This Act creates the 17-person Behavioral Health Planning and Advisory Council to the Division of Substance Abuse and Mental Health and ensures the Council will satisfy the requirements of Title XIX of the Public Health Service Act (42 U.S.C. 300x-4(a)). The Act designates the Council as Delaware’s State Mental Health Planning Council under Title XIX of the Public Health Services Act (42 U.S.C. 300x). The Act also makes clear that the Council is a public body for the purposes of the Freedom of Information Act.
This Act amends the City of Seaford's Charter (“Charter”) as follows: 1. In Section 1, to make clear that the existing exceptions to the general requirement of advertising and competitive bidding requirements are meant to excluded from both the advertising and competitive bidding requirements established in the Charter. In addition, to create a new exception to the general requirement of advertising and competitive bidding for a purchase related to a Department of Public Works or Department of Electric project in the aggregate amount of not more than $50,000. Furthermore, to provide that an advertisement for bid is not required for a purchase related to a Department of Public Works or Department of Electric project in the aggregate amount of $50,000 to $99,999. For projects that do not require an advertisement for bid, the Director of the Department of Public Works or the Department of Electric, as applicable, shall solicit competitive, written proposals from a minimum of 3 contractors. Finally, purchases related to a Department of Public Works or Department of Electric project with an aggregate amount of $100,000 or greater continue to generally require competitive bidding and advertisement of bid. 2. In Section 2, to increase the City’s borrowing limit from $2 million to $3 million and make clear that a Councilman is not personally liable for a note issued under Section 37 of the Charter. 3. Throughout the Act, to make technical corrections to conform existing law to the standards of the Delaware Legislative Drafting Manual, including as it relates to the drafting of lists, numbers, and amounts of money. This Act requires a greater than majority vote for passage because § 1 of Article IX of the Delaware Constitution requires the affirmative vote of two-thirds of the members elected to each house of the General Assembly to amend a municipal charter.
Presently, a legal process does not exist for a Delaware hospital to seek the appointment of a guardian for a non-acute patient who has been a patient at the hospital for an extended period, after having been abandoned by family. This bill authorizes a hospital to petition for a court-appointed guardian for such a patient after providing two notices to the patient, the patient's surrogate, or the patient's family if there is no surrogate, of the need to seek a guardian for the patient.
This bill deletes an unnecessary restriction relating to amending the Sussex County budget. No similar provision is applicable to the Kent or New Castle County budget process.
This Act authorizes the Division of Motor Vehicles to issue migratory shorebird special registration plates.
This Act amends the Charter of Dewey Beach to give the Town Commissioners the authority to impose and collect a lodging tax. The new lodging tax is distinct from the existing accommodations tax. A rental property may be subject to either the accommodations tax or the lodging tax, but not both. In addition, the lodging tax may not be imposed before April 1, 2021, the initial rate may not exceed 1.5%, and the rate may not be increased by no more than .5% annually until the maximum rate, 3%, is reached. This Act also makes technical corrections to conform existing law to the standards of the Delaware Legislative Drafting Manual. This Act requires a greater than majority vote for passage because § 1 of Article IX of the Delaware Constitution requires the affirmative vote of two-thirds of the members elected to each house of the General Assembly to amend a charter issued to a municipal corporation.
This Act requires statutorily designated health providers to provide medical certifications of death, for death certificates, electronically and for the death certificates to be electronically filed with the Delaware Vital Events Registration System (DelVers). This Act sunsets on March 30, 2021.
This Act supports veterinarians in their effort to protect people from rabies and to ensure the welfare of animals. This Act enables licensed veterinarians to exempt an animal from the mandated rabies vaccination, if the veterinarian determines, based on their professional judgement, that the vaccine would endanger the animal's health and a titer test may be administered to assist in determining the necessity of the vaccine.
The purpose of the Bill is to allow for the modifications to the Disability Insurance Program for state employees that were included in the Governor’s Twelfth Modification to the COVID-19 State of Emergency to continue until December 30, 2020 in the event that the State of Emergency ends prior to that date.
This Act ensures that the price protections for Delawareans related to price gouging put in place during the COVID-19 state of emergency do not cease immediately upon the lifting of the COVID-19 state of emergency, but instead continue for a short period of time during the COVID-19 recovery period. The COVID-19 recovery period runs until the sixty-first day following the termination of the COVID-19 state of emergency. This Act is intended to set the ceiling for what constitutes price gouging during the COVID-19 recovery period. This Act is written to give the Governor flexibility to carry out the legislative will of protecting Delawareans while not regulating price more than necessary given the market needs and conditions. If additional executive orders are issued to further ratchet down or slowly ease the transition back to normal operations, those are the protections that will be in effect during the COVID-19 recovery period. Sections 1 and 2 of this Act sunset on the sixty-first day following the termination of the COVID-19 state of emergency. Section 3 will not sunset to ensure that a violation of this Act occurring while the protections of this Act are in effect can be pursued after the expiration of this Act, the termination of the COVID-19 state of emergency, the termination of the COVID-19 recovery period, or the suspension of the protection of this Act by the Governor.
Due to the public health emergency caused by COVID-19, several legislative task forces and committees have not been able to fulfill the reporting requirements of the task force’s or committee’s enabling legislation and need additional time to complete the necessary work to prepare a report. This Act extends the following legislative task forces and committees: (1) The Pharmacy Reimbursement Task Force. (2) The Local Service Functions Task Force. (3) The Division of Developmental Disabilities Services Task Force. (4) The Department of Health and Social Services Reorganization Committee. (5) The Non-Acute Patient Medical Guardianship Task Force. (6) The task force created to study volunteer firefighter recruitment and retention. (7) The Gun Violence Prevention Task Force.
