 LEGISLATIVE BULLETIN - March 28, 2003 SB 2358,
railroad lease and indemnification, was extensively amended in the House
Transportation Committee and given a 10-3 Do Pass recommendation today.
No other bill has absorbed so much Grain Dealers’ time this
session. Getting some
concessions out of the railroads on lease provisions, including
insurance and indemnification requirements, is a struggle. As it now stands, the bill also gives PSC more authority in
regard to arbitrating lease cost and site sale cost disputes.
Railroads don’t like that either.
The objective here is to win some shipper-friendly changes, while
trying to avoid lease cancellations because the railroads don’t like
those. Narrowing the scope
of the bill to licensed grain elevators only helps greatly in that
regard. This is not a
perfect bill, nor everything we wanted in the bill, but it is a step in
the right direction in some aspects of using railroad property.
PLEASE CONTACT YOUR REPRESENTATIVES AND OTHERS YOU KNOW ASAP TO
VOTE FOR THIS BILL. SB 2008,
PSC budget - The Government Operations Division of House Appropriations
has cut the $250,000 for investigation into a rail rate complaint to
$200,000. It has been
suggested that interested groups like Grain Dealers, Wheat Commission,
and farm organizations pony-up the rest.
This must go through the full House Appropriations Committee, the
House and then face concurrence or non-concurrence with the Senate.
The Senate had approved the entire $250,000 and put an emergency
clause on the matter. PLEASE
CONTACT HOUSE APPROPRIATIONS COMMITTEE MEMBERS IN SUPPORT OF THIS BILL. HB 1372,
blocking crossings, seems to be fixed.
In its newly revised form the bill will provide an exemption from
the ten-minute crossing-blocking rule where there is a written agreement
between a railroad and all involved government and commercial entities. It is presumed that this agreement could specify the
crossings to be blocked, when, and what kind of notice would be required
to emergency services. This
keeps the decisions on the LOCAL level, which is what we’ve been
encouraging. Cities were
given this option before; townships were not.
There remains a question on whether the RR needs to be in the
agreement. A
conference committee might address that. HB 1486,
wheat checkoff, passed the Senate 31-15 with the amendments described in
the March 15 Legislative Bulletin.
The checkoff amount remains the same at a penny per bushel.
It remains to be seen if the House will concur, or if it will try
to put back into the bill an increase and/or a diversion of funds to
grower groups. Senate Ag
has expressed its predisposition to not go along with that. HB 1087
was amended by the Senate to restore the Wheat Commission, Farm Bureau
and Farmers Union to the Advisory Council of the Upper Great Plains
Transportation Institute. HB 1197,
credit sale contract indemnity fund, passed the Senate 46-0. It is headed for a conference committee for the addition of a
few necessary amendments. It
is expected to pass easily. There
was only one negative vote on its first trip through the House. HB 1222
was meant to protect owners of anhydrous from civil liability if someone
stealing it was injured in the process.
It will likely die in the Senate.
HB 1352 offers the same protection, but also includes a pilot
project on security measures for anhydrous.
This one has passed both chambers. HB 1291
and HB 1403 both deal with sales of abandoned railroad
right of way. 1403 will die
and 1291 will come out of committee Do Pass.
It will say that current lessees must be given first chance to
buy, public uses second, adjoining landowners third.
Public use might be a bike, snowmobile or hiking trail.
The price must be “equitable”, whatever that is.
Senator Nething, a lawyer, jokingly said in committee that such
terminology means lawyers can be kept busy determining what that word
means. The language “price…cannot
exceed comparable values of adjacent and similar property” language in
the old 1403 is probably less subject to dispute. SB 2124 on
noxious weed tolerances has already been signed by the Governor. SB 2407
regarding weight of fertilizer spreaders and chemical applicators has
now passed both chambers by wide margins.
Minor cleanup language changes were made in the House and the
Senate is likely to concur. Grain
Dealers and Ag Association had been active in getting this one properly
amended early-on in the session. The legislative session
is entering a new phase. Hearings
are nearly all completed. Many
conference committees are meeting to reconcile differences between House
and Senate versions of bills. The
big money items will likely wait until near the end to see how all the
pieces of the financial puzzle fit together. Survey on
genetically engineered wheat.
The Institute for Agriculture and Trade Policy sent out a survey
to most North Dakota elevators in February regarding concerns about
genetically engineered wheat.
They are still accepting responses.
If you have misplaced your survey, but still want to respond,
call Dennis Olson at the Institute in Minneapolis, 612-870-3412. In light of
circumstances at home and abroad we will close with the following: God bless
our native land,
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