30-28.18 - Requests for drafting bills or resolutions; bills to conform to request; public access.
§ 30-28.18. Requests for drafting bills or resolutions; bills to conform torequest; public access.
A. All requests for the drafting of bills or resolutions by the Divisionshall be submitted in person, in writing, or by voice transmission. Eachrequest shall contain a general statement respecting the policies andpurposes that the requester desires incorporated in and accomplished by thebill. All written requests shall be signed by the person submitting them.Neither the Director nor any employee of the Division shall reveal to anyperson outside of the Division, except to the Division of LegislativeAutomated Systems in fulfilling its duties as provided in § 30-34.14, thecontents or nature of any request or statements except with the consent ofthe person signing such request. Exceptions to this general rule are asfollows:
1. When the Director or an employee receives a request that is substantiallythe same as one previously received, he may, unless specifically directed notto do so by the person first submitting such request, so inform the personsubmitting the similar request;
2. Unless specifically directed otherwise, the Director or employee mayreveal the nature of a request when seeking information from anyone to assistin drafting the bill; and
3. Copies of all floor substitute bills, conference committee reports, andsubstitute bills accompanying a conference committee report shall be placedin a secure electronic file immediately following the final drafting of thelegislation and may be accessed by either the Clerk of the House of Delegatesor the Clerk of the Senate or their employee designees after such legislationis offered for introduction in either house.
Bills drafted by the Division shall conform to the statements submitted withthe request or any supplementary instructions submitted by the person whooriginally made the request.
B. All legislative drafting requests and accompanying documents shall bemaintained by the Division as permanent records. Each of these separate filesshall be considered the property of the requester and no one other thanmembers of the Division staff shall have access to any such file without thespecific approval of the requester. However, on the effective date oflegislation drafted for the 1989 Session or thereafter, the file for a billthat was enacted, including any amendments in the nature of a substitute orconference reports that were offered for consideration shall become publicproperty.
C. All legislative drafting requests from the Governor, a Governor'sSecretary, the Lieutenant Governor, the Attorney General, or the head of anyjudicial, legislative, or independent agency shall be submitted to theDivision on or before the same deadline applicable to members of the GeneralAssembly for submitting legislative drafting requests for legislation to beprefiled to the Division, as established by the procedural resolution adoptedby the General Assembly, or in default thereof, as adopted by the Joint RulesCommittee. Requests from the Governor may also be submitted in accordancewith the procedures established by the Rules Committees of the House ofDelegates and the Senate for the conduct of business during a legislativesession.
(1966, c. 676; 1976, c. 112; 1988, c. 214; 1989, cc. 412, 512; 2001, cc. 568,584; 2002, c. 2; 2005, c. 839.)