Since 2009, when video-conferencing was first permitted under the Freedom of Information Act (“FOIA”) by Senate Bill No. 104 (145th General Assembly), technology has continued to evolve and the need to provide more mechanisms for participation by members of public bodies and the public has grown. In addition, under the Governor's March 12, 2020, Declaration of a State of Emergency for the State of Delaware Due to a Public Health Threat “State of Emergency” and House Concurrent Resolution No. 85 (“HCR 85”), public bodies in Delaware have been successfully holding virtual meetings. This Act amends FOIA to allow a public body to hold a meeting electronically if specific notice and public access requirements are met. The notice and access requirements follow the guidelines established under HCR 85. This Act gives “advisory bodies” the broadest ability to hold virtual meetings because the vast majority of citizen boards, commissions, task forces, and councils currently in place in Delaware are comprised of volunteer citizens, who serve without pay, and who are charged with providing advice to administrative agencies, the legislature, and others in government. Advisory bodies meet to review data and discuss the programs or operations of particular governmental bodies, to provide advice and recommendations to governmental bodies and members of the public on particular issues, to confer and issue opinions regarding legislation on particular public policy issues, and to provide support and direction for particular public policy goals. There are other boards, commissions, and councils that meet to decide whether to grant or deny certain rights, remedies, or privileges to specific individuals or legal entities, such as a permit, a license, an appeal, or other decision by the board that has legal significance in a subsequent hearing. Boards that have the authority to decide rights, remedies, or privileges in specific situations are not considered advisory bodies under this Act. Frequently, advisory bodies have a difficult time conducting business because business can only be conducted when a quorum of the advisory body is present at the physical meeting location. As a result, some advisory bodies go months without being able to make quorum, members become discouraged, the advisory body stops holding regular meetings, and eventually becomes ineffectual. Delaware agencies and citizens have made great strides in utilizing the technology to conduct virtual meetings since the State of Emergency was ordered as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic. However, shortfalls with this technology have been experienced, including the knowledge that significant portions of our State are not yet served with the quality of internet service necessary to support virtual participation in which the participant can be both heard and seen. For this reason, this Act encourages virtual participation encompassing both the ability to hear and see all participants, but also allows technology that only provides the ability to hear all participants. Under this Act, if an advisory body holds a virtual meeting when there is no state of emergency or threat of a public health emergency, members of public must be able to monitor the meeting virtually or in-person at a physical location. If the advisory body is required to accept public comment or provides the opportunity for public comment, the public must be able to participate virtually or at the physical location. Specifically, this Act does all of the following: 1. Allows an advisory body to hold a virtual meeting at any time, if there is an anchor location that is open to the public and 1 or more members of the advisory body attend the meeting at the anchor location. 2. During a state of emergency, allows any public body to hold a virtual meeting. If all members of a public body are elected by the public to serve on the public body, there are requirements to ensure that members have contemporaneous access to documents and the public has the ability to monitor the proceeding and provide public comment, if public comment is otherwise allowed by statute. 3. Permits the Governor, by executive order, to allow all public bodies to hold virtual meetings if necessary to prevent a public health emergency. 4. Clarifies that if its members are not all elected by the public to serve on the public body, a public body must allow a member with a disability to attend a meeting electronically as a reasonable accommodation under § 4504 of Title. If all of the members of the public body are elected by the public, then a public body must allow a member with a disability to attend a meeting electronically unless doing so would present an undue burden. This Act does not revise § 10006 of Title 29, the existing video-conferencing section, because § 10006 permits more types of public bodies to conduct a meeting through video-conferencing than are permitted to conduct a virtual meeting under this Act in the absence of a state of emergency or executive order by the Governor. Senate Substitute No. 1 for Senate Bill No. 243 differs from Senate Bill No. 243 as follows: Section 1 sets forth the findings and intent of the General Assembly regarding the use of technology to improve access to public meetings for all Delawareans and in particular, individuals with disabilities. Section 1 also clarifies that it is the intent of the General Assembly to incorporate the well-established body of law that requires places of public accommodation to provide reasonable accommodations to individuals with disabilities if the accommodation can be provided without imposing an undue burden on the place of public accommodation. Section 2 makes technical corrections to conform existing law to the standards of the Delaware Legislative Drafting Manual. Section 4 revises the new virtual meeting section, as follows: 1. Reorganizes the new § 10006A for clarity. 2. Revises language to improve clarity and incorporate concerns from stakeholders. 3. Clarifies that a public body that is composed entirely of members elected by the public to the public body may allow a member with a disability to attend a public meeting through a means of electronic communication as a reasonable accommodation. 4. Allows any public body, at the discretion of the chair or presiding officer, to allow the public to monitor or provide public comment through the use of an electronic means of communication. 5. Requires that if a public body holds a virtual meeting, the public must be able to monitor the virtual meeting electronically, and, if applicable, provide public comment through the use of a means of electronic communication. Section 5 sunsets § 10006A, the new virtual meeting provisions, in its entirety, on June 30, 2021. This sunset provision anticipates continued work by agencies and public stakeholders to learn from experience using technology to hold virtual public meetings and to revise this section during the next legislative session to reflect lessons learned through experience. Finally, Senate Substitute No. 1 for Senate Bill No. 243 states that passage of this Act requires a greater than majority vote for passage because § 1 of Article IX of the Delaware Constitution requires the affirmative vote of two-thirds of the members elected to each house of the General Assembly to amend a charter issued to a municipal corporation.
