Improve the Odds of Legislative Success

If you’re working to pass affirmative legislation, what steps can you take to improve the chances of getting a bill to the governor’s desk?

Here are a few strategies:

Start Early

Passing a bill is like remodeling a house: it always takes longer than expected, and you’re bound to encounter unexpected delays.

While it’s not necessary to file a bill during pre-filing, you also want to avoid waiting until the bill filing deadline. In the Texas Legislature, where lawmakers are limited to acting on emergency items for the first 60 days, navigating the process can be especially challenging.

Many committees typically don’t begin hearing bills in earnest until early March. For practical purposes, a bill needs to clear its committee in the house of origin by the first week of May to have a realistic chance of passing. This leaves only about eight or nine weeks to secure a bill’s initial hearing.

Bills that receive an initial committee hearing earlier in the session appear to have a better chance of passing. For example, during the 2023 session, the House State Affairs Committee held 12 public hearings to take testimony on bills (with the last few hearings focused solely on Senate bills that had crossed over to the House). At the committee’s March 15 meeting, there were eight House bills on the agenda, and four of them eventually became law—a significantly better outcome than the average passage rate of about 15% that session. However, at the committee's April 26 hearing, only one of the 11 House bills on the agenda was enacted.

As the session progresses, committee hearing agendas also tend to get longer, and even bills that make it out of committee can get stuck in the queue—waiting to be set on a House calendar or brought to the Senate floor for consideration.

Of course, once you get through the first body, navigating the other one can alsoface roadblocks. Toward the end of session, even a few days to get a bill referred to committee can take up precious time.

Get Stakeholder Support

Building strong stakeholder support is essential for passing a bill. A broad coalition adds credibility, showing lawmakers that the bill has widespread backing. Stakeholders also bring expertise, helping to refine the bill and address potential concerns. With more advocates, you can mobilize resources, generate public pressure, and increase the chances of swaying undecided legislators.

(Stay tuned for future posts discussing strategies for building a broad coalition and the challenges of managing coalitions.)

Have Legislative Champions

It’s one thing to get a legislator to file a bill. It’s another to have someone who will make it a priority and can articulate the issue on your behalf.

Every office is different, but a fair guess would be that a Texas House member may file 40 or 50 bills while a state Senator may file more than 100 pieces of legislation. At the end of the day, there are limits to how many bills an office can work through the process, and you want a bill author who will make your issue a priority. Also, when a legislator carries a bill, you’re relying on them to be able to explain and defend the bill in committee and on the floor.

How do you find a champion for your bill? Elected officials are responsive to their voters and will often file bills of local interest in response to constituent requests. When the bill deals with a specialized topic, it helps to approach offices that have demonstrated interest in the issue or who serve on a committee with jurisdiction over the subject.

Do the Legwork

Even with a great bill author, that legislator has a lot of competing priorities and relies heavily on their staff to accomplish the work of moving bills through the process. Legislative staff are smart, dedicated, and incredibly hardworking, but there’s only so much they can accomplish during a session. Making their jobs easier can help tremendously.

Preparing background information, crafting bill analysis, lining up potential witnesses, contacting committee members, building a base of support with stakeholders and other legislative offices, and maintaining open lines of communication with legislative staff can make a big difference in improving the likelihood of success.

Anticipate Challenges

In the mid 1980s, I worked for State Senator Richard Anderson from Northeast Texas, who gave me a simple but invaluable piece of advice: anticipate.

Think about all the factors that could affect your legislation - timelines, parliamentary challenges, questions, and other roadblocks - ahead of time, and prepare contingency plans. Also, don’t forget non-substantive issues that could affect your bill, such as politics or personality conflicts.

Be prepared for various scenarios and have backup plans, such as identifying other bills that could be amended to achieve your objectives

Summary

In closing, a common saying in the legislative world is that it’s easier to kill a bill than to pass one. But doing your homework, planning ahead, having strong partnerships and being ready to hit the ground running can dramatically improve your chances of success.

What steps do you think help move bills through the process? Let's continue the coversation. Send me an email at david@mintzconsulting.com