Sierra Club members and staff at a rally in support of EmPower reform, March 13, 2024 (Photography by Lizzy Unger)
Our Chapter’s legislative work has been extremely active on our three priority bills – EmPOWER reform (HB 864), the Maryland Bottle Bill (HB 735/SB 642), and the Transportation Climate Alignment Act (HB 836/SB 681) – and several other important bills.
To date, our team has submitted testimony on over sixty unique bills, and twenty cross-files of these bills that are identical but filed in the opposite chamber.
The crossover date of March 18 is the target date for the House and Senate to pass bills that have been approved by their committees so that they can be acted upon by the other chamber without requiring special action. So, this is currently a peak period of activity as we work to get bills out of committee and passed by at least one chamber.
Here’s an overview of where things stand.
Clean Energy
Our priority bill on EmPOWER reform (HB 864), sponsored by Delegates Crosby and Qi, is moving forward. The bill will help reduce greenhouse gasses and consumers’ energy costs. We are working alongside a great coalition of over 40 consumer, environmental, community, housing, faith, and health groups and have been co-leading the grassroots coalition engagement on the bill. We kicked off the campaign in January, with an excellent virtual rally attended by almost 100 people and held an in-person rally in Annapolis in March. The bill had a productive hearing in the House Economic Matters Committee, with Chapter Director Josh Tulkin testifying alongside coalition partners. It passed the full House on March 14th, and the Senate will take it up next week. A similar bill passed the House last year, but time ran out for action in the Senate. We are optimistic that this year it will proceed to enactment.
We have also submitted written testimony on over 15 clean energy and building electrification bills – including bills supporting solar deployment in the state, creating an innovative networked geothermal pilot program (HB 397/SB 570: WARMTH Act – which has been passed by the House), and requiring all-electric new construction in Maryland (HB 1279/SB 1023: Better Buildings Act). For more information, please contact Mariah.Shriner@mdsierra.org.
Zero Waste
House and Senate hearings on the Maryland Beverage Container Recycling Refund and Litter Reduction Program (HB 735/SB 642 or, more simply, the Maryland Bottle Bill) were held in late February and early March, respectively. We are now working to get the bill through a committee and passed on the floor of one of the chambers by March 18th. The bill would add a small deposit to the price of beverages in covered containers that would be refunded when they are returned for recycling. Ten states have had similar programs for decades. It is the most effective way to prevent beverage container litter and the ensuing plastic pollution. It would divert empty beverage containers from landfills, incinerators, roadsides, and waterways, and increase beverage container recycling from about 23% to 90%. A coalition of about twenty environmental and civic organizations have been working together to get this bill passed. Baltimore City and County and numerous municipalities have joined the team. Learn more from the joyful Virtual Rally held in February and sign on to the Action Alert to ask your elected State representatives to pass the Bottle Bill this year!
Other zero waste bills have also been moving.
- The Paint Stewardship Program (HB 1/SB 325), in its fourth year, has passed both chambers and is likely to become law (it was literally minutes away from enactment last year when time ran out due to a controversy over an unrelated bill). Several other zero waste bills have passed the House and are awaiting action in the Senate:
- Chain of Custody for disposal of Synthetic Turf playing fields (HB 457)
- A bill that would ban plastic bags in collection of yard waste on State properties and highways (HB 173)
- A bill requiring water bottle refill stations in all future construction with water fountains (HB 871).
- The Plastic Post-Consumer Recycled Content bill (HB 168) has been heard in the relevant House committee and will be discussed further at the sub-committee level shortly with the Bottle Bill.
- Legislation on mattress and electronics stewardship (HB 1355 and HB 830/SB 686, respectively) and supporting grants for food scrap composting (HB 1318) were heard recently and are awaiting action.
For more information, please contact Martha.Ainsworth@mdsierra.org.
Transportation
We are excited about the progress on the Transportation and Climate Alignment Act (HB 836/SB 681) sponsored by Delegate Edelson and Senator Lam. We have been working with a coalition of over a dozen environment, transportation, labor, and community groups to push the bill forward and have been facilitating weekly calls to strategize on the bill. In January, we co-organized a webinar that over 140 people attended to highlight the bill and success stories in other states. In February, we helped organize a rally before the Senate hearing to raise awareness about the bill. We also worked with our coalition partners to solicit written testimony from over forty organizations and prepare for successful hearings in the Senate Finance and House Appropriations Committees. Check out our petition action on the bill here!
So far, we have testified on over 20 transportation bills that help advance public transit, bike infrastructure, and electric vehicles. We also submitted testimony and testified before the House Appropriations and Senate Budget & Taxation Committees to encourage them to fully fund public transit systems across the state (including WMATA, MTA, and Locally Operated Transit Systems) to avoid service cuts, fare increases, and wage freezes for transit workers. For more information, please contact Lindsey.Mendelson@mdsierra.org or JanePLyons@gmail.com.
Natural Places
The Natural Places Committee has been working on state legislation since the end of last year’s legislative session. The committee has written or signed onto testimony on the following issues:
- Increasing native highway pollinators along roadways instead of sterile turfgrass (HB22/SB178), which has been passed by both chambers
- Controlling harmful invasive plants by increasing the number of prohibited plants in Maryland (HB979/SB915), which has been passed by the Senate and is on track in the House
- Decreasing roadway collisions of vehicles and wildlife by building wildlife crossings and culverts (HB1129/SB902), which has been passed with amendments by the Senate Education, Energy, and Environment Committee
- Ensuring funding for natural places in Maryland through improved implementation of the Maryland the Beautiful Act (HB228/ SB259)
- Increasing protections for our stream valleys and promoting more effective water pollution reduction projects (HB1165/SB969 and HB1284)
- Improving the state’s outdoor lighting to reduce light pollution and make it less disruptive for people and wildlife (HB305/SB405)
- Providing the right for communities impacted by illegal water pollution to enforce the law in state court, addressing the Supreme Court Sackett vs. EPA decision (HB1101/SB653)
- Reducing the use of armored shorelines and creating a potential funding source for living shorelines (HB655/SB546)
- Preserving the remaining vernal pools in Maryland that harbor threatened and other wildlife (HB729).
For more information on these and related issues, please contact Lily.Fountain@mdsierra.org or Carolyn.Parsa@mdsierra.org.
Voting and Democracy
As a grassroots organization the Sierra Club also supports legislation that supports democracy by making voting and participation more accessible. Vacancies in the General Assembly often occur at the beginning of a 4-year term when a new governor staffs their administration. Current law allows an appointed legislator to serve the entirety of a 4-year term. Legislation we support will require a legislator appointed in the first year of a term (say, 2023) to stand for election in the general election that occurs in the second year of the term (for example, November 2024). The State Senate has passed SB 29, and we await action by the House of Delegates on the similar bill, HB 412. For more information, please contact Rich.Norling@mdsierra.org.
Lobby Night and You!
We appreciate all of our members and supporters who helped make Lobby Night 2024 a great success! Lobby night is one of our biggest events of the year where we meet with members of the General Assembly to advance our core priority bills. Over 200 Sierra Club members and supporters met with over 120 Delegates and Senators (or in some cases their staff), covering nearly every legislative district during Lobby Night this year. More than 60 people volunteered to be district captains to lead lobby night teams in each district.
We encourage you to all keep the momentum going by sending action alerts, letters and emails to your legislators – letting them know of the importance of these issues to you and your community – and by participating in our Chapter’s activities.