Senator Catherine Pugh

It is good to be back in the district although I seem to find myself in Annapolis quite often.  This session I was promoted to Deputy Majority Whip of the Senate and Chair of the sub-committee on Transportation.  These new duties came along with the appointments by Senate President Miller that I had already accept which are Senate Chair of the Joint Committee on Fair Practices, Vice Chair on the Special Subcommittee on Substance Abuse and member of the Join Audit Committee

This session was very busy.  While I co-sponsored over one-hundred bills, I personally sponsored 27 very important pieces of legislation which does not include our bond bills.

 I must tell you that I left Annapolis quite disappointed because it was a battle getting some of the legislation that I considered most important out of committee and on to the Senate and House Floor for a vote. For ten years, longer than I have served in Annapolis, there has been discussion around moving the compulsory attendance age in which children should be in school to 18.  That legislation has never left a Senate Committee until this year.  I was able to successfully argue SB 436 on the Senate Floor for the first time.  We received a 27-20 favorable vote.  The bill passed the Senate but never received a vote on the House Floor.  All legislation must clear both houses before they can be signed into law by the Governor.  Governor O’Malley sent two letters of support requesting that the Senate and House Committee pass the legislation.  SB 436 also received editorial support from the Washington Post and USA Today. We will go back next session to continue the fight.

 Another great disappointment to me was not passing SB 603 which would have allowed the Maryland Automobile Insurance Fund to accept installment payments from it 70,000 subscribers.  Legislation has been before both the House and the Senate for 20 years.  I guess I can take some solace in the fact that I was able to get the bill out of committee and on to the Senate Floor for the first time in 20 years.  We were also able to get support from both the Washington Post and The Sunpapers and that the legislature past SB 603.  The bill died at the Sine Die (the last day of Session).  This means we will have to come back and wage another fight to get this bill passed. 

 However, there were quite a few successes this session.  I want to begin by talking about our bond bills.  With the unity in the 40^th District we were able to pass five out of our six bond bills.  Our Delegates, Conaway, Robinson and Tarrant agreed and co-sponsored all six of our bond bills in the House and I sponsored all six of them in the Senate.  We met with all of our requestors of bond bills and committed to securing funding for their projects before our term ended in 2010.  We are well ahead of our promise. We will secure funding for our one bond bill that we did not get funded this year in the next session.  Our bond funding help to move forward some exciting projects in our community.  Hopefully you will take the time to go around and see the projects as they develop, near completion and are completed.

To view more of Pugh’s View from the Legislature Wrap Up Premier Issue please click HERE!

Welcome to the new home of Senator Catherine Pugh on the web! We are happy to have launched this new website to give you updates on projects I am working on, district news, issues and policies, etc.