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DST drama: It fails! It passes!
Daniels urges Republicans to change 'no' votes; 3 do
April 12, 2005
After a flurry of phone calls and one-on-one meetings between the governor and wavering lawmakers, the Indiana House erased an earlier vote and, for the first time in 22 years, passed a bill moving Indiana toward daylight-saving time. The House voted 51-47 for the time change Monday, but only after House Speaker Brian Bosma, R-Indianapolis, held the vote open for at least 10 tense minutes to secure the final votes needed. The battle over the divisive time switch, though, is far from over, as even some of those lawmakers who voted for the bill said they don't know if they'll approve of it when the final vote is taken later this month. Gov. Mitch Daniels acknowledged that, even as he thanked the House for a vote he called "very courageous." "It's just one step in a process that, as we've seen, has lots of potholes in its path," he said. "But it's an important step forward." Crucial, in fact. If the House had not passed the bill, it would have been dead for this session. The vote was bipartisan, with 12 Democrats joining 39 Republicans voting yes. Now, Daniels and other supporters must win the backing of at least 26 senators for the time switch and persuade the 51 House members to vote yes again when the issue returns to the House for final passage. Given how tough Monday's vote was, that won't be easy, said one ardent opponent, Rep. F. Dale Grubb, D-Covington. "It shows you how contentious and divided the state is," Grubb said. "We'll see what the Senate does now." When the bill was initially voted on Monday afternoon, it received only 49 yes votes -- two short of the 51 it needed to pass, but also short of the votes needed to defeat the bill. For the next two hours, Daniels and other supporters tried to win over the last votes they needed. Daniels called lawmakers and had some come to his office. No deals were cut, and no promises made, he and the lawmakers said later. At the same time, House Minority Leader B. Patrick Bauer, D-South Bend, and other opponents were trying to keep the "no" votes in line. Only someone who had voted no could ask for a second vote. Rep. Eric Gutwein, R-Rensselaer did so at about 6 p.m. But when the red and green lights lit up the roll-call board in the House, there were only 50 green lights. While Gutwein and Richard McClain, R-Logansport, had switched their votes to vote for the time change, one supporter -- Rep. Scott Reske, D-Pendleton -- hadn't voted. In fact, he wasn't in the House at all. He was, he said later, on a phone call and didn't know the vote was being taken. For 15 chaotic minutes in the House, supporters scrambled to find Reske, and opponents called for the voting to be concluded. Bosma, though, wasn't about to let the bill fail a second time, one vote short of passage. "He's not in the men's room," Rep. David B. Yount, R-Columbus, told Bosma as the search for Reske continued. "Did you check the ladies' room?" Bosma said with a wry smile. Moments later, though, one red light switched to green. Daylight-saving time had its 51st House vote, without Reske. Rep. Donald Lehe, R-Brookston, switched. Supporters burst into applause. Rep. Gerald Torr, the Carmel Republican who had led the legislative fight for the time switch, was ecstatic. He called his wife --then the governor's office. Everyone there knew anyway. They, like people elsewhere in the Statehouse and around the state, had been listening to the webcast debate. Swarmed by reporters after the vote, Lehe said that while he had been "adamantly opposed for so long, I felt it was important to at least give the governor the opportunity to pass another of his important issues. I just decided I would at least give it a chance to go the next step. There's no guarantees what will happen after the next step." That next step is for the bill to move to the Indiana Senate. No daylight-saving time bill has made it to the Senate since 1983. That year, it got thumped, 46-4. In 1995, however, the House voted for daylight-saving time by mistake. Lawmakers thought they were voting on a nonbinding resolution and, when they realized what they had done, voted to kill the bill. Lt. Gov. Becky Skillman, a former state senator, said senators might not have wanted to think about the issue Monday, one of the most controversial and divisive in Indiana. "It never passed the House in 20 years," she said. "Now they'll have to do some soul searching." Senate President Pro Tempore Robert D. Garton, R-Columbus, said the Senate will not vote for something that's illegal -- and the bill contains a House amendment that would let some counties opt out of daylight-saving time. The federal Department of Transportation, which determines time zones, has advised the state that while the entire state can opt out of daylight-saving time, individual counties cannot make that choice for themselves. Garton said the Senate will dissent on the House version of the bill, which then will go to a joint House-Senate conference committee, where a final version will be negotiated. Garton said the Senate Rules Committee will hold a public hearing on the bill before a final vote is taken. Both chambers must vote on the issue again. Only if the time switch passes those votes will it move to Daniels to be signed into law. Garton said he will vote for the time switch if the bill's wording is legal. But he said he didn't know if the bill would pass the full Senate "Prior to the last couple of days I thought it would," he said. But the questionable amendment in the House, coupled with Monday's dramatics, may have swung momentum against the bill, he said. "It's been such a confusing situation. It may have generated more heat than light," Garton said. Currently, 77 Indiana counties are on Eastern Standard Time year-round, meaning they don't change their clocks. Ten counties in northwestern and southwestern Indiana are in the Central time zone and observe daylight-saving time. Five counties in southeastern Indiana are in the Eastern zone but do -- without state or federal permission -- observe daylight-saving time. The question of which time zone Indiana is in may prove key to whether Indiana adopts daylight-saving time this year. The bill calls for the legislature to urge the governor to ask the federal Transportation Department to hold hearings on which time zone Indiana should be in. McClain said if the final version does not contain a statement that Indiana prefers the Central time zone, he would be hard-pressed to vote for the measure again. During his campaign for governor, Daniels told voters that he preferred the Central time zone. The bill, though, states no preference, and Daniels has said that Indiana should first adopt daylight-saving time before considering the equally divisive issue of which time zone. But, Daniels said Monday, "I hear the legislature loud and clear and have said myself that it's something we ought to examine, whether more Indiana counties, particularly those furthest west, might be better in the Central time zone. But that's a long way off." During the intense debate on the bill Monday afternoon, every seat in the House gallery was filled with lobbyists and others. More stood along the wall. Others crammed in front of the glass windows at the back of the House, waiting to see if this would be the year the House finally would approve the bill. At least one lawmaker, Rep. Woody Burton, R-Greenwood, said that's why he voted yes -- just to get the bill out of the House and, maybe, settle the issue. Personally, Burton said, "I don't care" what time it is in Indiana. "I don't want to mess with this again next year," he said. Call Star reporter Mary Beth Schneider at (317) 444-2772.
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