves legislators with few meaningful opportunities for oversight - essentially ceding the legislature’s duty to set statutes that provide quantifiable results for Hoosiers - in this case, clean air to breathe and clean water to drink. These decisions should not be left to political machines but to the statute, which should be clear and unambiguous. The bill passed committee 6-5 and heads to the House floor for further action. Take action ASAP on this detrimental bill!

Coming up this week:

The House Committee on Energy, Utilities, and Telecommunications will meet again to discuss SB6. HB1002 is on Monday’s Second Reading Calendar in the Senate, meaning it could be amended by any member of the body.

To follow these bills in real time, make sure you follow our social media for an up-to-date detailing of our work at the Indiana Statehouse: Facebook, X and Instagram. We tweet and post throughout the week about the progress of bills we mention in our reports.

Respectfully Submitted,

The CAC Team