Rep. Mike Smith

This Act requires all candidates for statewide office, the General Assembly, and all elected county offices, to request a criminal history background check, no later than the filing deadline, from the State Bureau of Identification. The State Bureau of Identification must, within 10 days of receipt of the request, provide the Commissioner of Elections with a report of the candidate’s criminal history or a statement that the Bureau’s Repository contains no information relating to the candidate. The Commissioner of Elections must then determine if the candidate is qualified under Section 21 of Article II of the Delaware Constitution to be considered a candidate and have their name appear on the ballot. The candidate will be considered a provisional candidate until the Commissioner of Elections determines the candidate is qualified. The information obtained by the Commissioner of Elections, from the Bureau, will not fall under the definition of public record in Chapter 100 of Title 29. The candidate must pay the cost of the criminal history background check, but the cost may be reimbursed from the candidate’s campaign funds as an authorized campaign expenditure. This Act will take effect January 1 after enactment.

This Act prohibits food establishments from providing consumers with ready-to-eat food or beverages in polystyrene foam containers or with single-service plastic coffee stirrers, cocktail picks, or sandwich picks. It also prohibits food establishments from providing single-service plastic straws, unless requested by a consumer. These restrictions take effect on July 1, 2025. This Act provides the following exemptions to the prohibitions on single-service plastic implements and polystyrene foam containers: 1. The definition of "polystyrene foam food service packaging" excludes coolers or ice chests used for the processing or shipping of seafood and containers used to contain, transport, or package raw, uncooked, or butchered meat, poultry, fish, seafood, eggs, fruits, or vegetables. 2. The prohibition on plastic straws does not apply to patients or residents of hospitals or long-term care facilities and for plastic straws that are attached to pre-packaged goods, such as juice boxes. 3. The restriction on providing ready-to-eat food in polystyrene foam food service packaging does not apply to any of the following: • Fire companies. • Health-care providers that provide long-term, acute, and outpatient health-care services. • Nonprofit organizations, including religious institutions. This Act also makes technical corrections to conform existing law to the standards of the Delaware Legislative Drafting Manual.

This Act amends Chapter 25, Title 24 of the Delaware Code relating to the Practice of Pharmacy. The amendments authorize pharmacists to engage in “collaborative pharmacy practice” with one or more “practitioners” meaning individuals who are authorized by law to prescribe drugs in the course of professional practice. Pharmacists may also do so pursuant to a “collaborative pharmacy practice agreement,” which means a written and signed agreement between one or more pharmacists and one or more practitioners that provides for a collaborative pharmacy practice.

According to a recent CDC survey, the COVID pandemic exacerbated an existing mental health crisis for students. One in 5 school aged children has a mental health condition, and 45% of children may have experienced a traumatic event. This bill provides for excused absences for the mental or behavior health of a student and requires that any student taking more than 2 such excused absences will be referred to a behavioral health specialist. This bill provides a supplemental tool to identify students struggling with mental and behavioral health issues and legitimizes these struggles faced by many students. Moreover, this bill makes clear that the mental and behavioral health of students is a priority in this State.

This Act is Nolan’s Law. The purpose of this legislation is to provide more behavioral health supports to school districts and charter schools in the aftermath of a school-connected traumatic event, which is defined as the death of any student, educator, administrator, or other building employee of a public school. The Department of Education is charged with developing guidance, best practices, and written resources for schools dealing with a school-connected traumatic event. The Department must consult with behavioral health specialists and school-based mental health professional organizations such as NAMI, Delaware, Delaware Association of School Psychologists, Delaware School Counselors Association, and the School Social Workers Association of Delaware. The Department must finalize these items by January 1, 2024. This legislation also requires the Department to cover the costs of grief counseling offered to students for up to thirty days after a school-connected traumatic event. In an effort to create a more standardized approach for the occurrence of a school-connected traumatic event, this bill charges each school district and charter school to establish a detailed crisis response policy that must meet a minimum number of required policies and procedures. Policies must be adopted by the school district or charter and distributed to the Department of Education by September 1, 2024.

This Act authorizes paramedics and other EMS providers to provide medical care to police dogs injured at the scene of an emergency. This Act also grants civil immunity to paramedics and other EMS providers who provide medical services to police dogs, so long as their efforts to assist the police dog were in good faith. However, this Act clarifies that in a situation where a human and a police dog need emergency medical care at the same time, the medical services personnel are prohibited from providing care to the police dog over the human, if the care of the police dog would hinder the human’s care.

Under the current salary scale for teachers, if a permitted paraprofessional in a school wishes to become a certified teacher in the same school, they may have to take a pay cut to do so. This Act provides teachers who previously worked as paraprofessionals in the schools to receive partial credit towards their experience on the teacher salary scale for their time working within the schools as paraprofessionals.

This Act authorizes the Department of Education to issue an initial or continuing license to a Junior Reserve Officer Training Core (JROTC) Instructor who has been certified by the United States Department of Defense (USDOD). This Act also removes outdated language.

This resolution designates August 31, 2023, as "International Overdose Awareness Day" in the State of Delaware, affirms the importance of overdose awareness, and encourages expanded efforts to keep Delaware residents properly informed of the grief that comes from losing a loved one to overdose.

To prevent Delawareans from facing exorbitant costs for potentially life-saving screenings and follow-up tests, and to allow providers to use clinical judgement in the use of breast cancer examination tools based on established national standards, this Act requires that all insurance policies issued or renewed in this State include coverage of supplemental and diagnostic breast examinations on terms that are at least as favorable as the coverage of annual screening mammograms. The Act covers all group, blanket, and individual health insurance policies (except specified accident, specified disease, hospital indemnity, Medicare supplement, long-term care or other limited benefit health insurance policies) as well as the State employee healthcare plan and Medicaid. This substitute bill differs from the original bill in that it makes technical corrections, excludes certain health, and adds to the definition of breast MRI.